A message from my dad following a Facebook post from me about crazy ol’ Pat Robertson and his comments about the earthquake in Haiti.  I like the part about NPR trying to discredit Christianity, especially in light of several reports on NPR about the persecution of Christians in Iraq.

January 16, 2010 at 10:31pm Reply • Report I am so disappointed that you would post and comment on such trash. You know better. What Pat Robertson said was off the wall, but to go out of your way to discredit him by siding with an idiot writer who is mocking God and your Christian faith … it’s not funny. I’m very sad. If you don’t think that Satan (the face of Evil) exists, then talk to any missionary (including Uncle Mark & Aunt Carol) who has been to Haiti. Voodo and devil worship is not funny. It has kept that nation bound up and in captivity. God loves them and sent Jesus to set the captives free. I don’t buy all Pat’s interpretation of current events, but he and those who support him and “Operation Blessing” have done more to consistantly help the poor and needy than any of his attackers. NPR & the M-S Tribunes editors/writers, who published the letter, sadly did so for their own “personal & corporate gain” and to drive their agenda to discredit the Christian faith. There is absolutely NO socially redeeming value derived from publishing it and it takes away from the real tragedy in Haiti. [me and my sister], you have made some very positive fb posts to encourage to your fb friends to give donations to help the Haitians, which is good and honorable. I hope you will keep it positive and avoid this kind of stuff, which just serves to stir up controvery and get attention. I love you and trust you enough to share how bad your Mom & I feel about this. I hope you love us enough to respect our faith and I hope you will prayerfully consider what I am saying.

Love,

Dad

In high school I was driving around with my mom when a Dodge Omni pulled in front of us. It had two bumper stickers: “Love to Lick” and “69 Me.’ My mother was so confused by these seemingly nonsensical stickers that she drove around for the next 10 minutes repeating to herself, “Love to lick. 69 me. What could that mean? Hmm…Love to lick. 69 me. 69 me. 69 me.” I finally begged her to stop saying it when I was .003 seconds from flinging myself out of the moving car to make the visuals stop.

My father has always had dogs. Big dogs, hunting dogs, working dogs; retrievers, Irish setters, big ole mutt dogs. You name a breed of big dog and we have probably owned one at one time.

Since his last big dog died (a shepherd/lab mix) and he himself has retired he adopted 2 tiny dogs, miniature pinschers. This in itself was weird, but then he has decided they need “things”. Like tiny sweaters. Special collars. Snow shoes that look like they could fit on a Barbie doll. When the first “mini-pin” demonstrated it was afraid of the rain (!!!) he bought it a little yellow rain slicker. It looked like the miniscule dog version of the Gorton’s Fisherman. 

Today he was giving me a long lecture about the disappearance of regional specialities and I had to stop him. “Dad, I’d love to chat with you, but I cannot take you seriously when you have a 7 pound dog french-kissing you in the ear.” OY!

All right…to clear the air, I will start by saying that I’m now the parent of adult children, so I’m hoping I won’t see a post here describing how crazy I am!

My mother is one of those women who can keep an immaculate  house without ever seeming as if she lifted a finger.  Of course, while I was growing up, my grandmother lived with us and it took me awhile to realize that my usually-looking-as-if-a-tornado-had-struck house probably wouldn’t look so much that way if I had another adult pair of hands living with me as we raised our kids.  My mother usually didn’t say too much about my very lived-in looking house, but until this day, I don’t think she can fully understand why having a house that looks as if the Better Homes and Garden crew was stopping by for a photo shoot at any moment just isn’t high on my priority list.  I definitely belong in the “it’s just a house” camp.

We moved a couple hours away from where my parents live over 21 years ago.   In 1995, I had our last baby.  My mother came up on the day that she was born (on my bathroom floor!), but left later in the same evening.  She was still working then, and my husband had a week off work, so it was fine.  Over the next few weeks, I did not recover as I always had from childbirth.  Instead of feeling on-top-of-the-world and in better physical health than ever the way I usually did after childbirth, I kept feeling worse.  I shared this with my mother, who, like me, at first didn’t make too much of it.  Of course, she kept after me to bring the new baby down so she could see her again, but I kept putting her off as it became clear after about a week or so that driving was totally out of the question for me.  I was passing out several times a day and within a month, in addition to the fainting, I was experiencing serious heart rhythm problems.  

Fortunately, I was able to find the medical care I needed very quickly and we were able to pinpoint the problem, but pinpointing it did not cure it.  For about three or so months as we added medication after medication, I was almost completely bedridden.  With a newborn.  And six other children.  Now…I was telling this to my mom and not keeping anything from her.  Describing exactly what was happening to me and how awful and unmanageable it felt as if our lives had become.

Now, not only did my mother not ever once volunteer to help out, she also kept on with the “why-don’t-you-come-and-see-us” line.  When, one day, very frustrated with this I told her that I wasn’t able to leave the house AT ALL at that time, she said “well, since you can’t be out and about, maybe you could use some of your time to fix up the house a bit.  I know you could stand to have a bit of painting done”!  I was BEDRIDDEN…and not allowed to carry my daughter alone and barely able to make it down to the kitchen a couple of times a day, so she suggests that I PAINT MY HOUSE.  Using a ladder.  While I’m passing out several times a day.

Yeah, I know…sometimes as parents we can’t stand to face very negative facts about our children…but this took the cake in denial.

A message from my dad following a Facebook post from me about crazy ol’ Pat Robertson and his comments about the earthquake in Haiti.  I like the part about NPR trying to discredit Christianity, especially in light of several reports on NPR about the persecution of Christians in Iraq.

January 16, 2010 at 10:31pm Reply • Report I am so disappointed that you would post and comment on such trash. You know better. What Pat Robertson said was off the wall, but to go out of your way to discredit him by siding with an idiot writer who is mocking God and your Christian faith … it’s not funny. I’m very sad. If you don’t think that Satan (the face of Evil) exists, then talk to any missionary (including Uncle Mark & Aunt Carol) who has been to Haiti. Voodo and devil worship is not funny. It has kept that nation bound up and in captivity. God loves them and sent Jesus to set the captives free. I don’t buy all Pat’s interpretation of current events, but he and those who support him and “Operation Blessing” have done more to consistantly help the poor and needy than any of his attackers. NPR & the M-S Tribunes editors/writers, who published the letter, sadly did so for their own “personal & corporate gain” and to drive their agenda to discredit the Christian faith. There is absolutely NO socially redeeming value derived from publishing it and it takes away from the real tragedy in Haiti. [me and my sister], you have made some very positive fb posts to encourage to your fb friends to give donations to help the Haitians, which is good and honorable. I hope you will keep it positive and avoid this kind of stuff, which just serves to stir up controvery and get attention. I love you and trust you enough to share how bad your Mom & I feel about this. I hope you love us enough to respect our faith and I hope you will prayerfully consider what I am saying.

Love,

Dad

In high school I was driving around with my mom when a Dodge Omni pulled in front of us. It had two bumper stickers: “Love to Lick” and “69 Me.’ My mother was so confused by these seemingly nonsensical stickers that she drove around for the next 10 minutes repeating to herself, “Love to lick. 69 me. What could that mean? Hmm…Love to lick. 69 me. 69 me. 69 me.” I finally begged her to stop saying it when I was .003 seconds from flinging myself out of the moving car to make the visuals stop.

My father has always had dogs. Big dogs, hunting dogs, working dogs; retrievers, Irish setters, big ole mutt dogs. You name a breed of big dog and we have probably owned one at one time.

Since his last big dog died (a shepherd/lab mix) and he himself has retired he adopted 2 tiny dogs, miniature pinschers. This in itself was weird, but then he has decided they need “things”. Like tiny sweaters. Special collars. Snow shoes that look like they could fit on a Barbie doll. When the first “mini-pin” demonstrated it was afraid of the rain (!!!) he bought it a little yellow rain slicker. It looked like the miniscule dog version of the Gorton’s Fisherman. 

Today he was giving me a long lecture about the disappearance of regional specialities and I had to stop him. “Dad, I’d love to chat with you, but I cannot take you seriously when you have a 7 pound dog french-kissing you in the ear.” OY!

All right…to clear the air, I will start by saying that I’m now the parent of adult children, so I’m hoping I won’t see a post here describing how crazy I am!

My mother is one of those women who can keep an immaculate  house without ever seeming as if she lifted a finger.  Of course, while I was growing up, my grandmother lived with us and it took me awhile to realize that my usually-looking-as-if-a-tornado-had-struck house probably wouldn’t look so much that way if I had another adult pair of hands living with me as we raised our kids.  My mother usually didn’t say too much about my very lived-in looking house, but until this day, I don’t think she can fully understand why having a house that looks as if the Better Homes and Garden crew was stopping by for a photo shoot at any moment just isn’t high on my priority list.  I definitely belong in the “it’s just a house” camp.

We moved a couple hours away from where my parents live over 21 years ago.   In 1995, I had our last baby.  My mother came up on the day that she was born (on my bathroom floor!), but left later in the same evening.  She was still working then, and my husband had a week off work, so it was fine.  Over the next few weeks, I did not recover as I always had from childbirth.  Instead of feeling on-top-of-the-world and in better physical health than ever the way I usually did after childbirth, I kept feeling worse.  I shared this with my mother, who, like me, at first didn’t make too much of it.  Of course, she kept after me to bring the new baby down so she could see her again, but I kept putting her off as it became clear after about a week or so that driving was totally out of the question for me.  I was passing out several times a day and within a month, in addition to the fainting, I was experiencing serious heart rhythm problems.  

Fortunately, I was able to find the medical care I needed very quickly and we were able to pinpoint the problem, but pinpointing it did not cure it.  For about three or so months as we added medication after medication, I was almost completely bedridden.  With a newborn.  And six other children.  Now…I was telling this to my mom and not keeping anything from her.  Describing exactly what was happening to me and how awful and unmanageable it felt as if our lives had become.

Now, not only did my mother not ever once volunteer to help out, she also kept on with the “why-don’t-you-come-and-see-us” line.  When, one day, very frustrated with this I told her that I wasn’t able to leave the house AT ALL at that time, she said “well, since you can’t be out and about, maybe you could use some of your time to fix up the house a bit.  I know you could stand to have a bit of painting done”!  I was BEDRIDDEN…and not allowed to carry my daughter alone and barely able to make it down to the kitchen a couple of times a day, so she suggests that I PAINT MY HOUSE.  Using a ladder.  While I’m passing out several times a day.

Yeah, I know…sometimes as parents we can’t stand to face very negative facts about our children…but this took the cake in denial.