Toughing it out

I have a cold. I hate colds. They make me grumpy and extra opionionated. I have been sharing my opinions freely lately. Honesty is fine in theory. But in practice it definitely depends. My mom does not believe in honesty when it comes to how she feels, -sort of. She has always believed that if you deny the pain your denials will start to be true. She taught me that a "fake" smile" soon becomes real -and she was mostly right. It just isn't the whole truth because sometimes when you don't take care of the immediate little pain it grows in to one you can not ignore (but enough about child rearing ....ba da dum). She has hit that unable to ignore it point more and more of late. And then not only is the pain overwhelming but also her sense of shame because a strong enough person would ignore it. She never would have punished us for being complainers, she wasn't really unsympathetis to pain BUT it was always quite clear where virtue lay. The tough women in our family got up and kept going, taught themselves to walk again after polio, never cried when they cut their fingers off (well, only two and only the ends). That sort of thing. Some how my children all pride themselves on not crying (well not the 4 year old -he's pretty impressed at his own tears) and I'd swear it's not my doing. I got the guilt over the tears but I also got the tears (I'm thinking from my father's side). Even my sweet other half is a weeper (the tears flowed during the first 10 minutes of UP).

So what is my point? I honestly, honestly don't know. Maybe there is a difference betwen the truth and honesty. I can't see the answer -even with that supposedly 20/20 hindsight (stupid, stupid saying). We just have to rely on that stuff that covers a multitude of sins.

Caleb did get over his headache. The daughter on the ski trip naturally got snowed in and several father later driving all over the state she is home. Mom, obviouly has not gotten over her aches. Another MRI was schedlued for today but it turned out that getting a 91 year old out of the house at 6:30am, in the dark, and the cold, down a narrow icey path in the foot plus snow when she was totally miserable was beyond us. The next available appointment is a ful week from now. For the first time in many years we will not be having Christmas at her house because the trip would just be too much and there is not a good place for her to sleep on the first floor there. We will all be here. Complicated family politics ensue...

The picture is Jesse after playing in the snow -the actual snow picture wouldn't download for some reason. So here he is teaching his dad "Kor-rah tay". Where he got it we don't know.

Cooking tip -hey I made oatmeal chocolate chip cookies using all this extra sugar stuff from a batch of caramel corm someone gave us in them (replacing not in addition to the called for sugar). Worked. Frugal, that's me.

Next blog, "Why doctors can't even spell team."