Monday, November 28, 2005

Anonymous Me...An Autobiography

{painting by Anne Hardy click the pic for her site}

When I was in the 8th grade, our assignment was to write an autobiography. The title of this post, was the title I chose for mine. I really enjoyed writing then and felt I was good at it. I was good at a lot of things then. But things changed. My sister died that year and a part of me died with her. It was the day after Thanksgiving and I only recall that fact after much thought. I've blocked out a lot from that night. I have a few snapshots in my head, and I remember more about what I was thinking at the time than "visual" memories. I was 13 and I knew things were bad, but I didn't realize how close to the end Cassie was. I remember realizing that she was going when one pupil was larger than the other...I remember how ragged her last breaths were...I remember going to the nurses station for a pair of scissors so that I could have a lock of her hair...I remember studying her face and hands so that I would never forget how they looked. It's hard to go back to that day. I find it harder with every year that passes, not because the memory fades, but because the pain doesn't. I always thought that I would take my children to see her. My Dad said that the night Cassie died we sat up together talking for a long time and I told him that and broke his heart. I don't remember the conversation at all.

Here is an excerpt of my paper from 8th grade (complete with grammatical, punctuation, and spelling errors)...


Melancholy & The Infinite Sadness

My sister, Cassidy
Anne Yelton, was born on October 29, 1983. Cassie was born 1 month premature
with severe cerebral paulsey. From the very beginning of her life she had it
hard. Neither my parents, family, nor I knew of the long, painful road we had
ahead for the next twelve long, but seemingly short years. From the beginning I
knew that my sister was special, and I loved her dearly for being so. The first
two years of her life were especially rough. She was sick with something all the
time. My parents were young and scared, and the doctors bills kept piling up and
we were going deeper and deeper in debt, so, even though it was the hardest
decision they ever had to make, my parents decided that it would be best for all
parties involved; on the day of Cassie's 2nd birthday, my parents put her in a
special home for
handicapped children in Asheville, North Carolina. Their,
she would recieve 24 hour care by people specially trained to care for children.
During her ten years in Asheville she was never sick until one May in 1992.
Cassie had very bad congestion in her lungs, and being that she was deaf, blind,
and mute and unable to move voluntarily, she spent most of her life lying in
either a bed, wheelchair, or bean bag, causing her to get an inadequate amount
of exercise. Her torso was twisted and her lungs constricted making it hard to
cough up the congestion in her
lungs. She was put in the Intensive Care Unit
at Memorial Mission Hospital. She was released a week later but left very weak
and her lungs were vulnerable and susceptible to getting the same thing again
and she did. Every year she was in the hospital at least twice and every time
her lungs were left even more vulnerable and susceptible. And each time my
parents were faced with the question of in the even that her heart stopped
should the doctors try to resuscitate her or not, and once again faced with the
hardest decision a parent ever has to face, my parents chose not to resuscitate.
We all knew that Cassie would die from this, but it was one of those things that
you put in the back of your mind, back in the deep, dark shadowy
corners,
and you keep it there until you can no longer suppress it, and your faced with
it, the ugly truth, face to face and you deal with it or die trying to ignore
and fight it. Finally it was
time to face the ugly, ugly truth head on. It
was, ironically, on Thanksgiving Day when we got the call. The nurses that took
care of my sister called and said that they had sent Cassie to the emergency
room at Memorial Mission. We quickly raced up to Asheville not knowing what we would find. The ride up there, I will never forget, it was dark, cold, and
silent. The whole way up there neither my mom or dad or I spoke, each pondering
his own thoughts in dead silence. When we got to the hospital we were allowed in
to see Cassie. I had never been so frightened in my life. After what seemed like
forever, they finally admitted her. After making sure she was alright we went
home. The next day early in the morning we made the trek up to Asheville and
stayed the whole day. My grandparents also joined us. Overnight, Cassie was put
into the Pediatric Intensive Care Unit. Through the day my little sister got
progressively worse. That night, after a day of only being let in only two at a
time, they let us all in that tiny, ugly room with a bad view. We all knew
what was next but nothing was said. I remember walking into
that room, like I had done many times that day, and seeing my sister struggling to breathe. I remember looking into her beautiful, deep, brown eyes and seeing that one pupil
was dilated and the other not. A wave of anger swept over me because even though she was heavily sedated with morphine, and her not being able to communicate
fear, or happiness or any other
emotion, I saw in her eyes fear and that
scared the hell out of me, and for a moment I hated and despised God. At about
10:00pm it was clear that any moment Cassie would breathe her last
breath,
and at exactly 10:07pm on November 24, 1995 she did. As the last light of life
left her poor, weak, body my hatred for God left too. My first reaction was
uncontrollable sobbing and
hyperventilation. Whe I finally regained control
of myself, I asked for a lock of Cassie's hair, and I got it. As I watched my
mother cut Cassie's long, beautiful, brown hair I began sobbing and thinking
about how this was her last hair cut. The next day, we met with McMahan's
Funeral Home and made arrangements for Cassie's funeral services. My parents
picked out a
white casket with golden trim and golden angels on all four
corners, it was so beautiful. My sister always looked pretty in light pink so we
got a pink and white rose spray. My mom and I then went to Belk to buy Cassie the
best pink, silk night gown and hair bows to match and we did. Oh, her funeral
was so pretty and perfect except when I had to play for the service. I played a
song on the piano, right in the middle I started sobbing and ran back to my seat
like a
fool. I felt horrible and I had ruined everything, and I hated myself
for that. I'll never forgive myself for as long as I live. I will forever
remember the best sister in the world, mine, Cassidy Anne Yelton.


I did forgive myself for the whole piano incident. For the next few weeks I would sit in the church all alone and play it until the song was perfect and I knew she heard it. I quit taking piano lessons and I didn't write much after that though. I learned alot from my sisters life and death. Growing up all my baby dolls had IVs and feeding tubes. She's the reason I want to be a nurse. She taught me about compassion and unconditional love. I made a lot of friends with the kids who lived with her....unfortunately, they're all gone now. I don't know what I believe about what comes after this life, but I like to think that all of those children are running around in some magical place free of their previous bodies, wheelchairs, pain, and fear. I can almost hear them laughing right now.

Saturday, November 26, 2005

A Few Things Before I Go...

Geof gifted me with a black eye on Thanksgiving. I had raked up a huge pile of leaves for my younger cousins and Geof...(and me) to jump into. Geof had been playing with a child-sized shovel made of metal...very hard metal. I told him to put it away while we played in the leaves. I gave to go ahead for everyone to jump in and chaos ensued. I was having fun throwing leaves at everyone and being the cool big cousin. All of the sudden I hear this thud followed by the sensation that my face was caving in just above my left eye. I knew instantly that Geof had hit me with the shovel. I ran away from the leaf pile holding my eye. My favoritest uncle looked at me and said that everything was still there but that I was bleeding. I went inside to wash up, compose myself, and check the damages. Geof followed saying, "I'm really sorry, Mommy!" "I'm so sorry" "I kiss it make it better" My rage melted and he planted a huge wet kiss on my eyebrow. How could I be mad? It was an accident and he was sincerely sorry. I had a cut above my eye and a knot that kept moving around. Nothing obviously broken. Now I have a wicked black eye and my pride is a bit bruised because I got my ass kicked by a 2 year old. No one ever told me that Motherhood was such a dangerous occupation!


What I see in the mirror...


Thanksgiving was at my aunt and uncles house. Not as good as when my mom has it, but at least she got to relax this year....thus allowing me to relax.

While at visiting my parents I was able to scan in some recent pics.....here they are for your viewing pleasure....



Geof...I mean Spiderman!

A tomato that my Dad grew...just in time for Halloween!!



In other news...
My life and the lives of the people in my little family are about to dramatically change...eventually for the better, I'm hoping. I am choosing not to go into detail because it is extremely personal and painful and I'd like to keep it private. My blogging habits may change and they may not, this is just a heads up for any faithful readers out there. On that note, I wish you all happy holidays, take care, and I'll see you on the flipside!


Monday, November 14, 2005

I Gave Birth To A Weird Wild Child

Geof is a born music lover and he gets it quite honestly. Today I was in the mood for music so I loaded up practically our entire mp3 collection on the computer and had the stereo bumping. Nathaniel rigged our computer so that the speakers aren't your average computer speakers. They are a little over 3 feet tall, 16 inches wide, and weigh 150 lbs each. Yeah, he's a man who likes his music loud...very loud. Between the two of us we have a very eclectic music collection so it's no surprise that our taste in music has rubbed off on Geof. Some of his favorite songs are...Cat Scratch Fever, Taking Care of Business, My Guitar Wants To Kill Your Mama, Godzilla, etc. Geof has been drumming along with the music all day today. His drum set is made up of 2 five-gallon buckets overturned and a fan (I guess for the cymbals) and his drumsticks are a pencil and a toy hammer. He really went crazy this afternoon when Judas Priests' Breakin' The Law came on. He's so funny.

Some other funny Geof stuff from today...
Out of the blue he comes in my room and asks me, "Are you kicking my ass?" I realize kids are like sponges, but I have no idea where that came from. I laughed (on the inside) and told him that that wasn't a very nice thing to say and he left.... ok?

Another out of the blue comment came when he came to me and said something about "talking beavers". I guess it was from the Disney channel because he was watching something on there before he said that. Of course, I can be very immature and my mind is usually in the gutter so I had to laugh out loud about that one.

Geof has had a pretty nasty cold this week. On Wednesday night I thought I was going to have to take him to the emergency room. He had a super snotty nose and started getting some pretty bad congestion in his chest with a slight fever. When he would cough it sounded like he was barking. I put some water on to boil to add some humidity to the air and put him in a nice warm shower. The next day he was improved and I took him to the doctor. He was cutting up like usual and then he turns to the doctor and says, "I'm shy!" There's not a shy bone in his body. He's the type of kid that never meets a stranger. He didn't get that from me. He's still snotty but everyday he improves. I've had to wash his face several times today because he's had that sick kid dirty snot whiskers thing going on. You know...the nose runs, he wipes it with the back of his arm or sleeve and it leaves a trail from his nose to his ear and then the dirt from playing outside gets stuck on the drying snot? Yeah, that look. I love being somebody's mama!

Sunday, November 13, 2005

Um..ok

You Are Changing Leaves
Pretty, but soon dead.

Huh? Am I going to die soon?

Saturday, November 12, 2005

My Prom Dress?

According to a quiz over at Quizilla this is what my prom dress would look like...


I never went to prom, sob sob (not!), but if I had I very seriously doubt that I would have worn a dress like this. First of all I like to bust a move, not bust out a boob!! Second, my parents would never have even let me out of the house looking like that!! If you would like to see what your prom dress would look like just click on the picture. The code Quizilla gave was all screwed up. Have fun!!

Friday, November 11, 2005

Things That Make Me Go Hmmmm...

I've always loved the ideas of fate and destiny, but I never really whole-heartedly put my faith in either one. However, the longer I am with Nathaniel, the more I believe that we were meant to be together. Yeah, I think it sounds corny, too, but there have been too many coincidences to ignore.

Nathaniel and I met in a sort of unconventional manner. Online, very random, neither looking for love in cyber space. Our lives have become so intertwined with each other that I think that we were possibly destined to meet at some point anyway. Here are a few examples of the things that make me go hmmm...

  • Nathaniel's uncle and his wife moved to the mountains of North Carolina shortly after we did, but they had planned the move a few years before Nathaniel and I met. This one takes a little background to really seem like "fate" but I don't feel like going into it so you'll have to trust me.
  • Also, before we met, Nathaniel watched a movie that was filmed and produced in Asheville, a city I used to frequent on a regular. By the way, if you happened to click on the word "movie" up there, let me just say that the movie is a total exaggeration and not meant to be taken seriously, it's a comedy...a very twisted, gross, hilarious comedy...you've got to see it!
  • The last and most recent thing in this list is the fact that The Woodbox Gang are scheduled to play in Rutherfordton. Now what in the hell does that have to do with anything, you ask...

...When Nathaniel was still living in Illinois he helped build, manage, and run a little coffee shop called The Yellow Moon Cafe. They have live music there and one day a little band called The Woodbox Gang played. Nathaniel really like them and struck up a friendship. He has all their albums, tshirts, stickers, etc. We are both big fans now...and so is Geof. The Woodbox Gang are from Southern Illinois and until recently have only played in that area. Nathaniel actually proposed to me while one of their songs played in the background. I kinda think of them as "our band" and they play a couple of "our songs". I checked out their upcoming show dates because we're planning a trip up there next May. As I was scanning the list the words RUTHERFORDTON and THE KODIAK popped out at me because that's my freaking home town and my new favorite watering hole!!!! I'd bet money that you've never heard of Rutherfordton. How random is that? The thing is, Rutherfordton just in the past few years voted in liquor by the drink. There were no bars or venues for live music 3 years ago. I just can't figure out how they found The Kodiak, or why they're making a 550 mile trip just to play for one night in North Carolina, especially Rutherfordton, NC. There's nothing else there!! I am absolutely floored by this. I cannot tell you how excited I am. I am so there!! January 21, 2006 I'm marking my calendar right now and working any plans around that date.

There have been a lot of little things to happen like that, but I can't recall any at the moment to add to the list. I may sound like a real dweeb, but I think it's quite interesting.

Gotta Love A Bargain!

I'm such a dork. Given my station in life I guess it's no surprise that my interests have changed drastically from what they were say 4 years ago. I crave new recipes, dream about dishwashers and vacuum cleaners that work and don't lose suction, actually look at a sales papers, peruse the online underworld of bargain hunters, etc. I saw a special report on my local news a few weeks ago about saving money shopping online and I would like to pass it on you my dear reader(s). You know when shopping online, sometimes you can get a great deal if you know some secret code? Here's a site with all kinds of secret codes for you to use to save tons of money it's called, oddly enough, Current Codes. The other online haven for thrifty folks is called Deal Hunting. I like the second site best. If you check out the forums you'll find freebies, samples, contests, etc. I got a free pair of Haynes panties!!!! See, there's my dorkdom showing through right there.

I would also like to give some props to the makers of ALL fabric refresher. This stuff is about a dollar cheaper than Febreze, smells better, and lasts longer. What more could you ask for?! My mom told me about this stuff and now Nathaniel and I are hooked. He even keeps a bottle in his truck.

Another great product I've found. I am one of the "lucky" gals out there who has to use conditioner. If I don't, I will have a huge rat's nest on my head and a very unhappy morning. I also, gasp! , color my hair so I really need a good conditioner. So, a few weeks ago I was wandering through the isles of my favorite bargain grocery store, GO, when I discovered St Ives Revitalizing Conditioner. A light shone down and that angelic "Aaaaahhhhhhh" sounded. Oh, don't laugh you know what I'm talking about. Let me tell you, this stuff was sent directly from heaven. It leaves my hair so perfectly conditioned that I can run a brush through it while it's still wet. It doesn't leave me looking like a total grease ball at the end of the day either. Also, it makes my hair smell sooo good...like the old formula for Pantene used to. I don't know what they did but I miss the old smell of Pantene...those fuckers! Anyhoo, just wanted to throw that out there. Enjoy!

There, that is the end of my free advertising campaign. I really hope, though, that someone out there will find any of this helpful. I realize there are a lot of us out there pinching our pennies.

Now I really feel like I've come out of the dork closet!

Saturday, November 05, 2005

Beret Schmeret

Your Hat Personality Is A
Beret
Funny thing, I really Really REALLY do not like berets...go figure!
Sorry to bore you with a silly quiz. More to come at another time. Long story short...we're back from visiting my folks, had a blast, no new pictures (sorry Deneen), Nathaniel is home for 4 DAYS!!!!!! Be well, 'til next time...
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