could i get a do-over, please?

When I was in college, my Daddy went to Montana for about ten days with HIS mother, leaving Mama at home.  When I came home that weekend, Mama wanted us to do some things together, but I wanted to get together with my friends.

Good grief, what was I thinking?

On Friday night, I did exactly what I wanted.  My good friend and I went out together.  Of course, I don't have any idea what we did, though I think it involved a high school football game.  I do remember that around 11 o' clock we ended up in the church parking lot with a bunch of our friends and played a game of Nerf football.  One of the people there with us was my brother, who, at the time was a patrolman for the police department.  When it came time for me to be home (even in college I had a midnight curfew when I was at home) he had the dispatcher call Mama and tell her where I was and that I would be home soon.

Needless to say, this really didn't go over well with Mama, but I wasn't exactly a teenager, so she couldn't punish me in the traditional sense.  She did let me know that she wasn't pleased with what I had done.  I can't remember exactly what was said, but I do remember feeling very small.

Fast forward nearly 20 years and that weekend still comes to my mind any time I think of things that I wish I could do-over.  It is particularly on my mind this week when my husband is in Alaska and (much like Mama in the time before everyone on the planet had a cell phone) I haven't been able to talk to him hardly at all and despite all of the people I have to talk to, I still feel lonely. 

I can't help but wonder how much it hurt her for me to be so selfish and insensitive to her feelings. 

The bad thing about that do-over list?  It keeps growing and so many of the things on that list are there because I put my needs above the needs of someone else.

Good grief, shouldn't I have learned something in the last 20 years ... shouldn't I be farther along the path to maturity?

Don't answer that, I don't think I really want to know.

i can't believe that i am actually going to do this

Let me be blunt ...

I am going to take a trip to Montana ...

we'll be gone for two weeks.

I am going with Mama, Daddy and my three kids ...

and without Ronnie.

Oh, and another little tidbit of information ... we just finalized this decision today ... we leave Sunday!

YIKES!

Before you accuse me of having taken leave of my senses (which I have been accusing myself of all afternoon) or of being a bad wife, let me tell you that I didn't plan to go at first.  Actually, when Mama called me yesterday the invitation started out for my two oldest children.  You may think this strange, but I actually thought it would be nice for them to go and me stay at home with my little guy and do some organizing of bedrooms and major prep for school.  Then Daddy mentioned that maybe D and I would like to go too.  My first reaction was, no thank you.  I just wasn't (and still am not) completely sure that I want to be gone that long without Ronnie.  It was only after talking to Ronnie that I even considered going and then only because he basically told me that I should go.  He didn't say that the kids couldn't go without me, but for whatever reason, the just thinks that my going is the right thing to do.

I am not sure if it is because he thinks I need the time away from ordinary responsibilities, or because he thinks my parents really want me to go, or maybe some peace and quiet sounds good to him, too.

But, whatever his reasoning, I have agreed and we leave in less than two days.  I know that I will enjoy the time spent with my parents, especially since Mama should be feeling pretty good after her last chemo treatment and since when we get home they will have to change the type of chemo she is getting and who knows how the new one will make her feel.  We have learned to take advantage of the times when she feels good.  The other nice part is that I will be able to help with the driving.  The trip goes much faster when you have three drivers ... our goal will be to drive straight through from here to Anaconda, Montana, about a 48 hour drive.

Oddly, the kids aren't as excited as I thought they would be.  I think they are kind of like me.  A little nervous about leaving their Daddy for so long.  I think that they will be fine once we go, but I know that we will all miss him.

With all that said, let me introduce you to our destination.

Anaconda is, or rather was, a copper mining town.  The town was built around the smelter and the Anaconda Company was everything.  At least that is how I understand it.  The picture to the left is the smelter stack, surrounded by large piles of slag ... the junk left over after the mining process.  (Please forgive me ... I don't really know all the technical terms!)  The stack really isn't very pretty to look at, but they keep it around because it is a very real part of the history of the town.  My sister-in-law is from there and I am sure that she could do a much better job of sharing the history ... but for now I'll just tell you that if you happen to be interested, they have a really nice website you can visit by clicking here.

The town is really very nice.  It is small and you can walk to many places.  One of LB's first comments to the boys is that there is a Dairy Queen that you can just walk up to the window and order ... no dining room, just tables outside and they are only open in the summer!

You can take a short drive and visit Georgetown Lake, which is absolutely breathtaking.

I don't know what all we will be doing while we are there.  I do know that this is mainly a trip to relax ... so we won't have a whole lot of predetermined plans.  I would like to take the kids to the fish hatchery and to Lost Creek Falls.  I also know that I plan to do a small amount of school work while we are there.  I will probably take the big kids to the library and let them learn a little local history and we plan to map our trip and do some geography on the way.  My Daddy has a wealth of information about Montana and specifically the areas we will be visiting, so I am sure that will be a great history lesson for the kids ... and lets face it, history is more interesting told to you by your Papa than reading it in any dusty old book!

For now, I really need to go start packing and help LB solve the very real crisis of which of her dolls/stuffed animals will make the journey with us and which ones will have to stay behind with Daddy!

Since I don't have a laptop, my computer access will be non-existent once we leave.  I will have lots of blogging to catch up on when I return ... both reading y'all and posting our experiences.  Who knows, two weeks with no internet may be really good for me!

So, I suppose I will see you guys in a couple of weeks.

Unless I chicken out ...

cannin' maters ... a family affair

My family has been canning tomatoes for as long as I can remember.  I think it was actually my Daddy's sister that got Mama started with the recipe for what we call tomato relish, but over the years she has tweaked and fine-tuned the process to make it her own. 

Now that I am an adult and no longer being forced to can tomatoes, I enjoy the process.  It takes time and a lot of chopping, but it is almost always done with several family members involved which makes the work go faster and the time pass more quickly.  All in all, I find it an enjoyable process.

There are still remnants of my childhood in the process, though.  One thing hasn't changed ... Mama is still in charge!  She freely gives orders to anyone helping, beginning with my Daddy and working her way through any of her kids and their spouses and then on to my kids (if they happen to be close enough to the house).  Of course, she is the one who knows the process inside and out and no one really minds her being in charge.  Actually, I kind of prefer it that way.  Sometimes it is nice just to do as you are told.

For years, Mama was the only person who would actually handle the cutting of the tomatoes.  Any one of us might be the one popping the skins or chopping the veggies, but Mama always handled the actual tomatoes.  Mostly, this was because she didn't trust any of us kids to not accidentally get a bad tomato into the mix.  While this was a distinct possibility back then, the tradition continues now that we are adults (and capable of smelling a bad tomato).  It makes her nervous to watch me (or anyone else) and it makes me nervous knowing that she is watching me and knowing that she can cut them at least twice as fast as I can.

Just for the record, I could can tomatoes at home in my own kitchen, but I would much prefer keeping it a family affair.  There is something satisfying about spending the day in the home where I grew up, doing the things with my husband and kids that I did with my parents as a kid.  I can't exactly describe it, but I know that it is something I will carry with me even after this process does move to my own kitchen sometime in the future.

______________________________________________

The kids did get to have a little fun while we were working last Saturday.  They have discovered the joy of complete abandon while riding their bikes down a steep hill through the trees and into the back yard.  This is something my brothers enjoyed when we were kids, but I don't remember ever doing it myself.  Seems as though I do remember one of those trips down the hill ending in an emergency room trip for one of the boys, but I am trying not to think about that!

Uncle Bob (my oldest brother) riding D on the back of his bike and LB heading back up the hill.

JW getting ready to head back up for another trip down the hill.

a look back

This is my 100th post. 

It is hard to believe that I have found that much to say in a little under 11 months.

Well, maybe not that hard to believe.

Anyway .....

It truly is hard for me to believe that a couple of years ago I had almost no knowledge of this thing that has become a such great outlet for me.  I like feeling connected to the world outside of my own and this little blog helps me to feel that connection.  Part of the reason is that it keeps me exploring other blogs, but another part is that I know that this blog can be read by anyone from anywhere.

During the relatively short time that I have been reading blogs and even shorter time that I have been blogging myself, I have come across several really innovative 100th posts.  Most recently, one of my college room mates posted her 100 favorite words.  It was an impressive list, but it would take me far too long to compile a similar one.  If you are interested, feel free to jump on over to Ruth's blog ~ Graphite Free ... just finish reading my post first!

So, here's what I came up with for my 100th post ... since this blog is about connecting my children to my childhood, I thought I would share the things from my own raising that I hope my children get to experience in theirs. 

In no particular order ...

I hope my children find a way to create lasting relationships with each other. 

I have 3 brothers ... two older and one younger.  My relationship with each of my brothers is as different as the men themselves.  As we were growing up we spent much of our time figuring out how to torture each other.  Actually, that only applies to the 3 youngest of us ... my oldest brother was grown by the time he was five and pretty much ignored the shenanigins of the rest of us.  Still, I have great memories of our childhood and young adult years, and the connections we made during those years are still in play today.  We may not always agree, but, now that we are all grown, I am happy that I can call all three of them friends.

I hope my children get to experience an extended family road trip. 

When I was 13 my parents closed down the family business and picked us up on the last day of school  with our big red and white van loaded to the gills and complete with a raised bed in the back with storage underneath.  From there we headed to Montana.  It is a long drive from Mississippi to Montana and we enjoyed every minute of it.  The whole trip lasted about 2 weeks and along the way we saw more of this country than we can possibly remember.  We visited the Royal Gorge, saw Old Faithful in Yellowstone National Park, were introduced to the majesty of the Tetons and discovered little stops along the way that we still enjoy visiting today.  One of my favorites is a place called Split Rock in Wyoming.  Basically, Split Rock is just a really big roadside park.  It has historical significance but I can't remember exactly what it is right this minute.  What I do remember is climbing the rocks while Mama and Daddy cooked breakfast on a Coleman stove.   I also remember playing frisbee in roadside parks along the way and then using that frisbee to gather snow to throw at my brothers while we camped at a KOA in Dillon, Montana.

In 1994, when I was 20, we went back to Montana to go backpacking in the Anaconda-Pintler Wilderness Area.  We had worked and prepared for over a year and it was the trip of a lifetime for me.  This time the trip lasted 18 days and it was amazing.  We went back to many of the same places we had visited in 1987 and this time we added Glacier National Park and Mt. Rushmore to the list of sights.  The backpacking itself was unlike anything I had ever done and the whole trip is still one of my most cherished memories.  I don't know how my kids will get to experience this since my parents had the "luxury" of owning their own business which afforded them the ability to close it down and take these kinds of trips.  Ronnie and I don't have this "luxury" but I still hope that we might someday find a way to make a trip like this a reality.

I hope my children learn the value of working together as a family.

Summer was a busy time when I was growing up.  My Daddy believed in living off of the land so to speak.  Besides, when you have 3 strapping boys to feed you learn to be creative ... and frugal.  So, every spring we planted a garden and then in the summer we not only harvested what we planted, we also bought from local farmers to supplement what we grew.  Canning was the story of summer.  We usually put up somewhere around 200 quarts of what we called tomato relish ... which we used as a base for any tomato dish, like spaghetti, soup or chili.  It was (and still is, since I still try to put some up every summer) a mixture of tomatos, green bell peppers, celery and onion.  We also canned tons of pickles, jelly and green beans.  We would grow or buy peas (Mississippi purple hull were Mama's favorite) and butter beans (otherwise known as green lima beans) and freeze these.  My uncle raised corn, so every summer we would get somewhere between 500-800 ears of corn that would all have to be shucked, silked and cut off the cob for cream corn ... and we did them all in a week.

I am boring you with sharing all of these details just so I can tell you that I didn't particularly enjoy all the work that summer brought and it is probably no wonder that I actually enjoyed going back to school every fall, BUT, looking back, some of my fondest memories of my childhood come from these times of hard work.  I guess it is because I now recognize how important those times were to the survival of our family in the winter when Daddy's business was much slower.  I want my children to experience this pulling together to do what it takes.  I don't expect them to be overly excited about it, but I'd be willing to bet that the time will come when they will appreciate the experience more.  Or maybe not ... I can't predict how they will react, but I can hope, I suppose.

This is not a complete list, of course.  It is just a glimpse into the legacy given to me by my parents.  There are parts of my childhood that I wouldn't want my children to experience.  Besides that, there are some things that my children are already experiencing that I wish I could have.  While I know I can't recreate my own childhood, I do think that it is important for Ronnie and me to give our children experiences to look back on and claim as special enough to pass along to their children.  Who knows what they will find special ... I hope someday I'll get to see what they choose to pass on to their children since that is most likely the best way for me to know what was special to them.

Okay, here goes ...

I have been toying with the idea of starting a blog for quite a while and now that I have actually begun this thing, I am wondering why I thought I might have something to say. I must credit a couple of friends who have recently started their own blogs with inspiring me to actually do this thing. And, if I can't come up with posts interesting enough to hold any one's attention, I'll just blame them.

One thing that kept holding me back in starting a blog was choosing a name. I wanted it to be something catchy, but didn't want anything too silly. Finally, a couple of nights ago, my daughter said something and I felt as if I was looking into a mirror and seeing myself at 9 years old. As usual, she was talking much louder than necessary and as I was telling her again that "it is not necessary for you to yell, I am standing right in front of you" I felt as if I was channeling my mother. It was at that moment that the name for this blog came to me. I truly feel as if I am "paying" for all of the stuff I put my parents through.

I am sure that most of us have heard our parents say that they hope we have children just like us one day ... well, my parents' wishes came true. I have three of the loudest and clumsiest children in the world. Rarely do we complete a meal that one of them doesn't spill something. My Daddy loved to tell me that if I would just take time and pay attention to what I was doing then ... (fill in annoying situation here) wouldn't have happened. I cannot even begin to count the number of times I have used that same line on my own kids.

There is also a flip side to this name thing ... while my children are providing me with plenty of reasons to apologize to my parents, they are also helping me to see many of the reasons why I am thankful for the way my parents raised me. My parents bucked the system all of their lives and while there were times that I hated that as a child, now I recognize that I am still drawing on their courage when I have to make hard decisions. I am more convinced than ever that the decisions we are making now for our children will affect them for the rest of their lives ... what a frightening, and yet, humbling thought.