Learning to G

Who knew gardening required knowledge and ability? I did not know. This year I planted my first garden, and it has problems! The first problem being me. The second being my lack of information, and the third being lack of money.

How am I the problem? I hurried.

How is my lack of information a problem? I forgot to consider how far apart certain things needed to be to grow in the same garden. I did not learn the best way to prepare the soil. I should have found out about the main problem weeds here before going nuts with the seeds. I ought to know that newly tilled grass needs to be limed, weeded with lawn and weed killer and not to let my mulching mower blow into the garden when it has things that are gone to seed like dandelions, creeping charlie, crab grass, grass.

How is money a problem? We could not afford the lime, or weed and lawn killer even if we had known what we know today.

You can see in the pics that our garden has been taken over, and even though some things are growing they will be choked out before they can produce. When it rains every day then the sun shines every day too it becomes impossible to keep all the weeds out of the garden. However, if I had made sure all the weeds were dead before I planted I could have kept up with it.

So take a look at our learning curve. See that I can mow our garden? This is not what it should look like.

I can say happily that my flowers are coming up strong and pretty. They may eventually be overcome by crabgrass and clover, but right now they are blooming.

Next year I will implement an intelligent informed plan that produces a good garden.

Conundrums Concerning Age 6

She already acts like a 15 year old. Aren't kids this age suppose to think that Mom knows everything? She disagrees with everything I say. How does this bode for the future when puberty and hormones and boys start factoring into the conversations we have? I seriously need some insight.

Time

Apparently, I just do not give time to blog. I want to give time to blog. I love to write, and of course I love to hear myself think. It is a good way for me to do checks and balances on myself. So far, my daily choices have been different and life is improving, but I do not seem to make the time to blog about them. My younger brother, Will started a blog called Random Rantings, and I think he was inspired. It was nice to get my mind caught up in a value even though I may have a blind side to the topic, I liked that it made me start to think about it from every direction to be fair, merciful, prayerful, and feel for someone other than myself. It also helped me know where I I stand on that idea today. Maybe next time I talk about it I will have developed a more intelligent stand point. Hopefully I become wise in this life rather than a fool.

Daily Changes

It is true that we experience personal changes every day. I have decided that I need to make better choices and create improved changes rather than devolving changes. I am going to try to include in that Blogging about my changes, how and why I chose to make those. Maybe it will help someone else.

01 Washington, George (1789-1797)
02 Adams, John (1797-1801)
03 Jefferson, Thomas (1801-1809)
04 Madison, James (1809-1817)
05 Monroe, James (1817-1825)
06 Adams, John Quincy (1825-1829)
07 Jackson, Andrew (1829-1837)
08 Van Buren, Martin (1837-1841)
09 Harrison, William Henry (1841)
10 Tyler, John (1841-1845)
11 Polk, James Knox (1845-1849)
12 Taylor, Zachary (1849-1850)
13 Fillmore, Millard (1850-1853)
14 Pierce, Franklin (1853-1857)
15 Buchanan, James (1857-1861)
16 Lincoln, Abraham (1861-1865)
17 Johnson, Andrew (1865-1869)
18 Grant, Ulysses S. (1869-1877)
19 Hayes, Rutherford Birchard (1877-1881)
20 Garfield, James Abram (1881)
21 Arthur, Chester Alan (1881-1885)
22 Cleveland, Grover (1885-1889)
23 Harrison, Benjamin (1889-1893)
24 Cleveland, Grover (1893-1897)
25 McKinley, William (1897-1901)
26 Roosevelt, Theodore (1901-1909)
27 Taft, William Howard (1909-1913)
28 Wilson, Woodrow (1913-1921)
29 Harding, Warren Gamaliel (1921-1923)
30 Coolidge, Calvin (1923-1929)
31 Hoover, Herbert Clark (1929-1933)
32 Roosevelt, Franklin Delano (1933-1945)
33 Truman, Harry (1945-1953)
34 Eisenhower, Dwight David (1953-1961)
35 Kennedy, John Fitzgerald (1961-1963)
36 Johnson, Lyndon Baines (1963-1969)
37 Nixon, Richard Milhous (1969-1974)
38 Ford, Gerald Rudolph (1974-1977)
39 Carter, James Earl Jr. (1977-1981
40 Reagan, Ronald Wilson (1981-1989)
41 Bush, George Herbert Walker (1989-1993)
42 Clinton, William Jefferson (1993-2001)
43 Bush, George Walker (2001-present)
44 Obama, Barak Hussein, II -- if nobody assassinates him first

Waiting on the Wanting

I have always had to wait for the things that I want. It has been a great thing for me. Sometimes though, I think God wants me to have them sooner than the waiting period would be up, and He makes a way to give them to me early.

One time, I had been prayerfully looking for the best way to travel to South Africa. I thought, maybe I could volunteer, get work, or even move there. For almost 6 months I researched and hoped to find the best way to afford it. One day my longest life friend called me and asked me to go with her somewhere that required a stamp in my passport. I told her I could not because it was not in my budget. She paid my way for 16 days because it was so important to her. In return, I took all the photos (over 3000) and did whatever she asked me to do during the trip. It turned out to be one of the best times of my life, and I will never forget that God, through Mel, gave me something that would have taken me years to save up for.

Only this week a smaller but similar experience occurred. My birthday was on April 8. All I wanted was a new cell phone, but one with features that I could enjoy. Of course, they are too expensive and neither John nor I could justify the unnecessary expense. I accepted that we would need to wait several months, and I left it at that. 2 days later, I lost my cell phone. I had to replace it immediately because we were on the road and stuck in a hotel, so we I was able to do so that very day. In the end, I got the exact phone I wanted, but I did not pay anything close to the price we expected to pay. It had just dropped in price by half and came with a $50 rebate, and a free internet aircard worth $100 or more. My upgrade fees were waved because I had signed onto my internet account once. The next day, we received an unexpected bonus for 3x more than the cost of the phone. What would have cost us $600-800 only cost $150 to be billed at a later time, but the money is there when the bill comes.

These types of things happen to me all the time. I am certain it is because the Lord blesses those who wait.

One Year--give or take

They say that if you can make it through the first year of marriage you can make it through anything. I finally understand what everyone is talking about. John and I celebrated our 1st anniversary while on the road in the truck, so we did not actually get to do anything for it. I can say we deserve a pat on the back because we spent the first year of our marriage living within 3-4 feet from each other on a truck. It is definitely the way to immerse oneself and face every possible difference head on right away. I do not recommend this approach. Surely it is better to ease into all these things. What's the rush?

I will always highly recommend to people to date for as long as you feel is right, then have a decent engagement period to work out the things you will want to agree on once you are married. John and I did not do this. We were pals for 3 months, then dated for 3 months, then we eloped in 24 hours once we decided to be married. There was not any planning together or working through the differences. It would be so much better to come to those agreements while still in the "romantic" mode. We gave ourselves a whole 24 hours to go from broken up to married. There was not a whole lot of discussion about finances, living arrangements, employment, and so on and so forth. It changes the dynamics immediately once you are husband and wife and need to include and consider each other in everything. I do not recommend shock therapy in this but slow immersion.

The best advice I could give to people who are courting would be to take to heart the advice their loved ones are giving them. We hear all these trite phrases like, "you marry who you date." Or someone might tell you not to be in a hurry that marriage will come. You may also have been told that there is someone out there for everyone, you have all the time in the world, and whatever you do, Stick to your standards absolutely in your choice of marriage partner. All these people and all this advice are correct and GOOD. Believe it, listen to it, heed it and be happy that you have such great help available to you.

Marriage is not something to pursue out of desperation to pressure from friends, or church members, or because of age or loneliness. It is something to be open to but not in a rush to do. It is something to prepare for then fight for everyday for the rest of your life. It is something that does not come to a person easily but it can be lost swiftly.

PRAY TOGETHER DAILY!!!!!!!!!

We all need a sense of Bathroom Humor

As I have learned from Will Ferrell's version of the host of "In the Actor's Studio," Scrumtrulescent means, 'I have no words." About what I have no words is the question that must be answered here. I have no words for the great unexpected turn my life has taken from running my own photography business to becoming a professional truck driver with my husband. It is not the most savory or respected profession. It seems to fall just short of the respect illegal alien field workers have been getting this past year, but it does come ahead of AL Quaida, I think.

After earning two degrees in the leisure services and tourism management, I had a pretty good idea of the direction my photography career would go. I will not share it here so as to keep my idea a secret until I can patent it or trademark it or what. Eloping with John in January '06 was not in the plan, but it is what I wanted, so we eloped. Then we moved for financial reasons, then I could not get a job, he was injured, we were stuck with nowhere to turn. Now we are living in a Freightliner Condo pulling trailers all over the US each driving 450-650 miles per day most days. I went from a 3,000 sq. foot dream house to a bunkbed set up slightly smaller than a twin and about 40 sq feet of storage space for food, clothes, incidentals, music, computers, snow chains, necessary equipment, and sundries.

Am I complaining? No. I actually really like this work. I do not like peeing my pants. This has officially happened 3 times since I took up this job. I am stuck on this idea because it is the one I find least diginified and the one thing I never would have imagined myself doing. Peeing on the side of I-5 in LA, CA during rush hour traffic because there is no way on this planet I was going to be able to get the 72' behemouth through traffic quickly to the nearest truck stop.

Yes, trucks are limited by the size, the laws, and the locations available. In Cali, truck stops are a rarity. So after doing seat ballet, skittering around during my inspection, shifting and clenching while I did my log book, then examining angles to figure out if there was any place I could squat without being seen before I burst or turned yellow, I discovered the sad fact that bodily functions cannot be embarassing.

We spend so much time hiding them from other people, but we cannot stop them from happening. I made a new rule. In the bathroom anything goes--poop, pee, pick, scratch, clean, wipe, huff and puff, blow the house down. That is the place designated for all bodily functions and should be the one place a person can go to and make all the noise and swishing sounds they need to without being laughed at, or made to feel stupid--of course leave the bathroom clean.

I have seen some pretty amazing things in our rest areas. A living mouse in a metallic toilet in the urine diluted with water in New Mexico, not the greatest discovery when you are running liking a flying mouse out of hell holding your crotch hoping you won't have an accident. You push open the stall door and what do you know you just can't use that one. There is a living mouse saturated in urine. If you pee on it, your cruel. If you pick it up and out your not only gross, and brave, but probably sick for at least a week and plagued with night mares. Nightmares about wet bats flying out of the toilet at the least opportune time and fluttering around your buttocks, tickling you so hard you laugh until you pee. Then you wake up having wet the bed. It can become a vicious cycle. Hypothetically. I never wet the bed. No. No.

So here I am a somewhat educated 34 year old newlywed touring America's rest stops and most of those great truckin' stories are about the time I peed here, there, and how I pee everywhere and anywhere. I do not poor the pee in the lot, but I can pee in the truck, in a cup. I can pee with my pants up. It is a new Dr. Seuss story line I am thinking of submitting. Now that he has passed they seem to be writing about anything in his name. I think getting the youth of America prepared for the truth about peeing that nobody ever talks about is going to benefit us in the long run. Maybe some young thinker will come up with a better solution than adult diapers, open mouth jars, rest areas, or 5 gallon buckets. These are all useful but hardly the ideal.

I now understand why dogs sniff around for that perfect spot on the ground to lift their leg, or in our Chihuahua's case, spread their legs. They are clean animals. They want a clean bathroom. How different are we? Not very! We scope out each toilet looking for the cleanest least used with the dryest floor and flushed or the one with the greatest combination of these available. Usually we find one with 2 out of the 4 preferences and overlook the other two missing preferences.

Now multiply this times 8-10 times per day. Oh, Pardon me, John just found a rest area . . .