The five-year ache

For the first time since 2003, I had to see a doctor because I was sick. My weekend virus turned into a stuffy head and chest, with trouble swallowing, so I saw Dr. U Tuesday.

Trouble swallowing is a sign of acid reflux, apparently, so he prescribed Prevacid, drew some blood to check for H. pylori and scheduled an upper GI for Friday morning.

The problem was, I also had a sinus infection which turned itself into debilitating and nauseating head and throat pain, unalleviated by Advil, by yesterday afternoon. I'm no crybaby, so when I called Geddy, in tears, for help he immediately called the nurse, who told me to come back in. I wound up getting a steroid shot for inflammation and another shot for pain and nausea, plus antibiotics. I slept from 6 p.m.-8 a.m. and the headache was much better this morning.

Lo and behold, when I went back for my recheck this morning, I had tested positive for H. pylori. I'm off Prevacid and the first antibiotic and on a potent two-week cocktail of two other antibiotics and Prilosec.

Oh yeah, and I have conjunctivitis in my left eye, too, so I'm taking eye drops three times a day.

I postponed my upper GI until I feel a little better, because I currently feel as though I've been run over by a truck. Which is fine, as long as I don't get sick again for another five years or so.

We interrupt this program to bring you the following announcement:

Moe has at last learned to ride a two-wheeler without training wheels!

Carry on.

Aw, MAN!

I had a fever all day yesterday and was dealing with vicious body aches and sinus issues from Friday night on, so I didn't feel well enough to attend church this morning.

And wouldn't you know it? Warren Barfield, my very favorite Christian artist, made a surprise appearance and performed this morning. G brought home an autographed copy of his new album for me, but I'm so sad that I missed him.

Testing my nerves

We received our Hewitt Homeschooling Resources PASS tests this week, and this morning Larry took the math section. In Georgia, homeschoolers are required to take a standardized test every three years beginning in third grade. PASS tracks progress from test to test, so Larry has taken it several times in the past few years and is pretty familiar with the process.

Curly Sue is a different story.

Theoretically, we don't have to test her because she's second-grade age by a few days. However, because GVA has agreed to enroll her as a fourth-grader, we decided to test her anyway to keep compliant with the law by treating 2007-08 as her third-grade year.

She is so incredibly nervous that it's breaking my heart. She took online placement tests for GVA, but never a bubble-in type. PASS is untimed but she's going blank on even the most simple math concepts right now.

I told her these tests are not pass or fail, that it's just a way for us to catch any learning gaps and fill them in this summer. Hopefully that will sink in. Larry was exactly the same way at her age and still does not test particularly well, but at least he has some experience.

They each still have language and reading sections to complete before I mail the answer sheets back Tuesday, and once their results are in I have to write progress reports for the two of them (also state law). I hope to finish Moe's progress report next week because I don't have to wait for test results for him.

It feels odd not to be planning and buying curriculum this spring. I feel like I need to be budgeting and shopping and writing lesson plans, or something! When our usual July start date rolls around I imagine it will be worse. Oh, well. Maybe I can occupy myself with school supply sales until our K12 materials arrive.

"It would talk; Lord, how it talked!"

I wish I had three wishes; I would wish not to talk so much three times.

I had a job interview this morning. It started out well. I stated my case, I showed my work, I explained my circumstances and how I would fit in with the company's needs, and I asked intelligent and relevant questions.

Somehow it turned into a retelling of all my business by the end. Ugh. And double ugh. How my brother's death relates to a freelance writing job I have no idea, and why it came up and out I do not know.

"[Her] talk was like a stream which runs
With rapid change from rock to roses;
It slipped from politics to puns;
It passed from Mahomet to Moses;
Beginning with the laws that keep
The planets in the radiant courses,
And ending with some precept deep
For dressing eels or shoeing horses."
-- Praed, "The Vicar"

This was perfect for me, too.

Meh. Maybe I'll write a cookbook.

Wonder ball

My 7-year-old nephew Aardvark has come to spend the day with us. A is so excited to be out of school for the summer, and when he arrived in his play clothes clutching a light saber in his hand, I just wanted to squeeze his precious, bright-eyed little self.

His mama has post-planning this week. She teaches kindergarten in the city school system, and her students are considered at-risk. Most of them had at least one parent incarcerated during the school year and several were shuffled back and forth between relatives so many times they weren't really sure where they lived. One who showed up at school with fresh belt buckle marks and old injury scars was "repossessed" by DFACS. Ja'Nya, 6, died in an apartment fire. It has not been an easy year, and yet when she was asked to take the EIP class again next year, my sister-in-law said yes without hesitation or reservation.

She is one of my heroes.

On Saturday night, I added a few more to my list.

Geddy and I were invited to the city housing authority's first annual Abstinence Ball, celebrating the commencement of the roughly 200 young people ages 12-18 who participated in the program this year. We were on a panel of four married couples who answered a prescreened question from one of the youths.

Decorations and food were paid for by a state grant. The venue was offered rent-free and a DJ and photographers helped make the event memorable. Donated special-occasion clothing adorned fresh-faced, smiling youngsters and their behavior toward us was beyond reproach.

But when I asked the housing authority's executive director -- another hero of mine -- what chance those lambs have, her sweet smile faltered.

"Truthfully?" she said. "Not much."

She leaned over and pointed out to my husband a beautiful teenage boy, wearing a yellow tie and a big wide grin. He is a Hurricane Katrina refugee, she told him.

Last week, his mother abandoned him.

I sat in a rented folding chair decorated with a white satin bow and watched these children dance and laugh, joyfully eating from a proper party buffet while careful of spills or drips in their secondhand finery. I was ashamed of my new dress and shoes, of my diamond earrings and polished fingernails.

Back home this morning, I listen to the giggling and enthusiastic, if overly ambitious, plan-making going on between my children and their cousin. I ponder the effects of a strong family, a permanent home, a decent education, a love of God and a sufficient honest income on a child's future. I think about the group of lambs who took the Abstinence Pledge Saturday night in a county gym.

I am going to pray that their chances change. That they change their chances. That they honor their pledges and protect a chance at a better future. God is a God of miracles; they can use a few. And I'm going to start asking today.

Right after I go squeeze the babies in my living room.

Wanna see sumpin' cute?

Here are my babies during our trip to the mountains last week. Moe's rockin' the Luke Skywalker hair, no?

Vacation is supposed to be a time of resting and recharging?!?!?

We finished our school year last Wednesday, which in itself is not important except that my last 2007-08 attendance form also marked the end of a six-year run of independent homeschooling. We start Georgia Virtual Academy Aug. 13 in second, fourth and seventh grades and will be considered public schoolers, though we will do our work at home. We are committed to one year of GVA and then we will evaluate how it fit in with our education goals and family dynamic before we decide to continue.

Friday was a fun night at Six Flags, which Geddy's company rented out for its employees for the evening. I rode Goliath (yawn), Acrophobia (scary!) and a couple of other coasters including my childhood favorite, the Dahlonega Mine Train. My new favorite is Batman, which I rode twice with my new friend Shana. We also rode several rides with the children, who don't like roller coasters.

Mother's Day was lovely, with a brunch at church, a very much wished-for wooden butcher's block and sweet notes and handmade gifts, and then a visit with my own Mama and extended family in the afternoon. A violent Saturday storm had knocked out the power to my parents' house, so we spent Sunday afternoon enjoying a breeze and the sunroom and the ambiance of candle-lit bathrooms.

Geddy's vacation was this week, so Monday the five of us headed for Mount Cheaha. We stayed the night in a chalet and watched a beautiful sunset together. Tuesday morning we left for the Anniston Museum of Natural History and got there at the same time as five schoolbuses, so we went to De Soto Caverns instead. We headed back to the museum in the afternoon and had it mostly to ourselves by then.

Wednesday night was our Spring Fling at church, and we allowed the two littles to each bring a friend. We brought home two of Larry's friends to stay overnight and so commenced the first annual Dork Convention (I kid). Seriously, it was all about Star Wars and and sound cards and custom-made light sabers and The Force and video games. Very fun, and we are so thankful that Larry has made good friends who are truly good boys.

Yesterday was our year-end party for our homeschool group, and one of the moms whose family owns a pizza restaurant arranged for the children to make their own pizzas for lunch. We had a nice time.

Today, I'm recovering and shopping for a dress for the Abstinence Ball tomorrow evening. Nothing like waiting until the last minute!

Womanly reading

Two books have really knocked me out lately. The first is a tiny tome called Where's Mom? The High Calling of Wives and Mothers by Dorothy Kelley Patterson.

"Where's Mom?" is full of wisdom and encouragement in bite-sized pieces. I didn't own the copy I read -- that belonged to the public library -- but I'm putting it on my wish list to use as a short-term Bible study. I'd love to give more thought and put pen to paper to answer questions like "Is homemaking a challenging career?" and "Is being a mother a worthy service?"

The second, Biblical Womanhood in the Home, is even more personally challenging. A series of essays on (what else?) Biblical womanhood by different female writers, this book helped me realize that in the 9+ years I've been home, I never truly have embraced being a homemaker. It's always been something I did while I was waiting for...something else. Guess that's why I've always been a miserable failure at it. Ding!

Covering everything from true beauty (Did you ever think about how physical beauty in the Bible is always linked to misery, deceit, destruction and death?) to foolish women to the much-discussed submission issue, this book went on my wish list before I had finished the second page.

If you're like me, a "Me Generation" 80's baby struggling to understand and apply Biblical principles of at-home wife/motherhood, I highly recommend these books.

Dude, where's my Kleenex?

I have been sick.

I was so sick that I knocked back Nyquil -- the not-cherry-kind -- without flinching. I was so sick that I watched both "Transformers" and "The Sixth Sense" and never jumped, not once.

I was so sick that my children did their schoolwork and chores without complaint or reminder, then chose some Ancient Civilizations videos to round out their day. They did not bicker. They created a card, a Ewoks note and a new Scump the Dog story to brighten my sick bed. They brought in a crate of books, stuffies and Cars figures to keep me busy. And my water glass never went dry.

Have I mentioned lately that I have the finest three children a Mama could want?