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How’s That Working For You? (#170)

Parade Magazine--a supplement to Sunday newspapers across the U.S.--has a recurring cover story I just can't get enough of called "What People Earn: A Special Report."

They run an updated version of their special report every six months or so, replete with scores of pics of typical wage-earners, including their annual incomes and their professions.

They always throw in a few movie stars, rock stars and sports celebrities just to inspire class envy in the rest of us. We ask ourselves which chick is worth her pay: 18-year-old Lindsay Lohan, who currently pulls down $10 million a year, or Jessica Simpson, who at age 24 almost seems like a has-been with a measly take of $4 million. Of course, both of them make peanuts compared to Lance Armstrong, who's hanging in there at a cool $19 million.

But when I recover from my momentary star envy, I check out the regular folks. And that's where the mysteries really abound. How is it that someone with a position as important-sounding as a "Public Health Administrator" in Columbia, Missouri only makes $25,000 per year, and an airport screener (presumably a very important job in our day and age) makes $29,800, but a mortgage broker is worth $280,000?

I've made several visits to mortgage brokers in my day, and the way I remember the transactions, I ended up doing all the work of supplying every bit of my personal financial history to them and then signing my life away, to boot. And I only refinance if there's "no cost" to me--so where the heck are they getting the $280,000 paycheck?

I don't mind a power-plant worker making $125,000, since it seems like those are guys we want to keep on our side, and a power-grid operator makes even more--$162,000--which seems like a small price to pay to keep brown-outs from rolling.

I think a cracker-jack probation officer is worth every cent of $65,000. But I'm still puzzled to think a tow-boat captain tows in $85,000 besides whatever else it is that a tow-boat captain tows.

How many boats would a tow-boat tow if a tow-boat could tow boats? (Sorry. I couldn't resist.)

It's the low-paying jobs that shock me the most. It seems that all the positions with the word "community" in them are terribly compensated for all their good intentions. A "community advocate"(is anyone really AGAINST community?) scrapes by on $18,600.

And a driver's ed instructor seems like a critical profession to me, yet the one profiled only drives away with 25 grand.

Each time this story appears, they include one writer in the bunch, just to infuse us wordsmiths with some angsty emotion to fuel our writing for the next few days. This time, it's a horror writer in Berkeley, California who's 33 years old and compensated for his efforts a crummy $18,500 year. I wonder which came first: the horror writing or the horrible pay?

All I can hope for the poor guy is that maybe he's lucky enough to be married to the woman who's making $105,000 as a pet-boutique owner. Can you imagine the horror of trying to live in Berkeley on less than 20 grand?

You may have noticed that I don't have a donation button on my site, and I'm not accepting advertising--yet--but that doesn't mean I wouldn't like to sell a few manuscripts and live like royalty--oops, I mean "on royalties."

But I need to face facts. Whenever Parade Magazine does their story on "What People Earn," writers are always down there at the bottom of the heap. If I was doing this for money, well, I wouldn't be doing it.

Still, it's good to know that Doug is thriving in his position as an, um...hold on a second...

"Hey, Doug, tell me again--what do you call what you're do for a living?"

"You mean, Knowledge Management Consultant And E-Business Systems Analyst?"

Yeah. What he said.

If I'm going to be a podunk writer, it's a darned good thing he's...not.

Posted by Katy on 03/14/05
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Ranch Or Honey Mustard? (#171)

So Kev's gone and it's just the two of us. The weather's nice out there today, and I want to get outside before the temp starts to drop off again, but Doug's been busy with some work for a client.

"I think I've come to a stopping point," he finally announces. It's nearly 3 o'clock. "We could go get some coffee or something."

"Or something?"

"Well, I do have a major starvation problem..."

I never think about this kind of stuff on Saturday. Heck, I barely think about regular meals during the week anymore. We both know where the fridge is, I figure. And the microwave's just a couple steps away. OK. I'm exaggerating about my expanding absence of meal preparation, but not by much.

"I pulled some chicken finger-thingies out of the freezer," I said. "Should I pop them in the oven?"

"Yeah."

"By the way," I asked, "what would you do about your 'major starvation problem' if I were dead?"

"Umm...cook the chicken fingers?"

Next, I'll show him how to pull them out of the freezer. At least then if I croak, he'll be fully prepared.

Posted by Katy on 03/12/05
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Saturdays With(out) Kevin (#172)

"So, I'm outta here."

Kev rolled out of bed around noon after getting home after two in the morning, ate some breakfast, got dressed, and now stands before his dad and me in all his shining glory.

"What? You can't leave!" I love playing this role of mine. I've got the darned thing figured out down pat. "We'll miss you so much--Doug, look at your kid's face...Won't we miss him if he's not here?"

Kevin pretends to be a pain-in-the-hmmm-hmmm, and almost sounds convincing. "Yeah. Well, I'm going."

I pretend to mistrust him. "Just where do you think you're going?"

"John Jenkins."

"What are you gonna do with Jenkins?"

"Hang out."

His eyes begin to twinkle. He knows the piece-de-resistance is about to be delivered on a platter.

I furrow my brow and glare at him. "Hang out, huh? And what does that mean, exactly?"

"Do drugs."

Dear Lord, how I love that kid.

Posted by Katy on 03/12/05
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If You Don’t Want To Comment On This Post, I’ll Forgive You. If You Ask Nicely, That Is. (#173)

Let me begin by admitting that I have issues with forgiveness. Not with giving it, exactly. And not with receiving it, either.

My problems with forgiveness revolve around definitions of terms, I guess. Am I really asking for forgiveness when I say to my friend, "I'm sorry you feel like I hurt you?" Or am I begging to be understood? Am I really being sincere when I'm caught off-guard by the offended, who makes my sins known to me in no uncertain terms and taps their fingers on the table until I say the magic words, "Will you forgive me?"

There are so many nuances involved in the art of forgiveness, so many fine lines when it comes to discerning my own motives, that I'm often more confused after a session of supposed forgiveness than I was before.

It seems I'm always struggling in my heart to forgive people who've neither asked for my forgiveness nor apparently believe that they've offended me in the manner in which I feel offended. Do you know what I mean?

Have you ever sweat bullets while preparing a heartfelt apology for something you said or did, and then when you delivered it with every ounce of sincerity in your being, the other person said, "I don't know what you're talking about. I don't even remember you saying that..."

That's happened to me so many times, I've lost count. And I'm never sure if the people are telling the truth, or if they just feel really uncomfortable admitting that I've offended them. And then I always end up wondering if they're really offended at me after all, only they're offended about something I've said or done that I'm completely unaware of!

One time when I was a relative newcomer to forgiveness, a friend asked me to meet her for coffee, and she proceeded to list (in alphabetical order, if I remember right...) everything I'd ever done to hurt her. Here I thought we were going for the French silk pie, and instead each sentence out of her mouth started with, "And then there was the time..."

Of the fifteen or twenty specific charges she brought against me, I only identified with one of them. "You don't like my dog." Well, she had me there. At the end of the session, I asked for forgiveness--for what, I still can't say. She said she was so glad we'd gotten together, and that she felt so much better after we talked. I cried for a week.

My one consolation, then and now, is that Jesus isn't confused about forgiveness at all. He made it the purpose of His life on this earth, in fact. He who caused people to be offended only with the shame of their own sins, since He committed none with which to offend them, also forgave them right up to His dying breath--first the thief hanging next to Him, and then those who crucified Him, because they knew not what they'd done. And when the Scripture says that He's now seated at the right hand of the Father, making intercession for us sinners, well...I believe.

Still, when it comes to me and other humans, I'm confused.

Do you have issues with forgiveness? Do you ask for it everytime you're "sorry," or just when you really intend to change your behavior? Do you have people in your life who ask regularly for forgiveness? Do you have any idea on earth what subject they're on?

Or is it just me?

Posted by Katy on 03/09/05
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Sacked (#174)

When my youngest son, Kevin, neared high school graduation, I realized I had a problem. For some reason known only to God and the skillful merchandise marketers at Walmart, I had seriously overestimated the number of paper lunch bags the Raymond household could expect to use in our natural lifetimes.

The idea of my math skills being so bizarrely deficient as to stick me with a surplus of many hundreds of bags has caused me no small amount of anxiety in the ensuing weeks and months, until now something new has been added to my 25-year long struggle with panic attacks: my best guess is that I have hyperventilation syndrome.

As you know if you've been reading here for even a week, last Sunday morning while sleeping I believed I was suffocating. Well, I landed in the ER the next night with the same symptoms, thinking I was certainly having a heart attack or something worse, like maybe imminent death without even bothering to distinguish myself by having the requisite myocardial infarction first.

It would be so like me to pull something like that.

But the EKG checked out fine, the chest x-ray proved to be another yawner, and the CT scan of my chest couldn't even drum up a blood clot or anything. I felt like such a failure.

Then I talked to my counselor a few days ago, who suggested that perhaps I'd manifested hyperventilation syndrome, and that, of course, I should try breathing into a paper bag the next time it happens.

Finally! My guilt over miscalculating our lunch sack needs began to abate as I pictured myself putting those puppies to excellent use balancing my oxygen intake and carbon dioxide output. I dedicated myself anew to being a careful, thoughtful, and grateful steward of the resources God entrusts to me, even if it means hyperventilating in order to make good use of a bad investment.

This morning, though, my paper bag nearly burst. I googled hyperventilation syndrome, and on one site came across this unfortunate piece of information, with no further explanation provided: "Use of paper bag is no longer recommended."

I read it aloud to Doug, who immediately shared my concern.

"Well," he said, "what's the alternative?"

"This says I need to see a shrink."

"You've got one. He said use a paper bag."

We laughed until we cried, but my breathing hasn't felt this normal in days.

Posted by Katy on 03/07/05
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Those Pesky Anglican Ankles! (#175)

Have you heard about the Anglican Rosary?

Honestly, until I caught up with some of Ragamuffin Diva's recent posts, I sure hadn't. Evidently, an Anglican priest came up with the concept in the 1980s. Ragamuffin's hubby purchased one for her online, where you can also get the book explaining how to use the beads.

I haven't been a practicing Catholic since the age of seventeen, but I've been a practicing Christian my whole adult life. (Whoever said practice makes perfect hasn't met me.) I've gotta say there are things about Catholicism I've never stopped missing, and the rosary is one of them.

It's not that I'm all about praying to Mary--I'm not. But I never got tired of the mysteries and the sorrows and the glories, and I crave them still.

So I called Mardel's, a mega-Christian-book-and-merchandise operation here in Kansas City, and asked for the gift department.

"Do you carry Anglican prayer beads? Kind of like rosaries for Protestants?"

"Ankle beads? I'm not sure we have any left..."

"No, not ankle. Anglican. Beads, like a rosary..."

"We don't have any ankle bracelets right now. We might get more, though. We've got some beaded necklaces..."

"Not ankle bracelets and not beaded necklaces. Not jewelry of any description. A rosary for Anglicans, who are kind of like Episcopalians, some of whom use a string of beads with a cross attached to say their prayers. Like Catholics do, only Anglicans are Protestants, like you. So, what I'm asking is whether or not you carry Anglican prayer beads."

"I'm sorry, ma'am. We're all out of ankle beads."

Yeah. Sometimes I really miss being a Catholic.

Posted by Katy on 03/05/05
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Terms Of Endearment (#176)

Every time 20-year-old Kevin walks into my field of vision, my life lights up. But the things that come out of my mouth when the lights come on, only he and I will ever fully appreciate.

Often I greet him with any song lyric that has the word "baby" in it, since he's my baby. I could go for "Baby, baby, I'm taken with the notion, to love you with the deepest of devotion..." but I never seem to move in quite that inspirational of a direction. It's not that I don't feel that way; it's just that Kevin and I have something deeper going on.

If I start with any "baby" song lyric, though, Kevin invariably responds with a "Mama" song, which he sings loudly and with feeling, occasionally down on one knee.

So, I hear the door slam--Kev's home from a long day at school. He trudges down the hall to my room, where he finds me sitting on the couch, writing.

Our eyes connect, and his are twinkling as always. I burst into song:

"Baby, baby, don't get hooked on me...."

and he sings his solo:

"Mama, just killed a man..."

And we both laugh like we didn't just sing the same old-fashioned love songs yesterday.

You tell me: Does it get better than this?

Posted by Katy on 03/04/05
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Unemployment Rate Skyrocketing? (#177)

You may not believe this, but I pay almost no attention whatsoever to my blog stats. I'm just not a numbers kind of chick, I guess. I'm into words--both the ones I share with you, and the ones you share with me. As long as that's happening, I'm happy.

Doug likes following stats, though, and every so often he gives me the scoop about what's going on out there in Statsville.

"You know what's weird?" he asked tonight. "For the past two weekends, your stats have been way up from what they were on the previous Monday through Thursday."

I've always known that blog readers tend to drop off on Friday, Saturday, and Sunday, presumably because they've, well, got better things to do. I've always assumed a lot of folks catch up on their reading on their employer's dime.

So here's my question: Did everyone suddenly quit their day jobs, or what?

Posted by Katy on 03/04/05
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Trading Faces (#178)

She got tired of being on the ER gurney pretty darned fast, but then she's not known for being overly patient. The room had a wind chill not unlike the one outside, which only hastened the inevitable.

"I've got to get up. I need to pee--quick!"

"Not so fast," the nurse said. "I'll get a wheelchair."

"I'm fine! Besides, I can run faster than you can push me! I can't wait!"

The nurse unfastened the EKG wires and removed the oxygen stats clothes-pin-like clip from an index finger. She unwound the blood pressure cuff from the left arm and disconnected the IV on the right.

An attendant rolled in with the wheelchair and made a big fuss of covering the old gal's rear end with a second hospital gown, put on backwards, like anybody really cares about stuff like that when she needs to pee.

Then the attendant bent down to make sure that the foot pedals of the wheelchair were perfectly aligned, as if the patient was about to test drive a sports car or something.

"Hurry! Really, I'm going to wet my pants!"

Which was pretty unlikely, since underwear and other valuables had been stuffed in a plastic bag some time back.

The attendant meandered down the hall behind the wheelchair, chattering cheerfully the whole way, stopping at least once to ask the doctor if she'd be needing a urine sample from the unfortunate lady who nearly produced one on the spot. Once she got the fiesty patient inside the bathroom and transferred safely onto the toilet, she asked if she should stay to witness the historic event.

"I'll be fine, and I'll be done in just a minute. I'll pop the door open when I'm through--OK?"

The attendant did not wait for the door to pop, though, and was standing in front of the patient within seconds, with one of her hands steadying the wheelchair.

The patient stepped to the back of the wheelchair, took ahold of the handles, and began to push it through the open door.

"Ummm...I don't know how to tell you this, but I'm supposed to be pushing the chair," the attendant said.

"Oh, yeah," I answered. "Sometimes I forget."

Posted by Katy on 03/01/05
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Just Breathe (#179)

"It's all right, my love. It's all right."

Somehow we'd gotten entangled in the bed. Both of us usually sleep on our right sides, with him facing the center of the bed and me facing my edge, but for some reason known only to God, Doug had rolled to his left side. I'd been up to use the bathroom at 4:30, and remember coming back to bed and rolling to my left side, also. So now we were spooning again, only Doug faced the outside of the bed, with me curled around his back.

My voracious dreaming resumed. I dreamed of the first house we lived in, back in 1979. I dreamed of a stranger knocking on the door and when I answered it, there was a sold sign in our yard, even though the place wasn't for sale.

"What's going on?" I asked the man on my front stoop. "You won't be needing this little place anymore," he said, with a cheesy grin and a giant, suitable-for-framing check in his outstretched arms. "You've just won 2.2 million dollars!"

I have such an active dream life, including regular nightmares, that I'm thoroughly attuned to the fact that it's "just a dream" even while I'm in the middle of it. I'm rarely frightened and often so amused by my nocturnal theatrics that I've gotten good at willing myself to stay asleep just a little longer so I can see how things turn out.

In the next dream scene, I had a conversation with a woman I'm close to, and expressed my feelings about a matter of great concern to me. She and I had more than a casual connection--we were lifelong friends. She was someone I could be honest with, I thought, and so I was. "You see?" Her voice turned caustic. "This is why we could never live together. You're just so negative about everything." I didn't see that one coming, and it really hurt, so I switched dream scenes fast.

Enter Gary Piane, my long time friend from grade school. In real life, I run into Gary every once in a while at Starbucks and we catch up with each other's lives. He's the nicest guy in the world, my own husband excluded. In my dream, we met unexpectedly in a gothic church building. I hadn't seen him in many years and he loved my new perm so much that he buried my face in his shoulder and spent an inordinate amount of time rubbing my curly head.

I had the distinct feeling of not being able to breathe, but I knew that with Doug standing right there in the church narthex watching along with God and everybody, the bear hug wouldn't last for long. I was right--it didn't, and I breathed a huge oxygenated gulp of relief.

Suddenly there was only Doug and me sitting next to one another in the back of the church, my head on his shoulder, trying to catch my breath. Then just as suddenly we weren't in the church at all, but at home in our own bed, with me still dreaming, but with a strange difference in the quality of the dream.

And then, as absolutely clearly as if I was awake--because in a very real sense, I was--I realized what was happening. I was suffocating. Somehow, I had wedged my face between Doug's shoulder and the mattress so closely that when he rolled from his left side partially onto his back, I became trapped.

You know how you wake up from certain dreams and the first thing you say is, "Oh, but it seemed so real!" This dream didn't seem real--it was real.

I cannot describe what it's like to be fully asleep and fully awake at the same time, but I know now it can happen. I became rapidly and consciously aware, while asleep, that I could not breathe at all, that whatever air pockets would have normally existed in a situation like ours simply weren't there. It felt as if I was physically trapped by the weight of Doug's body, which I could not push away from mine no matter how I struggled.

And then in my dream--and in real life--I thought, "When Doug is dreaming and he starts breathing really loud, it wakes me up. I must try to breathe loudly enough for him to wake up. Otherwise, I'm going to die."

I tried, both in my dream and in real life, and at first I could make no sound at all.

"You have to do this," I told myself both in my dream and in real life. "If you give up, and you die, Doug will be so upset that he suffocated you."

I knew I had to do it, for him.

So I breathed tiny shallow breaths, with every particle of oxygen left in the space allotted me, and with each inhalation and exhalation I forced miniature wisps of noise from my mouth, until finally Doug rolled away from me and spoke, bringing me fully to my senses.

"It's all right, my love. It's all right."

He thought, of course, that I'd merely been having another nightmare, that he'd awakened me with his words.

Until I told him that, while I was sleeping, I'd awakened him with my gasps.

"I slept, but my heart was awake." Song of Solomon

Posted by Katy on 02/28/05
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Will You Still Love Me Tomorrow? (#180)

"Babe," I say, "I'm exhausted. All I want is to go put on some comfy old pajamas and relax. But it's still so early...would you mind?"

"Not at all," Doug says.

I take a peek at the clock and try to tell myself no one should be putting on PJs at this hour, but I can't resist the temptation. "But, really, it's only 5 o'clock. Will you still respect me?"

"In the morning? Yeah."

I squirm a little. "But what about tonight? There's a whole lot of hours to get through before morning."

"Hmmm...you're right about that."

We both laugh, but just to be on the safe side of an old cliche, I'll think I'll hold off a little while longer.

Posted by Katy on 02/27/05
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My Life With A Celebrity Blogger, Take One (#181)

It has been humbly suggested over at Doug's site that he is riding the coat tails of my blogging success to his own meteoric rise in the blogosphere. As of this very hour, that preposterous idea is SO three days ago!

Congrats to radio personality and super-fun blogger Cindy Swanson for adding Doug to her list of illustrious interviewees. And kudos to Doug for his brilliant and swift-thinking answer to Question Number Five. I predict the guy will go far.

Thanks, Cindy!

Posted by Katy on 02/25/05
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I’m So Excited I Can Hardly Stand Myself! (#182)

My mother-in-law, Adele F. Raymond, who turns 83 years old tomorrow, is about to become a published author.

Oh, she's had some poems printed in her local newspaper in Massachusetts during WWII, but nothing much since then. She even worked in the offices of Popular Science Magazine before she got married in 1949 and started raising her family.

But then, life kicked in. The family moved a few times before settling in Rome, NY, where they stayed until 1970. When my father-in-law, Jack, accepted a transfer to Kansas City, she packed up the house and joined him here. Jack died of skin cancer the year Doug and I were married, in 1977, and Adele joined the workforce once again. She's retired now, of course, and we sold the family home last year. Adele has a lovely apartment in a retirement community, where's she's making new friends and keeping the old.

For as long as I've known her, Adele's written poetry. Most of her poems are about her love for the Lord, and His goodness and faithfulness toward her. She loves to include a typed copy of one of her poems when she sends birthday cards to her friends and family, so I'd read quite a number of her creations over the years.

But not all of them. None of us had read all of them until we asked her to pull them from boxes and scrapbooks and computer files. That girl's been holding out on us!

As I write this, I've got one eye on my long, winding driveway. Today, and soon, the UPS guy (one of my favorite men in the world, right up there with Santa Claus) will deliver a cardboard carton containing sixty copies of Adele's published book of poetry--a gift from her children for her birthday. Now she can give autographed copies of her entire bound collection to all her friends!

Adele knows about this, because we wanted to involve her in decisions about cover art and poem selection, and she is thrilled! As a still-unpublished book author myself, I think I can say she's going to get a huge kick out of this.

And I'd just like to say, no one deserves it more.

Posted by Katy on 02/25/05
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So What’s Up With The Tennis Balls? (#183)

You could say that the crowd I'm hanging with these days isn't too swift.

So maybe that's why I'm so keyed in to the amazing variety of assistive devices available on the market. I remember back when my grandma broke her leg helping my mother throw a garage sale in the sixties, when the only type of walker we knew about had to be lifted completely off the ground between each couple of steps.

Maybe the oldsters haven't picked up a lot of speed since then, but they've sure picked up a little. Last summer, when my mom blew out her knee and ended up needing surgery, I hightailed it over to Wal-mart and got her what she's since come to proudly refer to as the "Cadillac of walkers."

Don't imagine there's not a pecking order in retirement homes--there is. If you've got to succumb to using a walker, you wouldn't be caught dead with one like my poor grandma had to hobble around with. They still make those, but when was the last time you saw a self-respecting senior shuffling along behind one?

If you injure yourself and are privileged enough to be able to acquire the four-wheeled, hand-braked type with the seat that lifts up to reveal a roomy storage compartment, like my mom's, you've scored more than an excellent walker. You've also exponentially elevated your own status, and probably set yourself up to be invited to join the in crowd.

Oh, yeah. No matter how old you get, there's always an in crowd.

So, here's my question. What the heck is up with the lime green, flourescent tennis balls that hapless handicapped folks have been attaching to the front legs of their old-fashioned walkers for the past, oh, thirty years or so? I'm guessing these seniors don't like walkers with four wheels because they're afraid those puppies are going to get away from them, but isn't there another solution? And why aren't orange or yellow tennis balls ever used? Is lime green code for something I just don't get?

Maybe the entire nation's elders, flourescent walkers in single file like the robots in a Will Smith movie, are in training to blow those retirement-home pop stands en masse on some dark, moonless night. Don't put it past them.

I googled "walker tennis balls" to see if I could gain any insight, and instead I gained the assistive-device industry's response to the senior population's obvious affinity for lime green tennis balls. Do you think it'll catch on?

All I know is, unless Mom ponies up, she may not be part of the in crowd for long.

Longer lasting than fixed tennis ball or traditional plastic cap.

Court-Side Glides snap right onto walker in seconds.

No dangerous slicing of tennis balls.

The tennis balls pop in and out for quick and effortless replacement.

Limited Lifetime Warranty.

Posted by Katy on 02/24/05
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Another Day, Just Not Another Dollar (#184)

"Don't you think she should have been something?"

Mom had just introduced two of my sisters to the RN at the assisted living place where she lives. I've met the nurse before, so after the intros, I began to ask her some questions about Mom's medications. Every once in a while, I sound like I know what I'm talking about, and Mom pounced on the opportunity to point out my career shortcomings.

Lisa the nurse looked at me speechlessly and my sisters, from their positions behind Mom, rolled their eyes.

Like always, I attempted to explain my mother's remarks and, as usual, I failed.

"My siblings have always had outside-the-home careers," I said, "and I haven't."

Never mind the fact that I help my husband run a successful web design business and have been hammering away at developing my writing for many, many years. And there's no point whatsoever in throwing in volunteer activities: With my mom, those just don't count.

My mother describes me variously to her doctors, tax preparers, and hospital admissions clerks as her "driver," her "note-taker," and her "daughter who doesn't work."

I let her chatter on about how I should have "been something" for a minute to the RN, who was by now obviously dumbstruck, before I finally broke her litany by saying, "Mom, I am something."

Mom waited for me to explain, but if she doesn't understand by now, she never will.

As crazy as it sounds--even to me sometimes--I have purposefully structured my life in such a way that I have "margin," time and space enough around the have-to obligations of life to have something leftover to give away for free. I love having the time and grace (and occasionally even the energy) to say yes when someone needs me. The person I end up saying yes to most often is my mom.

Ironic, huh?

I can't worry about what she thinks of me. I've got the time, but that's not how I'm going to spend it. She needs help, and I intend to give it to her, no matter how she might choose to introduce me.

Still, I plan to keep asking God what He thinks. If He thinks I'm something--or, better yet, someone--it's all good.

And I'm pretty sure He does.

Posted by Katy on 02/23/05
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Personal blog of christian writer & fallible mom Katy McKenna Raymond in Kansas City, Missouri Katy is represented by Greg Johnson at WordServe Literary Read more Katy at LateBoomer.net Follow Katy on Twitter Follow Katy on Facebook 123 Recent Posts Try Becoming Brenda Starr Off Beat Scattered That’s It So I’ve Finally Signed With An Agent. Now What? The Spoon Sciatica Sweetheart A Woman’s Train of Thought Has No Caboose However much we own, we are all still living on borrowed time After all, when restaurants shrink portions, they don’t shrink prices. As with everything in life, balance is key. Slow down, you move too fast… Yeah, I know. I have issues. Search Advanced Search Syndicate Login E me at katy @ ngenius.com	How’s That Working For You? (#170) Parade Magazine--a supplement to Sunday newspapers across the U.S.--has a recurring cover story I just can't get enough of called "What People Earn: A Special Report." They run an updated version of their special report every six months or so, replete with scores of pics of typical wage-earners, including their annual incomes and their professions. They always throw in a few movie stars, rock stars and sports celebrities just to inspire class envy in the rest of us. We ask ourselves which chick is worth her pay: 18-year-old Lindsay Lohan, who currently pulls down $10 million a year, or Jessica Simpson, who at age 24 almost seems like a has-been with a measly take of $4 million. Of course, both of them make peanuts compared to Lance Armstrong, who's hanging in there at a cool $19 million. But when I recover from my momentary star envy, I check out the regular folks. And that's where the mysteries really abound. How is it that someone with a position as important-sounding as a "Public Health Administrator" in Columbia, Missouri only makes $25,000 per year, and an airport screener (presumably a very important job in our day and age) makes $29,800, but a mortgage broker is worth $280,000? I've made several visits to mortgage brokers in my day, and the way I remember the transactions, I ended up doing all the work of supplying every bit of my personal financial history to them and then signing my life away, to boot. And I only refinance if there's "no cost" to me--so where the heck are they getting the $280,000 paycheck? I don't mind a power-plant worker making $125,000, since it seems like those are guys we want to keep on our side, and a power-grid operator makes even more--$162,000--which seems like a small price to pay to keep brown-outs from rolling. I think a cracker-jack probation officer is worth every cent of $65,000. But I'm still puzzled to think a tow-boat captain tows in $85,000 besides whatever else it is that a tow-boat captain tows. How many boats would a tow-boat tow if a tow-boat could tow boats? (Sorry. I couldn't resist.) It's the low-paying jobs that shock me the most. It seems that all the positions with the word "community" in them are terribly compensated for all their good intentions. A "community advocate"(is anyone really AGAINST community?) scrapes by on $18,600. And a driver's ed instructor seems like a critical profession to me, yet the one profiled only drives away with 25 grand. Each time this story appears, they include one writer in the bunch, just to infuse us wordsmiths with some angsty emotion to fuel our writing for the next few days. This time, it's a horror writer in Berkeley, California who's 33 years old and compensated for his efforts a crummy $18,500 year. I wonder which came first: the horror writing or the horrible pay? All I can hope for the poor guy is that maybe he's lucky enough to be married to the woman who's making $105,000 as a pet-boutique owner. Can you imagine the horror of trying to live in Berkeley on less than 20 grand? You may have noticed that I don't have a donation button on my site, and I'm not accepting advertising--yet--but that doesn't mean I wouldn't like to sell a few manuscripts and live like royalty--oops, I mean "on royalties." But I need to face facts. Whenever Parade Magazine does their story on "What People Earn," writers are always down there at the bottom of the heap. If I was doing this for money, well, I wouldn't be doing it. Still, it's good to know that Doug is thriving in his position as an, um...hold on a second... "Hey, Doug, tell me again--what do you call what you're do for a living?" "You mean, Knowledge Management Consultant And E-Business Systems Analyst?" Yeah. What he said. If I'm going to be a podunk writer, it's a darned good thing he's...not. Posted by Katy on 03/14/05 Permalink Ranch Or Honey Mustard? (#171) So Kev's gone and it's just the two of us. The weather's nice out there today, and I want to get outside before the temp starts to drop off again, but Doug's been busy with some work for a client. "I think I've come to a stopping point," he finally announces. It's nearly 3 o'clock. "We could go get some coffee or something." "Or something?" "Well, I do have a major starvation problem..." I never think about this kind of stuff on Saturday. Heck, I barely think about regular meals during the week anymore. We both know where the fridge is, I figure. And the microwave's just a couple steps away. OK. I'm exaggerating about my expanding absence of meal preparation, but not by much. "I pulled some chicken finger-thingies out of the freezer," I said. "Should I pop them in the oven?" "Yeah." "By the way," I asked, "what would you do about your 'major starvation problem' if I were dead?" "Umm...cook the chicken fingers?" Next, I'll show him how to pull them out of the freezer. At least then if I croak, he'll be fully prepared. Posted by Katy on 03/12/05 Permalink Saturdays With(out) Kevin (#172) "So, I'm outta here." Kev rolled out of bed around noon after getting home after two in the morning, ate some breakfast, got dressed, and now stands before his dad and me in all his shining glory. "What? You can't leave!" I love playing this role of mine. I've got the darned thing figured out down pat. "We'll miss you so much--Doug, look at your kid's face...Won't we miss him if he's not here?" Kevin pretends to be a pain-in-the-hmmm-hmmm, and almost sounds convincing. "Yeah. Well, I'm going." I pretend to mistrust him. "Just where do you think you're going?" "John Jenkins." "What are you gonna do with Jenkins?" "Hang out." His eyes begin to twinkle. He knows the piece-de-resistance is about to be delivered on a platter. I furrow my brow and glare at him. "Hang out, huh? And what does that mean, exactly?" "Do drugs." Dear Lord, how I love that kid. Posted by Katy on 03/12/05 Permalink If You Don’t Want To Comment On This Post, I’ll Forgive You. If You Ask Nicely, That Is. (#173) Let me begin by admitting that I have issues with forgiveness. Not with giving it, exactly. And not with receiving it, either. My problems with forgiveness revolve around definitions of terms, I guess. Am I really asking for forgiveness when I say to my friend, "I'm sorry you feel like I hurt you?" Or am I begging to be understood? Am I really being sincere when I'm caught off-guard by the offended, who makes my sins known to me in no uncertain terms and taps their fingers on the table until I say the magic words, "Will you forgive me?" There are so many nuances involved in the art of forgiveness, so many fine lines when it comes to discerning my own motives, that I'm often more confused after a session of supposed forgiveness than I was before. It seems I'm always struggling in my heart to forgive people who've neither asked for my forgiveness nor apparently believe that they've offended me in the manner in which I feel offended. Do you know what I mean? Have you ever sweat bullets while preparing a heartfelt apology for something you said or did, and then when you delivered it with every ounce of sincerity in your being, the other person said, "I don't know what you're talking about. I don't even remember you saying that..." That's happened to me so many times, I've lost count. And I'm never sure if the people are telling the truth, or if they just feel really uncomfortable admitting that I've offended them. And then I always end up wondering if they're really offended at me after all, only they're offended about something I've said or done that I'm completely unaware of! One time when I was a relative newcomer to forgiveness, a friend asked me to meet her for coffee, and she proceeded to list (in alphabetical order, if I remember right...) everything I'd ever done to hurt her. Here I thought we were going for the French silk pie, and instead each sentence out of her mouth started with, "And then there was the time..." Of the fifteen or twenty specific charges she brought against me, I only identified with one of them. "You don't like my dog." Well, she had me there. At the end of the session, I asked for forgiveness--for what, I still can't say. She said she was so glad we'd gotten together, and that she felt so much better after we talked. I cried for a week. My one consolation, then and now, is that Jesus isn't confused about forgiveness at all. He made it the purpose of His life on this earth, in fact. He who caused people to be offended only with the shame of their own sins, since He committed none with which to offend them, also forgave them right up to His dying breath--first the thief hanging next to Him, and then those who crucified Him, because they knew not what they'd done. And when the Scripture says that He's now seated at the right hand of the Father, making intercession for us sinners, well...I believe. Still, when it comes to me and other humans, I'm confused. Do you have issues with forgiveness? Do you ask for it everytime you're "sorry," or just when you really intend to change your behavior? Do you have people in your life who ask regularly for forgiveness? Do you have any idea on earth what subject they're on? Or is it just me? Posted by Katy on 03/09/05 Permalink Sacked (#174) When my youngest son, Kevin, neared high school graduation, I realized I had a problem. For some reason known only to God and the skillful merchandise marketers at Walmart, I had seriously overestimated the number of paper lunch bags the Raymond household could expect to use in our natural lifetimes. The idea of my math skills being so bizarrely deficient as to stick me with a surplus of many hundreds of bags has caused me no small amount of anxiety in the ensuing weeks and months, until now something new has been added to my 25-year long struggle with panic attacks: my best guess is that I have hyperventilation syndrome. As you know if you've been reading here for even a week, last Sunday morning while sleeping I believed I was suffocating. Well, I landed in the ER the next night with the same symptoms, thinking I was certainly having a heart attack or something worse, like maybe imminent death without even bothering to distinguish myself by having the requisite myocardial infarction first. It would be so like me to pull something like that. But the EKG checked out fine, the chest x-ray proved to be another yawner, and the CT scan of my chest couldn't even drum up a blood clot or anything. I felt like such a failure. Then I talked to my counselor a few days ago, who suggested that perhaps I'd manifested hyperventilation syndrome, and that, of course, I should try breathing into a paper bag the next time it happens. Finally! My guilt over miscalculating our lunch sack needs began to abate as I pictured myself putting those puppies to excellent use balancing my oxygen intake and carbon dioxide output. I dedicated myself anew to being a careful, thoughtful, and grateful steward of the resources God entrusts to me, even if it means hyperventilating in order to make good use of a bad investment. This morning, though, my paper bag nearly burst. I googled hyperventilation syndrome, and on one site came across this unfortunate piece of information, with no further explanation provided: "Use of paper bag is no longer recommended." I read it aloud to Doug, who immediately shared my concern. "Well," he said, "what's the alternative?" "This says I need to see a shrink." "You've got one. He said use a paper bag." We laughed until we cried, but my breathing hasn't felt this normal in days. Posted by Katy on 03/07/05 Permalink Those Pesky Anglican Ankles! (#175) Have you heard about the Anglican Rosary? Honestly, until I caught up with some of Ragamuffin Diva's recent posts, I sure hadn't. Evidently, an Anglican priest came up with the concept in the 1980s. Ragamuffin's hubby purchased one for her online, where you can also get the book explaining how to use the beads. I haven't been a practicing Catholic since the age of seventeen, but I've been a practicing Christian my whole adult life. (Whoever said practice makes perfect hasn't met me.) I've gotta say there are things about Catholicism I've never stopped missing, and the rosary is one of them. It's not that I'm all about praying to Mary--I'm not. But I never got tired of the mysteries and the sorrows and the glories, and I crave them still. So I called Mardel's, a mega-Christian-book-and-merchandise operation here in Kansas City, and asked for the gift department. "Do you carry Anglican prayer beads? Kind of like rosaries for Protestants?" "Ankle beads? I'm not sure we have any left..." "No, not ankle. Anglican. Beads, like a rosary..." "We don't have any ankle bracelets right now. We might get more, though. We've got some beaded necklaces..." "Not ankle bracelets and not beaded necklaces. Not jewelry of any description. A rosary for Anglicans, who are kind of like Episcopalians, some of whom use a string of beads with a cross attached to say their prayers. Like Catholics do, only Anglicans are Protestants, like you. So, what I'm asking is whether or not you carry Anglican prayer beads." "I'm sorry, ma'am. We're all out of ankle beads." Yeah. Sometimes I really miss being a Catholic. Posted by Katy on 03/05/05 Permalink Terms Of Endearment (#176) Every time 20-year-old Kevin walks into my field of vision, my life lights up. But the things that come out of my mouth when the lights come on, only he and I will ever fully appreciate. Often I greet him with any song lyric that has the word "baby" in it, since he's my baby. I could go for "Baby, baby, I'm taken with the notion, to love you with the deepest of devotion..." but I never seem to move in quite that inspirational of a direction. It's not that I don't feel that way; it's just that Kevin and I have something deeper going on. If I start with any "baby" song lyric, though, Kevin invariably responds with a "Mama" song, which he sings loudly and with feeling, occasionally down on one knee. So, I hear the door slam--Kev's home from a long day at school. He trudges down the hall to my room, where he finds me sitting on the couch, writing. Our eyes connect, and his are twinkling as always. I burst into song: "Baby, baby, don't get hooked on me...." and he sings his solo: "Mama, just killed a man..." And we both laugh like we didn't just sing the same old-fashioned love songs yesterday. You tell me: Does it get better than this? Posted by Katy on 03/04/05 Permalink Unemployment Rate Skyrocketing? (#177) You may not believe this, but I pay almost no attention whatsoever to my blog stats. I'm just not a numbers kind of chick, I guess. I'm into words--both the ones I share with you, and the ones you share with me. As long as that's happening, I'm happy. Doug likes following stats, though, and every so often he gives me the scoop about what's going on out there in Statsville. "You know what's weird?" he asked tonight. "For the past two weekends, your stats have been way up from what they were on the previous Monday through Thursday." I've always known that blog readers tend to drop off on Friday, Saturday, and Sunday, presumably because they've, well, got better things to do. I've always assumed a lot of folks catch up on their reading on their employer's dime. So here's my question: Did everyone suddenly quit their day jobs, or what? Posted by Katy on 03/04/05 Permalink Trading Faces (#178) She got tired of being on the ER gurney pretty darned fast, but then she's not known for being overly patient. The room had a wind chill not unlike the one outside, which only hastened the inevitable. "I've got to get up. I need to pee--quick!" "Not so fast," the nurse said. "I'll get a wheelchair." "I'm fine! Besides, I can run faster than you can push me! I can't wait!" The nurse unfastened the EKG wires and removed the oxygen stats clothes-pin-like clip from an index finger. She unwound the blood pressure cuff from the left arm and disconnected the IV on the right. An attendant rolled in with the wheelchair and made a big fuss of covering the old gal's rear end with a second hospital gown, put on backwards, like anybody really cares about stuff like that when she needs to pee. Then the attendant bent down to make sure that the foot pedals of the wheelchair were perfectly aligned, as if the patient was about to test drive a sports car or something. "Hurry! Really, I'm going to wet my pants!" Which was pretty unlikely, since underwear and other valuables had been stuffed in a plastic bag some time back. The attendant meandered down the hall behind the wheelchair, chattering cheerfully the whole way, stopping at least once to ask the doctor if she'd be needing a urine sample from the unfortunate lady who nearly produced one on the spot. Once she got the fiesty patient inside the bathroom and transferred safely onto the toilet, she asked if she should stay to witness the historic event. "I'll be fine, and I'll be done in just a minute. I'll pop the door open when I'm through--OK?" The attendant did not wait for the door to pop, though, and was standing in front of the patient within seconds, with one of her hands steadying the wheelchair. The patient stepped to the back of the wheelchair, took ahold of the handles, and began to push it through the open door. "Ummm...I don't know how to tell you this, but I'm supposed to be pushing the chair," the attendant said. "Oh, yeah," I answered. "Sometimes I forget." Posted by Katy on 03/01/05 Permalink Just Breathe (#179) "It's all right, my love. It's all right." Somehow we'd gotten entangled in the bed. Both of us usually sleep on our right sides, with him facing the center of the bed and me facing my edge, but for some reason known only to God, Doug had rolled to his left side. I'd been up to use the bathroom at 4:30, and remember coming back to bed and rolling to my left side, also. So now we were spooning again, only Doug faced the outside of the bed, with me curled around his back. My voracious dreaming resumed. I dreamed of the first house we lived in, back in 1979. I dreamed of a stranger knocking on the door and when I answered it, there was a sold sign in our yard, even though the place wasn't for sale. "What's going on?" I asked the man on my front stoop. "You won't be needing this little place anymore," he said, with a cheesy grin and a giant, suitable-for-framing check in his outstretched arms. "You've just won 2.2 million dollars!" I have such an active dream life, including regular nightmares, that I'm thoroughly attuned to the fact that it's "just a dream" even while I'm in the middle of it. I'm rarely frightened and often so amused by my nocturnal theatrics that I've gotten good at willing myself to stay asleep just a little longer so I can see how things turn out. In the next dream scene, I had a conversation with a woman I'm close to, and expressed my feelings about a matter of great concern to me. She and I had more than a casual connection--we were lifelong friends. She was someone I could be honest with, I thought, and so I was. "You see?" Her voice turned caustic. "This is why we could never live together. You're just so negative about everything." I didn't see that one coming, and it really hurt, so I switched dream scenes fast. Enter Gary Piane, my long time friend from grade school. In real life, I run into Gary every once in a while at Starbucks and we catch up with each other's lives. He's the nicest guy in the world, my own husband excluded. In my dream, we met unexpectedly in a gothic church building. I hadn't seen him in many years and he loved my new perm so much that he buried my face in his shoulder and spent an inordinate amount of time rubbing my curly head. I had the distinct feeling of not being able to breathe, but I knew that with Doug standing right there in the church narthex watching along with God and everybody, the bear hug wouldn't last for long. I was right--it didn't, and I breathed a huge oxygenated gulp of relief. Suddenly there was only Doug and me sitting next to one another in the back of the church, my head on his shoulder, trying to catch my breath. Then just as suddenly we weren't in the church at all, but at home in our own bed, with me still dreaming, but with a strange difference in the quality of the dream. And then, as absolutely clearly as if I was awake--because in a very real sense, I was--I realized what was happening. I was suffocating. Somehow, I had wedged my face between Doug's shoulder and the mattress so closely that when he rolled from his left side partially onto his back, I became trapped. You know how you wake up from certain dreams and the first thing you say is, "Oh, but it seemed so real!" This dream didn't seem real--it was real. I cannot describe what it's like to be fully asleep and fully awake at the same time, but I know now it can happen. I became rapidly and consciously aware, while asleep, that I could not breathe at all, that whatever air pockets would have normally existed in a situation like ours simply weren't there. It felt as if I was physically trapped by the weight of Doug's body, which I could not push away from mine no matter how I struggled. And then in my dream--and in real life--I thought, "When Doug is dreaming and he starts breathing really loud, it wakes me up. I must try to breathe loudly enough for him to wake up. Otherwise, I'm going to die." I tried, both in my dream and in real life, and at first I could make no sound at all. "You have to do this," I told myself both in my dream and in real life. "If you give up, and you die, Doug will be so upset that he suffocated you." I knew I had to do it, for him. So I breathed tiny shallow breaths, with every particle of oxygen left in the space allotted me, and with each inhalation and exhalation I forced miniature wisps of noise from my mouth, until finally Doug rolled away from me and spoke, bringing me fully to my senses. "It's all right, my love. It's all right." He thought, of course, that I'd merely been having another nightmare, that he'd awakened me with his words. Until I told him that, while I was sleeping, I'd awakened him with my gasps. "I slept, but my heart was awake." Song of Solomon Posted by Katy on 02/28/05 Permalink Will You Still Love Me Tomorrow? (#180) "Babe," I say, "I'm exhausted. All I want is to go put on some comfy old pajamas and relax. But it's still so early...would you mind?" "Not at all," Doug says. I take a peek at the clock and try to tell myself no one should be putting on PJs at this hour, but I can't resist the temptation. "But, really, it's only 5 o'clock. Will you still respect me?" "In the morning? Yeah." I squirm a little. "But what about tonight? There's a whole lot of hours to get through before morning." "Hmmm...you're right about that." We both laugh, but just to be on the safe side of an old cliche, I'll think I'll hold off a little while longer. Posted by Katy on 02/27/05 Permalink My Life With A Celebrity Blogger, Take One (#181) It has been humbly suggested over at Doug's site that he is riding the coat tails of my blogging success to his own meteoric rise in the blogosphere. As of this very hour, that preposterous idea is SO three days ago! Congrats to radio personality and super-fun blogger Cindy Swanson for adding Doug to her list of illustrious interviewees. And kudos to Doug for his brilliant and swift-thinking answer to Question Number Five. I predict the guy will go far. Thanks, Cindy! Posted by Katy on 02/25/05 Permalink I’m So Excited I Can Hardly Stand Myself! (#182) My mother-in-law, Adele F. Raymond, who turns 83 years old tomorrow, is about to become a published author. Oh, she's had some poems printed in her local newspaper in Massachusetts during WWII, but nothing much since then. She even worked in the offices of Popular Science Magazine before she got married in 1949 and started raising her family. But then, life kicked in. The family moved a few times before settling in Rome, NY, where they stayed until 1970. When my father-in-law, Jack, accepted a transfer to Kansas City, she packed up the house and joined him here. Jack died of skin cancer the year Doug and I were married, in 1977, and Adele joined the workforce once again. She's retired now, of course, and we sold the family home last year. Adele has a lovely apartment in a retirement community, where's she's making new friends and keeping the old. For as long as I've known her, Adele's written poetry. Most of her poems are about her love for the Lord, and His goodness and faithfulness toward her. She loves to include a typed copy of one of her poems when she sends birthday cards to her friends and family, so I'd read quite a number of her creations over the years. But not all of them. None of us had read all of them until we asked her to pull them from boxes and scrapbooks and computer files. That girl's been holding out on us! As I write this, I've got one eye on my long, winding driveway. Today, and soon, the UPS guy (one of my favorite men in the world, right up there with Santa Claus) will deliver a cardboard carton containing sixty copies of Adele's published book of poetry--a gift from her children for her birthday. Now she can give autographed copies of her entire bound collection to all her friends! Adele knows about this, because we wanted to involve her in decisions about cover art and poem selection, and she is thrilled! As a still-unpublished book author myself, I think I can say she's going to get a huge kick out of this. And I'd just like to say, no one deserves it more. Posted by Katy on 02/25/05 Permalink So What’s Up With The Tennis Balls? (#183) You could say that the crowd I'm hanging with these days isn't too swift. So maybe that's why I'm so keyed in to the amazing variety of assistive devices available on the market. I remember back when my grandma broke her leg helping my mother throw a garage sale in the sixties, when the only type of walker we knew about had to be lifted completely off the ground between each couple of steps. Maybe the oldsters haven't picked up a lot of speed since then, but they've sure picked up a little. Last summer, when my mom blew out her knee and ended up needing surgery, I hightailed it over to Wal-mart and got her what she's since come to proudly refer to as the "Cadillac of walkers." Don't imagine there's not a pecking order in retirement homes--there is. If you've got to succumb to using a walker, you wouldn't be caught dead with one like my poor grandma had to hobble around with. They still make those, but when was the last time you saw a self-respecting senior shuffling along behind one? If you injure yourself and are privileged enough to be able to acquire the four-wheeled, hand-braked type with the seat that lifts up to reveal a roomy storage compartment, like my mom's, you've scored more than an excellent walker. You've also exponentially elevated your own status, and probably set yourself up to be invited to join the in crowd. Oh, yeah. No matter how old you get, there's always an in crowd. So, here's my question. What the heck is up with the lime green, flourescent tennis balls that hapless handicapped folks have been attaching to the front legs of their old-fashioned walkers for the past, oh, thirty years or so? I'm guessing these seniors don't like walkers with four wheels because they're afraid those puppies are going to get away from them, but isn't there another solution? And why aren't orange or yellow tennis balls ever used? Is lime green code for something I just don't get? Maybe the entire nation's elders, flourescent walkers in single file like the robots in a Will Smith movie, are in training to blow those retirement-home pop stands en masse on some dark, moonless night. Don't put it past them. I googled "walker tennis balls" to see if I could gain any insight, and instead I gained the assistive-device industry's response to the senior population's obvious affinity for lime green tennis balls. Do you think it'll catch on? All I know is, unless Mom ponies up, she may not be part of the in crowd for long. Longer lasting than fixed tennis ball or traditional plastic cap. Court-Side Glides snap right onto walker in seconds. No dangerous slicing of tennis balls. The tennis balls pop in and out for quick and effortless replacement. Limited Lifetime Warranty. Posted by Katy on 02/24/05 Permalink Another Day, Just Not Another Dollar (#184) "Don't you think she should have been something?" Mom had just introduced two of my sisters to the RN at the assisted living place where she lives. I've met the nurse before, so after the intros, I began to ask her some questions about Mom's medications. Every once in a while, I sound like I know what I'm talking about, and Mom pounced on the opportunity to point out my career shortcomings. Lisa the nurse looked at me speechlessly and my sisters, from their positions behind Mom, rolled their eyes. Like always, I attempted to explain my mother's remarks and, as usual, I failed. "My siblings have always had outside-the-home careers," I said, "and I haven't." Never mind the fact that I help my husband run a successful web design business and have been hammering away at developing my writing for many, many years. And there's no point whatsoever in throwing in volunteer activities: With my mom, those just don't count. My mother describes me variously to her doctors, tax preparers, and hospital admissions clerks as her "driver," her "note-taker," and her "daughter who doesn't work." I let her chatter on about how I should have "been something" for a minute to the RN, who was by now obviously dumbstruck, before I finally broke her litany by saying, "Mom, I am something." Mom waited for me to explain, but if she doesn't understand by now, she never will. As crazy as it sounds--even to me sometimes--I have purposefully structured my life in such a way that I have "margin," time and space enough around the have-to obligations of life to have something leftover to give away for free. I love having the time and grace (and occasionally even the energy) to say yes when someone needs me. The person I end up saying yes to most often is my mom. Ironic, huh? I can't worry about what she thinks of me. I've got the time, but that's not how I'm going to spend it. She needs help, and I intend to give it to her, no matter how she might choose to introduce me. Still, I plan to keep asking God what He thinks. If He thinks I'm something--or, better yet, someone--it's all good. And I'm pretty sure He does. Posted by Katy on 02/23/05 Permalink Page 46 of 84 pages « First < 44 45 46 47 48 > Last »


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Personal blog of christianwriter & fallible momKaty McKenna Raymondin Kansas City, Missouri

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