Yes Mom, they come in other colors

I received an odd phone call from my mother last night. Apparently she's been waiting all summer for her orangish-yellow tomatoes to turn red. She's even got some that she picked wrapped up in newspaper to try and facilitate the process. But yesterday she dropped own and juice ran everywhere. This prompted the phone call as to whether there are in fact tomatoes of other hues. I was flabbergasted to say the least. How could my own mother be unaware of the wonderful world of love apples! She protested my fits of laughter with the fact that she lives in California and all of the tomatoes there are of course red! I suppose if you live under a rock. And I know she has the food network. I did the only thing I could think of. I told her to Google "tomato varieties" and click on the images link. Then I said she ought to probe the produce section a little deeper on her next shopping trip. I'm sure not everyone finds this as funny as I did, but that's okay. I guess you had to be there. ;)

Whew.

Mike's dad is out of surgery now and home. Yay! Only a few inches of colon short! Not bad for a cancer free diagnoses. It has been rather tense around here while playing the waiting game. The collective sigh of relief could probably be heard all the way on the other coast. In this small victory for my ever- shrinking circle, a glimmer of hope. Yes, my son took the term "terrible twos", as a jumping off point for pushing limits. Yes, it is now in concrete that Mike is a horrible communicator on a regular basis, let alone when he is scared. Yes, I am still "forgetting" to make another appointment to find out about my own medical shortcomings. Mom's still at her wits end, dad's still pushing her buttons, and my brother is still dying. But Joe came out okay. And that is something to be celebrated. Those doctors were all but sure he was cancer ridden. Turns out it was just an insanely dense pocket of pre-cancerous polyps. Good thing we didn't let him put off that pesky colonoscopy this time around. Next year might have been a different story, but it wasn't. And because it wasn't, it gives me a faint hope. Not that all of the things that are bad in life are going to get better; but that some of them might. And if some of these life hiccups do get better, than I'll be more than capable of trudging through the rest.

Phoenixisms

A couple of things I thought were funny that the boy said.


"I have lemonade in my shmonke" - He had water in his ear.
"Look I have a facebook" - Walking around with a book on his head after hearing me talking on the phone about not bothering with the site.

Phoenix is the big 3 today!

Happy, happy birthday son. We had to have your grandparents over on Sunday for presents and cupcakes because grandpa is in the hospital today. But that's okay because we know he is going to come out ok, right? Anyway it's just the three of us today. There will be finger paints, temporary tattoos, fruit leather, and probably lot's of toys and mess. We also have to make thank you cards for Nana and Papa, Grandma and Grandpa, Chris, Jenny and Cassady, and, Nicole and Louie for all the awesome stuff that they brought you. It was a series of small get-togethers instead of one big bash, but ultimately I think it worked out better that way. You got to spend individual time with everybody. Every day we love you more, and every day you astound us with how much you've learned just since the day before. You are my everything Phoenix, and I just hope that you never forget that.

And yes mom, I will post the skate boarding video sometime in the relative future.

At A Snail's Pace

Sometimes the world around me is going warp speed, but my brain is stuck on rewind. Right now is one of those times. Trying to sort my way through the fen in my head. There is light at the end of the tunnel. I just don't see in yet. I am in the middle of a struggle, I am not ready to talk about it. I am sorry.