I left that garage as requested clean as a whistle, then I sat down to a lunch that I brought with me, because if you have ever cleaned a garage out that had more than five years of accumulated items you automatically know that it will be an all day job. As I It was very hot I found a shady spot under a tree next to the home I was working at. I heard talking and assumed my employer had company, so I continue on with my lunch.

I was half way through my lunch when the a voice got closer to me. It was the woman who hired me on the phone, she had come to sit at the chair next to the window to use the phone. I was facing the window she saw me as I was there eating, but she assumed that the window was sound proof , because as I gestured that I was eating, I put my sandwich up to say so, she nodded and then proceeded with her conversation. This is where it got ugly.

My employer was hosting a conversation with someone. I have no idea who, but this is what I heard and very sadly I must admit that I happened to be a person who has a great hearing ability. This person was speaking about me, she said to her counterpart on the phone how great a person I was, to have almost finished the garage and it was not even noon. I was fully intending to move as I then felt uncomfortable being privy to her private conversation, but what she said next made me sit there, and  it made me sick to my stomach.

“Yes I tell you she is great but snobbish as hell how dare she turn her nose up at my offerings up all of Joe”s toddler clothing!” “This is probably a woman on her last dollar and you know that they always need everything, just who does she think she is saying no to my wanting to help her out”. I was dumb founded Should I have said yes and have those clothes shoved down my throat even if no one I know could use them?

I did not think so, not then nor do I now. My employer of the day went on to say “in her shoes at her station in life practically destitute, yes I can tell from the lack of attention to her cuticles and her hair graying, with out so much as a tint from a box from a drug store or what ever people like her use, these people should take anything offered to them, to show gratitude for at minimal the thought given her”. she went on and said “what a bad idea it was to have hired that pathetic person in the first place, you know all these people are the same they don’t know their station in life”.

She smiled at me through the window and went right on telling the person on the other end of the line that “she had decided the moment that I refused her help that she would not use me other than today”. She said “why try to help people who may be on drugs, or alcoholics, or maybe even just looking at your things to come and rob you later” ” You know they are all drug addicts or something of that nature”. (I in all fairness to that remark it was totally unfounded, I answered  to an add, in my neighborhood for this job, and it is less than half a mile away from my very home. She called my prior customers to verify my capabilities no less other neighbors of mine and hers.

I felt a heat rise through my back as if on fire, poor or in need makes no difference how you say it, you, me and any one in need of help is lumped in to a group of people who do no good in this life. I was offended and felt that yes anyone and everyone should have the right to their opinion as this woman most certainly does. I on the other hand feel that founded judgment is the only way one should destroy a persons dignity. I was not asking for anything, not a hand out, not a give me anything, on the contrary my full intention was to earn a dollar the old fashion way (work for it).

I could have been all of those things that her mind ran to, but I was a person who needs work, just plain old fashioned work, so what to do? no what did I do, I finished my lunch, finished my job, and then told her that I had received a call for a more permanent job and would not be available to help out as planned, she said” oh let me know if it does not work out. I really could use a person who does quality work like you around”. I just said that I was grateful to know a person in her station of life, because it keeps one grounded.

I was seething, and would not ever set foot near that person not ever again. I am in need but I am hard working, decent, humble, and not indulging in my “addictions” because I have none. I have rethought all of my conversation to the clothing that I was offered. I was very polite, and truly I know not one person who has a boy the age of who the clothing was for. I have my station in life I know it well I am a person in this world who at this time needs to help out financially in any way possible, for keeping our home is our first priority at the moment.

I know not all people are the same, and I feel sorry for people like this person, misinformed, uneducated in the facts of this countries economic state, prejudice to people of poverty, and who knows not a station in life that she would be tolerated to belong to. I am still trying to work hard at what ever comes my way, I eat my lunch in the car, hot or not. I do not want to know who else may think as this person thinks, and I play the car radio so as to not ever hear how rude or how nice people can be when they think you can not hear them talk about you. It was a conversation never meant for a person in my station in life to have heard.

Why? well I have warned you all,  and maybe , those who have been on either side of that conversation would rethink how your perceptions of others may be wrong. We all need each other.

Food For The Mind

Lilly”s Way        www.lillysway.com

On that note I will say to you that at the time of need, real need, an opinion, or a heart felt suggestion may be all that some one needs to get through a rough spot in their lives, and maybe just maybe a feeling that they are not the first person ever to suffer what is transpiring at this time in their individual lives. I love to read and I might add I love to read everything for there is fact and fiction alike in the real world and it makes us laugh, cry, feel sad, or good, or maybe it just makes us forget the immediate trouble at hand.

For me the truth is that I love to immerse myself in the reality of what is around me and I really think that this world needs that, for in my opinion I see apathy for most any piece of conversation that can be brought up and it truly disturbs me to see that. Of course I do not mean that everyone is that way but a disturbing part of us are. I know I have to sight what I am saying for some of you so here goes case in point the “oil spill” my neighbor “oh well those people will eventually get what they deserve”, the cashier at the grocers” I am so tired of this heat and all the parking spots taken for the handicap everywhere!”, our barber ” I wish that those darn beggars would move to another corner and just give my customers a break”, my daughters teacher “the system of today is so fowled up I had to retire to get my full benefits”, my nephews wife “, I wish the war was over before my baby is born. I asked each what can you do to change any of the above all and I mean all replied that is just the way it is and we have to take it.

I know that the war is supposed to stop soon I feel we can not thumb our nose at our responsibility to leave (eventually), and the the system is off its keel but if we all just get the benefits for the sake of it when will the real reason for teaching our young people be good enough, and oh yes the beggars should not scare us to death so that another corner would be nice for one, but what about the real problem that the beggar is a displaced individual in our society down on his luck and knows not what else to do?, and that parking in this heat is a night mare yes it is (imagine having to stay in that heat ten minutes longer to unload your wheel chair). I am just saying that while my opinion may not suit all, most of the times an opinion is maybe warranted sometimes.

I have had opinions that are not so nice I am not a know it all. I just happen to want to share with those of you who need a different opinion on something or other. But I read what I can and I get quite a lot of the good ones that are out there sharing as I do and oh well what a great world we live in to have the availability to do so. With that I will say tell me you like it, or tell me you hate it I can live with it. I do not have to publish all nasty comments though, and that is my opinion.

Food For The Mind

Lilly”s Way   www.lillysway.com

As our lives and families changed and grew he was basically a permanent fixture in my home through his teens, and then when he married we stood in their wedding, and we were there when his children who are almost completely grown now were born. I love my sister in-law also, she was just right for him and has really been a great person to him. He became blind several years back and I can say even when he can see nothing with his eyes he can always asses a situation or an event clearly,  and his summation is always on target and then never going off half cocked he can find a resolve for it.

He came to see us today because he heard that I was not able to get around like usual and that he in his words might need to give me some”cheering up”. He gave me all the good memories and the bad, as if I was there he recounted all the greatness he saw of us as his role models. I called him a suck up and then we both laughed. He said even when he lost his sight when I spend time with him I always treat him as if he can see. My descriptions were never confusing to him because when we went out, or shopping we could always relate to or refer to something we both had seen or done together. Today he said he was going to return the favor.

And here I thought all those years he was with us he was just trying to be a pain in the but, No it was preparation for his blindness he said to me, even when we none of us new that he was going to loose his sight. In all fairness the when he lost his sight was not a good time but that fact that he was lucid and not an older person just made it tolerable for him to reference the experiences we shared and it always gave him something he could relate to very well. My bother in-law is in his 40’s and has been as close to me as if he and I were brother and sister and that my husband was the in-law.

I say this in jest because since my husband was the oldest my brother in-law idolized his older brother. But if I were allowed to choose a great friend and even a brother this person would be who I would pick.  I was glad he and his family came to see us, and even more glad to say that they stayed to have supper with us. We visited for half the day which really felt as if only a couple of hours had passed. He asked me to be strong and never feel sorry for my self. I just listened as he gave me a speech that he said came from one of the wisest people he had ever met.

My brother in-law asked me to stay the same person as always no matter what, and not accept this card dealt to me through my health. He said that there are plenty of miraculous things in this day and time to help individuals who are in my situation health care or not. I felt as if I had heard that speech before, but I still listened to him. He went on to say that only when there is a need for something, can there be a solution. I looked at him a little perplexed and he then went on to say all the years that we had a in our younger years had given us a base from which to accept that when a devastating blow strikes you In your life time, It does not mean that it has to be devastating to you for a lifetime.

OK, double talk, is it now? I asked. He said “no I know the strengths you possess and you have always been a God send to me in my lowest of times as I learned how to live as a blind person”, He told me that he learned from me to travel with the family as if I could see, and to never just sit around and think that because he was sightless that he could not see. I sat there and remembered when he first lost his sight how scared he was, and how he grew strength as time went on, and then now a very confident self sufficient individual who can cook sew and tell you who is in the room even when not a word has been spoken.

I had been in so much pain these last few days that my husband who is home from work for a while bought take out all of the last few days. I am really having a rough time, but I have paid close attention to my body and I have found only when I get up and then sit over and over I have more pain. And when I stand for a longer period of time I can manage to get my chores done. So if I do not repeat the sit and stand routine I gain progress in my day. I have new tennis shoes they are very thick in the sole and take the shock before the walking motion can catch up to my knees.

I am trying really hard I am not to fond of take out, and then there is the cost, so I do have motivation, but I have also found that there is always another day and that my chores can take longer than usual, so I have slowed down the production line quite a bit. I have not dusted in a couple of weeks and was very embarrassed from the way my home appeared to be not the presentable way it should be for company. My brother  in-law is blind, but my sister in-law and her daughter are not. I was trying to apologize for the lack of tidiness in the home when my brother in-law just said to me that he always sees the same old house we had in his mind the one where the kitchen and bathroom were the only other rooms in the home and the living room /bedroom /dining room were ten feet away.

I laughed at that and then said hey you did not go blind until ten years ago and we have lived here well beyond that time, He turned towards me and said that when he imagines any thing at all in his mind the first thing to come to him is the best or happiest place that he has ever been so that when anything is described to him his memory will immediately relate to that particular place,  and then he said “I grew up there and my brother and you were there for me when I needed you, so I can describe that place to anyone as if I can still see”. “It was always home to me, and any home that you have had since then is the same to me home. so don’t go on about what is not done on the house, because we are here to see you, and be here for you not a thing else except maybe a another cup of coffee”.

I had a great time and I remembered that family can be great even if they are in-laws.

Food For The Mind

Lilly’s Way            www.lillysway.com

I as usual have just kept up that old faithful mind set that nothing lasts for ever and I sometimes feel that I am dead wrong this time, I only wish I was and maybe I can believe that they are wrong. I sat for a collective 18 idle hours waiting for a diagnosis at the emergency room, only to be given a Tylenol 3 prescription, that is standard. In after the x-rays confirmed my worst fears. I am going to be crippled here soon yes that was the diagnosis, I know that oh well people live with that everyday, but with no health care this is a night mare. I have bone on bone damage now, and it is escalating to now my other leg I am worried and rightly so.

I have been crying at night, every night for as long as I can remember anymore I am a nervous wreck I can not eat, or function, I break to the nearest chair in sight just to get off of my legs constantly. I went to the grocers with my family and could barely stand the pain long enough to remember what I needed. I was trying to get things that no one else ever thinks about when they go, and frankly I wanted to get out of the house. What a bad idea I cried my self to sleep and could not function on my legs at all the next day.

My thirteen year old has a computer chair he brought it to me to get to the kitchen so that I could make him breakfast, so now I am on wheels so to speak that is on wheels,  but not a wheel chair, with no arms on this chair I move, since it is for a young person it is narrow and has the ability to raise up to reach the cabinet with little effort and I think I will try to modify it. I have been pouring my thoughts towards the chair since I need it more often than not. I have for two days now jumped in that chair and used my arms to spring board myself from room to room. I have given myself a diet of liquids, for the proof is in the pudding. If I loose a bit more weight I can maybe stand longer. I cannot and will not walk well again they say, but I think that I will,  it came like day to night, one moment I could and just ignored the very uncomfortable  pain and then I was in this chair. I pray for some kind of God send everyday. More importantly I look for a remedy everyday.

I am an adult I know where there is no cartilage there is no cartilage, but oh well, I can dream can’t I ?  I have even played the mega millions. I need a ray of hope that seems attainable. I believe that there must be a way to afford a buffer or a fake cartilage. I am just kidding about the lotto I did buy a ticket and well with the law of averages I may  or may not have Murphy on my side, but it does no harm to try. I have to much to do and now that my husband is feeling bad I am feeling useless in this battle.

I saw an infomercial this morning that was geared toward the rebuilding of cartilage in the joints, I concede to you that it may not work in all practicality, but trying something is always better than just giving in to the words I heard last week and I quote (” you can get a government plan to help with you debilitating disease as you will eventually loose not only your ability to move your legs at the knee, but as the x-rays have shown us your whole body has this disease”). I asked if there were no prospects for a remediation to the problem, the intern went on to say that they can manage the pain very well for me. I don’t want a pain killer I want an address to the core of the problem not pain medication I said, he shrugged his shoulders and said ” wouldn’t we all”, he then wrote out the prescription and sent me home. I am angry at the little things that I cannot do and even more so at the large tasks that seem now insurmountable. The future that someone else has painted for me is unacceptable and an inconceivable one in my view.

I do not cave easily no, not at all after biting my lip and thinking on this I decide not to fill out the prescription  and take the road less traveled. I can continue research on my own and find maybe a natural way to address what my disease is doing to me. I do not like feeling helpless and I have made up my mind that I am not helpless, there are many, many, many things that I can do to over come the tasks that are overwhelming to me, and then there is the tenacity that has helped me come this far in my life. I refuse to think that there are no resolves to this particular problem. I dare to give up for it means that I will be where “they”  have put me, in the group that accepts all that they are told by a doctor and just accepts their fate.

I already have read more on the subject than I would have liked to, but I can always recall those firm and unrelenting words my mother shared with me through trying times. “Educate yourself my darling Lilly, for knowledge is power, knowledge can release a person from the grips of evil, and deliver a person to the yields of the earth if you are brave enough and can withstand the tides. If you can see past the bad and the things that block you from that view. Learn to look past the now and never just settle, learn what you are capable of achieving”. I did walk when all said I would not ever, and I played all sports when they said I would not ever play one, I emerged from the grips of a hellish childhood with love and yearning for a better life ahead, I did those things with out a doubt in my head  that I could not.

I often saw my mother broken, and deteriorated, beaten down physically, and mentally, and then when we all left and packed up and left him my father, he would find us and he would bring us back, to even a more horrific encounter than the one that made us run away in the first place. I do remember that my mother would make us go to school the very next day and would pack us a hearty lunch with notes  that would say “I love you, God loves, you and you love all of your siblings, this is enough to get any one through anything. My mother with her broken arm, or black eyes, or her hair ripped out in clumps on the ground would not ever send us to school with out a lunch.

I thought that she was not brave , but as I grew I saw her try  and try and try to leave until we all grew up and left. The days of long ago still fresh as if yesterday. I left last and slow I worked two jobs and went to school to save enough to finally leave, My father would take half of all that I earned and made all of my chores tougher, but I kept my composer and went along with all that I had to, for the dream of all that I knew would and could be different. I found that he grew ill and week and that I did not have to run I knew that my mother was to broken and old to leave.

I became a strong willed person with nothing but love for the new life that was on the horizon for me. I knew that there is as much good as there is evil out there and that I had the power to choose. I have been through and survived a broken jaw when my father punched me across the room for not being fast enough to get him a glass of water, I lost 3 molars and two teeth. I learned to chew at the front of my mouth, I have had six broken ribs, a cracked pelvis, a broken finger and a hairline fracture from one end of my skull through the circumference, the migraines were horrid. I did find natural healing and a mind set that would and has gotten me through a lot. I write these horrible things along with the good things for those who might care to know that all things evil do come to an end.

I have a decease so what, I feel that I can try to overcome the prognoses, yes this person who gave me a bad report on my health did not know the things that I have experienced in my life and the things  that have happened to this body, he just knows what he has studied and can only give me a prognosis from that prospective, If I am to be crippled by this disease it will not be without a fight, it will not be with out all of the knowledge of how to deal with what is to come, and it will not certainly be with out my giving in to concede that I have been beaten, and well that will be a clod day in ha-tees.

So for now I am in the chair more often than I care to be but knowledge is power and I am feeling a bit smart today.

Food For the Mind

Lilly’s Way  www.lillysway.com

He accumulates a mountain of paper work for his verification process to each active project and when he stops at a rest stop it is usually to answer e-mails and tend to emergency task that require immediate attention. His phone rings at least once every minute so he gets no rest at all, Please let me say that we are very grateful for the opportunity to be busy and have work. The projects active at this time are 9, and when 4 shut down for the day the other 5 start the evening shift so he is on call and makes at least 1 appearance to each site by the morning, when the others start up again well I guess by now you get the picture. I have done this run before well into our 30 plus years together It is tiring, unrelenting, and extremely demanding.

When we were young and not so young just about a couple of years ago we always worked together, it was almost a manageable chaos. the work, the travel, the good and bad foods and the job site it self in beautiful towns, and in ugly towns, in a nice area of a city or in the worst you could imagine. Eventually when the summer came around all of us would go and help out on the trip. My children learned to drive on the trips, they learned an array of things like about how to travel, and take a phone message, where to go to the bathroom and most importantly where not to, how to greet people, how to find the nearest hospital in case of an emergency, what safety measures there were to take in consideration at rest stops, and gas stations, and the various hotels motels and places that rented rooms for the night.  I decided to make it a family trip and jumped in the car with him  last Thursday so he could ride and visit with the kids and I would drive.

The kids are now in the teens only one is eleven they have spent virtually every summer and vacation time on the road with us for the purposes of work, but my children other wise could know very little of their father if we were home all of the time. Traveling was some times nightmarish with toddlers in diapers, or ill and I will not bore you with the teething process on the road. Just so that we are on the same page as to my mind set for travel (I do not like it at all), but I will go and go, and go if it means that my family can learn that you can have a chance to absorb from each other the good the bad and the ugly and still come out of the experience with love and appreciation for each other.

My children never go to bed with out saying good night to us, they take the time to text or call their dad every evening. They even can guess what town he might be in by the time they go to bed. The way we have lived was never ideal and sometimes I could pull my hair out for the things that we went through on the road, but I know that my husband has had just as much of my children that any working dad can get He is very grateful for that. He a;ways says ” hey remember” something or other about their learning to walk or their first words and it is comforting that they can know him as well as they do.

I was non to happy on the summers and holidays that were in strange towns or a different state when it was just he and I, but when we took the kids, well they were challenging to say the least, but we were really to busy to notice the things that we did not like about the traveling. My children like all children liked to wonder and ask about every little thing they saw, their curiosity was never ending. They gave us a new perspective on our travels  and we just grew into this automatic packing and unpacking way of life. My oldest can name any model and make of almost any vehicle by 5 years of age. He would say hey mom look at the color of the 94 Chrysler that’s ugly don’t you think? I would just say oh I guess it passed me before I could see it (I had no idea then or even now what make and model a car is).

We have come to travel with a large cooler, our back packs, our own blankets, pillows, and very important our own individual music at least the kids call it music. We have eaten any where and every where and always try to take pictures for the sake of memories. we had a very extravagant meal on this trip I have to share this because it is summer and some of you may be thinking of getting out there to see this great state we live in called Texas. The place we ate at (if you like fish and shrimp) was called Kings Point off of highway 77 heading south before you get to Riviera on the left is a big blue sign it states you can travel to the water and than your there about 8 or maybe 10 miles in.

This was the best I have ever tasted and I grew up fishing I could scale, gut, and fillet a fish by the age of 8 with out so much as a blink, my mother hated the very smell of fish so my sisters and I learned to cook , boil, saute, bake and most assuredly fry fish by the book from any cook book we could find, we eventually added our own spices and had great recopies to share. So when I say that it was the best I have ever had it means a lot to me. The most succulent ocean scallops, the biggest gulf shrimp, the tasty fish itself left me in awe, but the start of the meal was a simple salad with a platter of big sturdy sliced tomatoes and the salad was covered with a whole sliced avocado and yet my tastes were challenged by their homemade tarter sauce nothing like it anywhere in Texas or any place else. I have been through most of the states in our country at one time or another but this was very different from what I know tarter sauce to be. It was a cross between a pate’, and a puree of a medley of the best combination of (you were not allowed to ask) the secret ingredients that you could possibly pallet.

My kids took pics by the water and ate until you could not eat another bite and the portions were so generous, you can only order by the pound no menus just great food by the pound trust me it was great. The prices were steep for our budget, but well beyond worth the price. I had to share this quaint restaurant because the secret is out the file of cars we passed on the way out of the parking lot coming down that long, lonely, seemingly your lost road was never ending until we got back to highway 77 where you should try to stop if you can for the best bite of fish and tarter sauce you have ever tasted.

We have eaten at many places that looked to be good and were not and places that looked as though you would not want to stop there, but you really can not tell a book by it’s cover. My kids now older and very knowledgeable talked about the food for the three days we drove and my husband slept all the way home. I am tired and want to get a little rest Today he is back on the road doing a little ring around the roses again for his work, maybe a little rested than before, and we just text-ed him what I made for dinner. I think I maybe would try to work in some travel this summer,  just another couple of months are left before all of our lives change again. The school runs, my son leaving and the daughter that wants to drive her siblings for me this year. My husband said that he knows things have to change, but he missed when the kids were little and it felt as if they would always need us to take care of them. I love that man and I can tolerate the road for him any day.

Food for The Mind

Lilly’s Way   www.lillysway.com

Every day is different and then by way of that avenue do I concede to what and how it will affect what I do. Am I predictable no, and by no means should you expect me to be so. Am I just fickled no I am not that either. I don’t ever see if my last day to write was offensive of just plain silly or even if I did not seem to be the same, because I am as different as the day is, every day. Oh and I thank God for that. I love to try things that I read about and I read every day. I want and hunger for the knowledge that could possibly be what I need that day.

Things are a world apart of thoughts from person to person. I think that there are as many different ways to live according to what one thinks as there are blades of grass on this earth and I do not think that I am all knowing and that we will all conquer with my point of view or with how, and what makes me tick. I do although think that if we share as human beings, we then give of ourselves enough that we may impress on  someone with the same conflicts, or triumphs that we are doing good to find those crossing paths. These thoughts and mistakes  make us who we are and they help us be what we are. It is the humane thing to share knowledge and to brighten someone else’s path from time to time with that knowledge.

I love that we have the Internet and that I can reach out to someone anyone and that they can reach out back to me. I read about the things that are important to someone else and I do not say oh that is wrong, for you it may be a rock solid point of view as mine are to me. In fact that is what draws me to sit and write , so that when I grasp a way to handle something or share how I did it. Life will keep on its track and time stops for no one. I have met so many people on line that I am a better person and I have grown in many ways from that connection. If you are willing to share I am willing to listen, but I hope you don’t think that I will agree with everything you say I most certainly know that you will not always take my point of view as always right.

Food For The Mind

Lilly’s Way  www.lillysway.com

It may be a little crazy but I do find where there is a will there is a way. I, although dedicated to my plight am facing adversity in just the simple challenge of being able to walk in to an opportunity with out seeming to, in need and conceding to what ever I can get until the next time of opportunity. This I can tell you is a recipe for disaster. I still rise up to what comes and fight until the task is complete. I have been idle now for a month and becoming alarmed as to what my husband can do for us on his own. He just keeps on going as if the energizer bunny starting over and trying to keep afloat at the same time is hard, but he just does what is presented to him at his job and keeps on going.

He has worked as a painter and in construction since he was 10 that’s right he gave up his education at the end of high school to support his family since his dad became ill. He worked as a painter for nine years at the age of 19 he found a good paying job that required us to travel for the projects to be completed were always in another city much as they are today. He did not mind and I became used to the travel, we were young so adventurous was the name we gave our livelihood, but if you have ever worked with your hands in a struggling economy you know that checks come irregular and usually at the end of a project, so we got used to saving real quick.

I learned not to use credit ever, and only buy what we need, and only by way of cash or you could run into trouble. Our creditors were the utility companies who would not ever work out a plan for the kind of payments we made according to our income, and if were in need of a vehicle we would save enough for a two thirds down and maintain a small note. These were the tricks to how our lives worked then, and how mainly we have to live now. The flat industry of our way to provide income for the family was a bust for our bank account and our very livelihood.

I paid virtually every doctor visit for my little ones cash even the astronomical train of shots required through out their early years. This because the cost of any insurance was way out of our grasp and when we got steady work the tide never would let us make any sort of regular payment, but what the heck you make do with what you have and keep moving towards the goals you can still accomplish, and put the others on the back burner. This gave us a good but simple life and a challenge to stay afloat.

I know that anything you have that is material has only the value  you place on it as an individual, but I do not flip my nose at my home. This is where my children have learned all that they need to come out a bit better off than the people of my era. My children have learned to educate themselves to the up most that their imagination will allow them to achieve. My husband and I both came from families that did not endear education, but through our struggle we learned that the knowledge availability of today will drastically turn the tide for our children and their future if well educated.

I stay up nights and can not find a restful minute as we are being scrutinized by our mortgage company’s evaluation of our ability to get a second chance to keep our home. We were on target even with the lack of work we still paid our mortgage note. but our note was sold to seven (7) different mortgage companies or banks until we ended up with the clause of a balloon note that kicked in two years ago. We have a large note but one we could live with since we did not indulge in credit cards and had our lives in control until there was no work and then my husbands illness, but we were floored at the prospect of coming up with a mortgage of $2,600.00. Monthly no less.

I tried to get a different loan and as I well knew since we had no steady checks we were not even considered for the mortgage refinancing of our home we have exhausted all of avenues the “saves” that the government had issued were for the people who lived beyond their means, and the people who were in  credit card  debt, so we have kept on the slide toward loosing our home for the past year we have worked and lived, but we did not get into the debt that would possibly save us from loosing our home now.

I felt a bit chastised from our mortgage company for not having the credit card debt that would save our home. In fact they wanted us to see if we had used our income to pay off credit cards and we could use that for our save, of course we had none. I don’t quite know what to make of the way you can ask for help, is it only after you have been bad, or done wrong can there be help for you when you need a helping hand? We are not asking for anything that the other people in debt are asking for we are working and have been applying all we have towards the saving of our home, but is it a wrong to have lived within what our means afforded us to?

I have a matter of a couple of weeks to the resolve of this consideration from our mortgage company. I am not holding my breath, but I am on pins and needles. I can only pray for the best and hope that we have a reasonable evaluation performed on our twelve page packet. I sent out nothing but zeros on almost all of the questions, as 65 % of the questionnaire pertained towards the credit card and loan debt. I really think that the forms were ridiculousness to say the least. We had no work and now we have work that would afford us to make a decent note. As I write this today my heart is heavy I know that it could go either way maybe 50/50 but I feel way down deep in my gut that maybe we should have over extended ourselves and we could have a better chance of being saved ha! go figure.

I am perplexed at the way things are at the moment and I know that I may have to start again, as I look at the trees and the sun on them this morning my smile came almost instantly just for the beautiful view I have for now. My children lay sleeping in their beds and they ate breakfast this morning while I drank my coffee, and soaked my knee in an epson salt pack. I remember all the good, all the bad, and all of the wonderful things as clearly as when I first set foot in this, my home. I felt as if I was always meant to be here. My son asked me if I had slept well, because of the pained look that had come out on my face, that had just come over my face since the probability of loosing my home crept in along with the appreciation I was giving it in my thoughts. I said that it was my knee and did not let on the fear I was hiding.

I was trying to tell my husband last night that I had not much faith in the packet, but he was glad to hear that I had got the packet off and with cheer in his voice, said he had to go because he was looking for a hotel close to the job site. I did not have the heart to tell him what my thoughts truly were and maybe it is for the best that I wait and not tinge his day tomorrow which is today with worry. He said that he felt good and that maybe we have taken a turn for the better this time. I said that I loved him and hung up the phone.

I have never heard my husband, I mean never heard him say I give up, on the contrary he always just says “lets see what tomorrow brings us”. He has much more faith than I at this point, I have an over whelming sadness that I am hiding today, the tears are there, the flushed look. I can be a very strong willed individual, but I am not infallible, nor am I with out fears. I guess the mind can ponder all of the bad as well as the good I just feel a little beaten hear of late. His way my husbands way is to always look at the bright side. I have strayed a bit and can not seem to fathom the will he has, but I am going for that second cup of coffee and I will again try to stay the fight until it is over. One way or the other, I will seek out that faith that is eluding me today.

Food for the Mind

Lilly’s way   www.lillysway.com

Of course I call myself a woman of today and I use a dust mop, vacuum, and regular mop. I would not be able to keep up with wood floors on any scale these days. On the Movie nights we would keep the television on all night until the broadcast signal went on every channel, and then we would turn on the record player and listen to Nat king Cole, Frank Sinatra, and the like for my mother she loved to sing to any music but these were her favorite. After a while when we were all tired and the floors were almost finished we would listen to our music I like to listen to Rock (now its called classic rock), my younger sister did not care what music was on she liked everything and my older sister would listen to the only record she had it was the Archie’s.

We usually finished right around time to fix breakfast and start laundry we washed every day except on Sunday and then my sisters and I would take a nap. I, these days wash every day, some of my older kids have started to keep up with their own laundry, because they have favorite things they like to wear so the laundry department is more under control. I remember that after a long night of doing the floors my mother never took a nap or a rest, she just kept on with her day as if not exhausted and  as I grew older and our routine change a little she just barreled through the regimen whether we were there or not. I prayed that I would have half of her tenacity  to get so much done.

One day as we were watching a movie on movie night I said to my mom in between the movie and waxing “hey mom don’t you get tired of working so hard everyone is asleep and if the floors aren’t perfect I don’t think anyone will mind”. I mean really. My mother said that “a man can work from sun to sun, but a woman’s work is never done”. I laughed and said to her, “so that’s why you do it because you think you should never have idle moments”, “because of a rhyme”?. She said “no because we live here and any place that you live, and spend with those you love who love you should be a clean, healthy surrounding, I can only do what I can with what I have, so I give you my best of what that is. I want you all to have some good memories and come back to me when you leave, and you will. So a clean, sparkling home with all I cook, and everything I can teach you might just be enough to encourage you to come back once in a while”.

I helped her finish that night just she and I as our family had disintegrated down to just my parents, myself, and my younger brother. None of my other siblings were there anymore they found that they could run and they did. I did not run I studied hard went to school half of my day and worked two part time jobs. I felt as if I was abandoning my mother when I left and got married. Many many things transpired  through those last years when I was still home as a young person, but of all the memories (those that I care to remember) I remember learning, asking, crying, and absorbing what my mother had to offer.

I having had so wonderful a person in my life made the difference between leaving half cocked, or leaving fortified and capable, so that I may be in a position to see her when it stirred me to do so. I saw my mother every possible time I could and it meant seeing her along with my father, but I had grown to be strong, no longer afraid, and as such that my mother made me. I was able to take her away from him so that she could finally have peace in her very ill last years. My father was annoyed by her illness, and begged me to take her or put her away so I seized the chance and kept her as long as I could. I had more work and many more responsibilities than I contemplated, but I would do it all again given the chance even with the knowledge of what hard times my mother went through in her illness. I would not have it any other way. I do all of my chore as I know that they must be completed, but I do not ever think that cleaning can’t wait, I spend a lot of my time any spare moment with my children if they allow me to, because I know that the chores will always be there, but that they will have to leave sooner or later and they will, so I am glad to have tile or carpet rather than wood. I do though try to keep them to the best of my ability clean, but I hope that my children will come back often after they leave regardless.

Food For the Mind

Lilly”s Way   www.lillysway.com

I was put to a regimen after a year of acupuncture of a grueling 1 mile walk every day by my father, so as to not be an eye sore in his eyes (he was not having a cripple in his home). Well that meant every day I was awaken to a grueling walk straight out of the door at 4:30 in the morning. My father had to be at work by 6Am so he would drag me around the block about five or six time yelling at me to walk every day for about a half of a year. No I am not exaggerating. I only got a break on the days he did not come home. I eventually got to where I could hobble on my own, and then one and a half years later I could do the walk where he would watch me and wait for me to do the four passes around the block.

My father was very rough and had an attitude of never ever say you can not do something. When I was released from the hospital after a year of treatment, my parents were told that I would not ever walk with out my braces and I would always be handicapped. My father was very outraged at that statement and said to them “you so and so’s know not everything, my girl will walk and you can shove your know it all c— down someone else s throat” I know that his motivation was not for me of at least I never thought that it was, but I do walk and have played sports as if I had not ever an ailment in my life as a young person.

About ten years ago I started to have  this pain in the same leg as I had the polio , I have seen my father and 2 of my brothers have knee replacements, and all had rheumatoid arthritis my father ended up in a wheelchair at the age of 65 until his death he was in pain taking all that the doctors could give him to alleviate it. Nothing ever did, my youngest brother has a hard time walking and although a knee was replaced he is in pain everyday with the other knee and would not replace it according to him it is very painful either way. My older brother has his own knees that look like four or five golf balls are growing from the center of  them  and is in pain a lot every day for as long as I can remember. We both do not have health care so as many people do these days we make do.

I have taken enough Aleeve and Tylenol to have filled a couple of five gallon buckets, you might say what an abuse of  over the counter medication, I say thank you God that I could have that availability to make it through the rough excruciating nights  that I know I would have passed out from the pain. I had been through the emergency room and tried to pay for a physician so many times I lost count. The story was always the same get a referral, keep the next appointment and we will start the rest soon I had spent close to $1,800.00 in a eight week span and not even had an X-Ray, that would be after the blood test the urine test and the see if this pain killer will give you any relief visit to the doctors I was still in “the you have to get a referral to get to the specialist” phase. I have never had health care and at this point I do not see it in my future.

I gave up on letting my children go hungry so that I could pay for Vicodin and the like, for the pain. After eight weeks of trying to get some relief, and my bank was dry,  going to the circus of health care was not an option. If you do not have a referral you cannot see a specialist, If you do not go through the expensive testing you  cannot go forward I was resided to my own remediation for my ailment, so I depended on the best that I could afford for the last 10 years. I do hobble and I am not ashamed I do my best and keep a stiff upper lip. On good days when the weather is cool and dry I do not suffer so much.

This past month was a nightmare though the pain just elevated continuously and I could not find relief of any kind ice, heat, ointments, braces not even my old reliable pain medications with my glucosamine would work. I had cried so much that my pillow stayed soaked from the tears. I scoured the Internet and came upon a blog on the effects of relief for arthritis pain called Tryflex I never would think to peddle someones product and I know that even as I write this there are those of you who would question my doing the very thing by pitching the name right out there. I will say to you walk in my shoes of pain just for a day not a month just a day and see if you do not have the courage to just pass it on.

I stay current on anything that can help I keep my legs active exercise,  soak my legs in Epsom salt, wear arch supporting insoles, and I never give up trying to live with this ailment. I took three of these pills after struggling so much about the cost $60.00 or so my son went and got it I was not sure just how much of our groceries would suffer the hit for an out of budget expenditure, but I am so glad that I did concede to the cost. I woke up this morning without the tears and without all of my usual struggling just to get to the bathroom. I kid you not I have been a useless person the past month, not even the simple task of cooking and doing the dishes could get done with out my having to sit every five minutes for the pain. I have taken a shower, changed the linen on my bed, put in two wash loads, cooked breakfast, and washed my dishes and I have only been up an hour. I am literally on cloud nine.

How can this be after only just one regular dose, so what comes to me is the saying that my mother would say when I did not want to accept a direction or believe something she would say “yours is but to do or die, not to ask and reason why” I was drawn to write to you out there just to let you know how this has helped me in just one day. I know the nay Sayer’s are out there, I know that it may not work for everyone, I know that there are those who might say “the gall of that woman, how dare she just put it out there as if to be a knowing educated physician”, and for your peace of mind please note that I do not profess to be. I am but a person with a resolve for my situation that may or may not help someone else. I am now and always willing to share with my fellow man what little I can.

I am without pain, yes I am still a little uncomfortable , but not in agony, not rolling around the bed in so much pain that you would like to pass out rather than go through this suffering. Please take from this what you will, I do not expect to heal the knees in just one day, but I will not let myself get beaten down by something that could take away my ability to walk with out a fight. So for now the battle front is a lull in the pain department, and if you read as  often as I do, every spare moment. I can say you may find this can help you too. If it does just pass it on.

Food for the Mind

Lilly’s Way   www.lillysway.com

I was so happy to have a child when he was born. I had been trying for over a decade and had given up hope to not ever being privileged to becoming  a mother, and then one late October day when I was traveling with my husband for work I got the flu and had to come home because I had the worst flu I had ever experienced. I was living on the bathroom floor of the hotel we were in. It was so bad that the neighbors were complaining that my dry heaving was to much to bear and they asked to be moved.

When the room was occupied that very same evening I was asked by the manager to move next to the elevators so that no one else would complain. I knew that my husband would not get a wink of sleep if we were moved next to the elevators, so I packed up in between the runs to the restroom and left my husband a note, (he only made it to the room by 9 every evening, the seminar he was attending for his job required him to be social after the 12 hour classes so as to help recruit the newbies for the work he did at the time). I made the flight and had not realized that a two hour flight can be an eternity if you are feeling ill.

The flight attendants were really nice we flew very often for these seminars and were always recognized by one flight crew or another on the Southwest airline domestic flights. I was green and they, they were very kind, although they kept their distance for fear of catching my flu. They let me rest in first class at the back of first class for the whole flight. The plane was virtually empty. I always said that there are nice people everywhere even up in the air. My sister who was house sitting for us met me at the airport and took me straight to the doctor the very next morning after a really bad night.

I usually got ill with the onset of Fall I have weak lungs from an accident in my early years that left me weak and susceptible to colds, they usually turned into pneumonia. My doctor was one of those that would make a joke and say that he could mark his calender for my visits because he knew that I would not take a pill with out his having seen me first. He was my physician until he passed away 6 years ago( He was a really great person). I knew that he would check the blood to see if I had taken my lung medication regularly. I was literally floored when he said that I was pregnant, and not ill at all. He said that I would have to be careful when the pregnancy got further along and that he would be there  if there were any complications.

I told my doctor that I would do my exercises the ones that I had not ever done before(the ones I hated so much) and take the swimming lessons he so encouraged me to take for three years.  He just said yeah I’ll believe that when I see it. I said I am about to become a mother, a mommy, a person who has to ensure the safety of another. I will be ready. I said this as I became green again and spent the next hour in his office dry heaving. He gave me a shot and finally I could leave and go find a phone to call my husband with the good news. He was speechless and did not believe me so after the initial four to six weeks of being ill I caught up with him to show off my belly.

My son was born after a full term pregnancy and yes there were complications, but only that he was breach, so a C-section was inevitable for his birth. I had become a swimmer and like a fish I swam. My health was not an issue at his birth as I had set my goals well beyond the birthing point. I was going to be a mother a person who receives unconditional love from their offspring. a responsibility that I had longed for. I was not about to profess my love for a helpless totally dependent life and not be worthy. My mother would say that you can not give of yourself one ounce of love to another, if you do not take care of yourself in  the first place. I used to be perplexed by that statement, but no longer. She was right how can I take care of a child if I am not even healthy enough to take care of myself, so I did.

I had all of the world in front of me and my path was very clear there was to be no half way, half done, not up to it today feeling in this task. I was on cloud nine. I was as healthy as a horse my doctor said at delivery time(I still resent that remark) all of my dreams were realized as the most magnificent cry rang in that delivery room. My husband cried for joy as he saw his new son come into this world, and I was so glad to hear the cry I exclaimed how beautiful it was to hear him. The doctor said only a real mother would ever say that, and that I should let him know if I still feel that way in a couple of months after he was home.

My oldest is a joy and always has been, I used to say that I had a (Stepford) son in joking because he has never given his father or I one day of grief. I know you say oh yeah sure I bet not, but you would be completely out of line. He to this date has not. Now he has completed all of his core classes and acquired a two year degree he will be leaving in the fall (This is a very happy , sad , heart wrenching, happy sick feeling ) time in a mothers life as many mothers get used to the fact that their children leave for the armed forces, they get married, they go away for school, or they journey to find themselves. I am not alone in this matter as any mother has the empty feeling that hollow gnawing will they be alright feeling everyday that they are gone. I know that it is as it must be, and I would not ever say a word to let him know my fears. I will help him pack at the end of this summer and give him no grief, I will be strong and not shed a tear for, I started to prepare myself for this time in his life on the day he was born. I not only physically got into a healthy regimen, but everyday I have reminded myself that he is only on loan to me for a short time(they all grow to fast) that he was made for the world and has to mature on his own to be the kind of person with substance that I have admired in his father for 30 plus years. I know that this is what becoming a mother is really all about. Doing your best and letting them go. I implore those of you about to become a mother the time with your children is but a blink of an eye use it wisely.

Food For the Mind

Lilly’s Way         www.lillysway.com