Home Sweet Home

Home from my trip safely and without incident.

I ran into my good friends Joe and Michelle with their baby in the airport in Sacramento; they were on my same flight home. That was really cool, because I boarded with them early, woo-hoo, seats in the front! It was nice to visit and play with the baby (who's not really a baby anymore, he's almost three...) XH, DD#1, and I were all in their wedding and they are DD#3's godparents. I was also their doula; they are very special to me.

I sat next to a young woman and her baby whose husband just got deployed to New Orleans to help with the effort there. It all happened so suddenly that she decided to take her baby and go to Portland to stay with her parents. His stay is planning on lasting a minimum of 60 days, and after that, who knows? She said that he was told he may need to resort to staying in abandoned homes and will only receive three bottles of water per day ration.
I'm sorry, are we having a bottled water shortage in our country too?

I sat next to another woman who was a lovely, lovely person. She shared with me pictures of her children; a son, 28, and twin daughters, 25. One of her daughters is recently engaged, the other is bi-polar and currently in Rome on a vacation. She had a big huge manic episode and has taken off; she's not sure where her daughter is, but believes that she will snap out of it and return. Being that she's only 25, she hasn't had the diagnoses very long so is having a difficult time dealing with it.

I picked up my kids at their dad's house to find DD#3 covered from head to toe in hives. XH has no idea what could have caused it, I think it might be nerves about the first day of school. She seems okay otherwise, just covered in hives. I've given her boatloads of Benadryl so I'm hoping it will clear up soon.

XH also told me that a good acquaintance of mine, Jerry, passed away suddenly on Sunday night. I worked with him on several school projects and really liked him; he was a very, very kind man. His wife Marcy and I are also acquaintances and his daughter has babysat for us occasionally for several years. Apparently they were camping and he had a heart attack and died. I don't know any other details; I just know that it saddens me so very, very much. Marcy works at our elementary school, I'm so sad for her and her children. I think I'll bake them a bundt cake today; a bundt cake is always appropriate when someone passes. I always liked Jerry so much; he was a very active member of the community and in the schools; he will be very missed.

The girls and I had dinner and hung out last night. I tried to go to bed early (around 9:00,) but sleep didn't work out for me so well last night. My crazy dog kept me up literally ALL night. This is the fourth or fifth time she has done this, she is quite old and is suffering from dimensia or something. She paced all over my bed panting continuously. I'd put her on the floor and she would bark to get up on the bed, then start the whole panting and pacing thing. I was woken up pretty much every 15-20 minutes all night. I'm fucking exhausted.

So here I sit; suffering from a bit of "after BlogThis conference blues," and coping with a few stressors that I came home too. This combined with the fact that I had NO sleep last night; I'm a teeny bit down. I think a nap may be in order to try to restore myself to some assemblance of my normal self.

I promise to post more pictures from the trip very soon!
Nap time.