I Hugged A Complete Stranger!

Whenever we would leave for school in the morning, my dad would say to us, "Have a Day!"  It was never, "Have a Good Day," it was only, "Have a Day!"  Well, yesterday, I HAD a DAY! 

We awoke early to go to St. George for the highly anticipated (at least for Gary) tonsillectomies.  Gary was first, and he was a trooper!  As I met him in the recovery room, he opened his eyes to say, "Mom, are my tonsills out (opening his mouth a half of a centimeter)?"  "Yes Gary!"  "Mom, did they tell you that I was SUPER BRAVE!"  "Yes Gary, I love you!"  He didn't open his eyes for another hour. 

A half an hour later, the nurses inform me that Jared is out of surgery and doing well.  One nurse timidly asks, "Are you Kathryn?"  "Yes."  "Your husband has woken 10 times, and each time he asks, Is Gary okay?  Is Kathryn okay?"  The operations could not have gone better.  We are GRATEFUL for good doctors.

We finally get full of IV's and we are ready to head out the door.  I am the driver with Gary asleep in the back and Jared asleep in the front.  Two minutes before the Logandale/Overton exit, Gary wakes up and begins throwing-up, again and again.  But no blood, so we are safe.  We get home to find that everything and everyone has survived here.  Then Jared mistakenly turns on the kitchen sink.  It breaks.  The kitchen sink breaking was not all that traumatic, I have no problem doing dishes in the bathtub for a while.  It was the amount of money already spent that day, that made me sick at the thought of buying a new kitchen sink.  I go to pick up Gary and Jared's pain prescriptions at Lins, worrying that the medication they have is minutes away from wearing off.  Surprise Surprise, they are out of that type of medicine.  They must see the deep lines in my forehead and quickly offer to call the doctor and work something out.  45 minutes later we leave for home.  The wind is CRAZY.  Sam is with me and as he opens the front door, it SMASHES into the neighboring, BRAND NEW SHINY BROWN PICK-UP TRUCK.  At this point, I was on the BRINK.

I looked at the DENT that the collision had caused, and I am ashamed to say that many thoughts ran through my mind.  "Oh, it was his fault for parking too close to me......I am sure he has good insurance...I can't control the wind."  But a quieter voice was saying, "This is a defining point for you.  You can be honest in easy situations, but can you be honest when it was HARD, financially and emotionally?"

I knew what I had to do.  As they came out of the grocery store, I said a little prayer and headed over with my insurance card.  "I, I, I put a dent in your truck!"  As I showed the man the dent, I began to rub it and found that the silver paint from our car came off, but the dent was still visible.  This gentleman looked at me and said, "If that is the worst thing that happens to this truck, we will be okay, it is not a problem."  This is the point where I hugged a complete stranger.  If you know me at all, you know that I am not a hugger, let alone a hugger of strangers.  

The rest of the day was relatively quiet.  I had "backed away from the brink," and could breathe again.  I prayed last night that this stranger would be blessed for the HUGE blessing he was to me.  Yes, it was quite a DAY!

Tonsillectomy Breath!

I heard once that the sense of smell brings back more memories than any other sense.  Dont' Google it, I don't want to know if it is true, it is true to me. 
Anytime I smell gasoline fumes, I envision myself sitting on a red sled behind a snowmobile.  All the while yelling, "Don't Jerk!  Don't Jerk!" (As in don't jerk the rope)  and Erin pretending she can't hear me, throwing me from the sled just seconds after the ride begins.  During those winter months, we inhaled TANKS of gasoline fumes.  We will all die of cancer, mark my word. 
Mosquito Spray -- 6 a.m., crisp chill in the air, 7 teenagers stumble from a big blue pick-up truck, and slather on the mosquito spray for another day of gopher killing!  Yes, for 13 years of my life, I was a professional gopher killer.  That in itself deserves 10 more posts. 
I tried to decide what smell would remind me the most of my dad.  A few came to mind...Popcorn, fresh fish (well, really only brook trout from Teton Creek).  Fresh cut grass.  The smell that comes right before the lightning strikes and the rain pours.  When most people closed their windows, we opened ours to "smell the rain."
My Aunt Karla's house has a specific smell.  My mom says that it is Juniper bushes, I think it is mostly Rice Krispie treats, really good Rice Krispie Treats!
I think that I have finally found the smell that I want to remind me of Overton, NV.  There are a few I don't want to remember - Friday Mornings in the Summer, Garbage day in our neighborhood..."Cooked" garbage is a smell I never care to remember.  And when it rains in the desert when it is 120 degrees outside, it smells a bit like a Senior Boys gym locker. However, each spring, all 10 days of it, the lemon trees start to bloom here!  When you smell them, you can almost taste sugar.
There are a couple of smells that will always remind me of the year 2011 - tonsillectomy breath and Amoxicillian.  Tomorrow Jared will have a tonsillectomy and Gary will also have a tonsillectomy and tubes put in his ears.  That will be 5 surgeries to date for this year (remember it is April) 3 tonsillectomies and 2 tubes.  Oh the Joy!  Oh the Smell!  Have you ever smelled Tonsillectomy breath - WOW!  I'm just saying......