Author: Doris

Emy forwarded me this photo of Pip who, I guess, is having the time of his life on the Queen Mary. Bob & Katherine have made it to Europe safely with Pip well taken care of.

This is the last week I’m part time at both jobs. Starting next Sunday, I’m going back to full time at my regular job which means it’s been a whole year since I started working at the hospital. I’m enjoying the extra time in my schedule, I’ll be a little sad to see it go, but that was the plan all along.

Mammogram – everything is normal. Which is good because I was a little worried about them.

With Jeremy gone, I’m doing 100% of the kitchen work which is up from my usual 10%. I visit the kitchen often enough and try to be helpful in many ways, but it usually ends up with Jeremy taking me aside and saying for the 10,000th time, ok Doris, don’t take this as a criticism, this is only a suggestion, but if you face the forks in this direction instead of that direction in the dishwasher, then they won’t hit each other and you can load 50% more forks. Increased forkage! sigh. I’m always baffled by the Tupperware cabinet. I know there is a way to fit all the containers and the lids in some organized way, but no matter what I do, I’m always left with 2-3 containers/lids that I can’t stuff into the cabinet.

It’s nice that Edda’s caregivers are around during dinner. It means I actually make dinner instead of eating oatmeal or cereal for dinner.

I am still thinking of Vince’s college essay. How did it never cross my mind that the essay should be about Edda? I think I think that it’s not Vince’s story to tell. It’s Edda’s story to tell. Maybe I think it’s too personal to be a college essay. Does that make any sense at all? I think that the college essay should be more outward looking than inward looking, though I’m sure I mentioned Edda in my essay when I applied to nursing school. I came across this article about the problem with memoirs from the NY Times written by Neil Genzlinger who has a daughter with Rett Syndrome.

Jeremy and Vince dropped out of cell service this morning. Those two often travel away from me, but usually at different times and to different places and almost never without cell service, so suddenly I feel lonely without them even though they’ve been gone already three days now. And my in-laws are also not within cell service either – they’ve been crossing the Atlantic for the past week and now in Europe without phones. It’s like we are back in the early 90s with the Martin part of my family. Everything, I assume, went fine with Philmont check-in. I asked Vince if Jeremy was holding up OK – Vince said that Jeremy was not very loud, but doing great! I’ve been reduced to watching youtube videos of other troops’ hikes in order to live vicariously.

Edda and I had the whole weekend together which is kind of a rare occurrence. I tried to mix enough activities out of the house with hanging out at home to make me feel like we are seeing people and doing interesting things and relaxing in a perfectly balanced ecosystem of moods. It’s tricky. If you don’t get the balance right, you can get the scary little thoughts creeping in like – I wonder if Edda knows the boys are gone? Does she miss them? I wonder if Edda knows I’m her mother? I’m not sure. Would she miss me if I were gone? What if the boys get in trouble and I won’t know for days? argh. I mostly did not think these thoughts and had a nice weekend.

Edda and I went to see the latest Spiderman movie. I have no idea what it is called and Vince was trying desperately to catch me up with all the Marvel gossip before he left for Philmont. I’m like there are bad guys and good guys and I think I only have to know that. It was a fun movie, I’m mostly bedazzled at what movie making can do these days.

We emission tested the van together.

There was some quiet quilting and napping. We also had Sunday night dinner on Saturday at Eric’s house and Ning and Brian & Noah made dinner for us on Sunday. Now for a dog walk, some dishes, showering Edda and then tucking her in and finally tucking me in.

The boys are off to Philmont. Started at 4am on Thursday morning when Jeremy’s alarm went off. It wasn’t necessary, he hadn’t slept at all that night. We did some last minute things (I think which only meant that Jeremy made himself a cup of coffee) and then loaded Vince up in the van and drove the 0.75 miles to the church – the meet up place. I did not bother to put on real clothes, I showed up in my pajamas.

Of course, there was last minute drama. Medical forms that were handed in at the very last, last minute, someone had to run home to get something (30 min roundtrip), someone urging the carpools to leave right this minute (5:30am for an 8:50 flight) because you’ll hit traffic, people asking – hey remember to put in the frequent flyer number for the flight. But it was fine, everyone got into cars and headed off to the airport. I was there just in case, but it turns out there was no just in case, so I headed back home and tried to go back to sleep, but that was futile.

The flight was fine, the rental vans were fine. Jeremy was nervous because he had tried to save money on the two days of lodging in ABQ (for altitude adjustment) and booked cabins which he had regretted last week because he thought there was no air conditioning, but it turned out there was air conditioning and a pool and the cabins were a nice place to hang out.

When I spoke to Jeremy this morning, he said he slept well and is much more relaxed. The plan is going well, the kids are having fun and getting along. He took a walk early this morning before the boys woke up.

The afternoon found them going up a mountain to 10,000 ft elevation taking the Sandia Peak Tramway.

Dinner at the Owl Cafe.

Grownups in charge.

After I dropped off the boys on Thursday morning and tried to go back to sleep, I ended up going back to the hospital to celebrate our unit’s 1-year-free of CLABSI (central line associated bloodstream infection) and CAUTI (catheter associated urinary tract infections). These are some of my silly and wonderful coworkers – there was a STAT team called the same time at the breakfast, so turnout was a little low, but I think they brought the food back upstairs.

The boys are getting ready to leave for Philmont tomorrow so the house is swirling with activity. I squeezed in three shifts at the hospital over July 4th weekend so I’m working from home the two weeks that they are in New Mexico.

On Monday, every single one of my five patients needed pain medication. I was giving out morphine, percocet, dilaudid, Xanax, oxy & flexeril all day. A day of pain management is a tough day. That’s like 3-5 doses of pain medication per patient so – 15 trips to retrieve the medication, administer medication and then to find a witness to waste the narcotic because sometimes the ampule comes with 4 mg, but the order says 2 mg. I hate pain management, one feels like a drug dealer.

There still is hair dying occuring in the house:

We squeezed in the beginnings of the college application process a few days ago by beginning to talk about the “brag sheet” that Vince was to provide to the guidance counselor by the end of the school year last year. (whoops) It started out rough (because, as we know, my hang-up is college admissions), as these conversations usually go between me and Vince and then it smoothed out by the end (which I give 100% of the credit to Vince). Vince was writing about various jobs he’s had or leadership roles and, of course, I’m encouraging him to polish them up a little (spin) and he rolls his eyes. But we have fun. I’m like – put down that you babysat toddlers and they voted you favorite babysitter because you make a mean Kraft mac & cheese. Then halfway through the hour, hour and a half we are talking about this, he looks at me and says, am I supposed to get pity points? Should my college essay be about Edda? Because it sucks, of course, but I don’t want anyone to feel sorry for us. Then we discuss this a bit. I asked a friend about this – she said, of course you have him write the essay about Edda, how could you not? I’m like, Edda’s not really that sick. We are lucky, we aren’t in the hospital all the time, she doesn’t have seizures, she eats well, I’m not worried when she catches a cold – I can still control my lifestyle pretty well. Sure, I gotta find childcare, but it’s not super specialized childcare. And she’s like – Doris, you know she’s really far from being well, right? And then I say, only when I talk to people with typical kids and usually only for the first time I talk about Edda am I reminded that Edda is really far from well.

On July 3rd, Vince hosted a party at the house. About ten kids, eating pizza and chips. I think Max got fed lots of pizza bones. When we got up in the morning we found a whole slice of pizza sitting right outside our bedroom door. Was Max so full that she couldn’t eat the last slice of pizza she found? I went to work at the hospital early in the morning, by the time I got home, Max had peed five times all around the house. Jeremy had stripped cushion covers off two couches, ripped the quilt and down comforters off of our bed and wet vac-ed numerous spots. I groaned. I’m like we have some crazy diabetic dog where we’ll have to give insulin shots Q4 hours. But it turns out that Max is probably just incontinent. Because, as the vet says, she’s a senior dog. I’m like – how is she a senior dog? She’s the new dog. The new dog we got 9 years ago.

Jeremy is experimenting with turkey for Thanksgiving. Really though, my parents left us this large turkey when they went to the West Coast and we need to empty the freezer chest to defrost it sometime this summer. He took the turkey breast off of the turkey, tied it in a tube and then sous vide it for many hours. It turned out perfectly evenly cooked, but kinda not palatable. One could not help comparing it to spam.

I had a difficult shift at the hospital on Thursday. I think I should be able to better handle the situations and be emotionally/physically resilient as time moves on, but it is not true. I spent a lot of time on Friday and today napping and fretting about going back to work tomorrow. Jeremy is trying to tell me that it’s just the way I see things – that I think there should be some satisfying and definitive solution to a flawed world. He thinks I should just accept a flawed world and that the world will always be flawed and we can only move the world towards being slightly less flawed.

Nothing makes one feel old like trying to explain to your son how exactly you managed, in the past, to drive to new and unfamiliar places without using Google maps. Today Vince took the car to Rockville Town Square and to the Giant. I had to then explain to him about parking validation and the bonus card use at the grocery store and to not forget the recyclable bags.

Jeremy is not sleeping well, it’s T minus one week until they leave for New Mexico for Philmont. He got up at 3 am flustered about the things that needed to get done. He started writing emails to parents, but decided it was too creepy to have an email sent at 3:30 am and so he scheduled to send them out at 8 am. Problems are cropping up and he’s hitting them down like those pesky moles in the whack-a-mole machine. Problems like 1) a previously undisclosed peanut allergy which means not only epi pens and benadryl, but also needing to replace all the hiking food that the camp usually provides for this kid because what else is eaten on the trail besides peanuts and peanut butter? 2) his own medical form which involves getting his own physical (whoops, he was busy collecting everyone else’s and forgot his own) and 3) a balance of $5,000 or so of fees.

Vince got his driver’s license today. He failed a few weeks ago because there was a stop sign behind a tree that he missed and ran through it (the sign, not the tree). This time, he told me, the stop sign was so completely obscured by the foliage that the tester said – hey, there is a stop sign behind that tree. He was nervous today, much more nervous than a few weeks ago when he was much more cocky and irritatingly talking smack. This time he said as he got into the car to drive to the DMV, let’s not talk, I’m going to listen to my music to calm myself down.

After he passed, he promptly asked to borrow the car for the afternoon. He said he was going to Walgreen’s to buy ring pops and drop them off at his friends’ houses. I said sure, no problem, just also go to the grocery store and pick up some hamburger buns and tater tots for dinner. And then he said – I’ll do that if you pay for the ring pops too. I was like – dude, our insurance just doubled, you sure you want to bargain about this now? And then he laughed and we ate ramen to celebrate.

Another Northern Tier video: (I will say this kind of embodies Vince’s talent that will be completely buried in the college application process which I think will serve him well. Jeremy & I both were saying that neither of us, under absolutely no circumstances would we sing and dance to Hooked on a Feeling in front of people who are essentially strangers that we were going to spend the next 7 days with and have only been with them for 24 hours.)

Jeremy got up very early this morning to bike to work. I could see his little icon on Google maps get closer and closer to his office. As soon as he pulled into work, I call him. Hey – I need you to be free on Aug 2nd to drive Vince to Pittsburg. Tom wants a meeting with us either Friday or Sat – are you free in the afternoons? And then we need to plan to make 180 meals on Friday August 23rd, are you free to take off work then? Jeremy’s like – omg, it’s only been hours since everyone is back home and really? are we doing this now? please Doris, I haven’t eaten anything, I just got to work. I walk over to Vince’s room to talk to him about various things that need to get done this summer. Vince is snoring in bed. I’m like – people it is already 10am, let’s get our act together, time’s a-wastin’. There are things to be done, lists to be written and to-do items to be crossed off… lol.

A northern tier video for your entertainment.

We are all back in the house together. Wonderful! You can feel the house expand with chaos and extra laundry, but that is OK. I’ll take it. On Saturday, Edda and I went to see Toy Story 4. I cried. Edda did not cry. I think she might have napped. She certainly slapped someone else’s Coke for a long time and totally bent their straw before I took notice.

We also happened by a Shibu Inu adoption event. I momentarially thought that we should get one of these dogs.

I spent a long time on Saturday quilting. Edda watched TV and napped. I listened to podcasts and am trying to catch up with the world. The Ezra Klein podcast – esp the one with Leana Wen who is now the head of Planned Parenthood. I would love to work for her. I’m working through the Cory Booker interview as well. He uses the word “love” a lot for a guy. Sometimes I listened to millenial women/dating podcasts. Fascinating. I’m not sure I could be a young person today.

Passport photos for everyone. No one can travel out of the country until everything gets renewed. Although we have no immediate travel plans, I do like being able to leave the country at any time. Like 3pm today! Let’s go somewhere. Oh no! I can’t. I’m getting my mammogram. No international travel for me today.