Shrubs and Salsa Online

Taken from my journal:

I figure someday, someone will wonder what I was doing on September 11, the day of the terrorist attacks on the World Trade Centers, the Pentagon and the plane that crashed into a field in Pennsylvania.

I’m writing this exactly six months later and I pretty much remember everything that happened that day.  Will I ever forget that day?  Don’t people still talk about what they were doing when JFK  was shot?

I remember I got the kids up and we were getting ready for school.  We were still not quite used to having to be at the bus stop at 8:30 am to get Camden off to first grade, and had our usual struggles to get there on time.  But we did, and after the bus came, I drove Jake up to KinderCare in Eldersburg. 

After dropping him off at “preschool” I went happily on my way to yoga class in Columbia.  I remember I was on Marriottsville Road heading south, almost to the Route 70 on ramp when I first heard about it.  I would have been a little after 9:00 am.  The news person came on the radio with the report.  She said that a second plane had crashed into the second WTC building and it was now considered a terrorist attack. 

I was stunned.  My heart started beating fast and it was hard to breath!  How could someone launch a terrorist attack on American soil?  My head spun as I continued to drive to my yoga class.  I was sure the two towers would collapse.  How could they not when two planes had crashed into them?

I got to The Yoga Center parking lot around 9:30 am.  I sat in the car listening to a Washington, DC radio station.  They were getting reports that a plane may have crashed into the Pentagon!  This was getting close to home.  Very scary stuff.  As it was time to go inside they had confirmations that a third plane had indeed hit the Pentagon.  I knew I had to go inside if only so I could dedicate the energies of my practice to the victims and their families.

In class, we all huddled around and talked about how scary the morning’s happenings were and how we were feeling about it.

I have to say, Kathy Donnelly did a fabulous job of getting us through a grounding practice and relieving some of our anxieties.  But as we were doing our ending relaxing meditations, I had the horrible thought that David could be called to war if things escalated and we retaliated!  That brought me to tears.  She ended the class with a group hug. 

(A few weeks later, one of the girls in class admitted she had no idea what was going on that day and didn’t understand at the time what all the fuss was about.  Poor thing.)

I drove home in a hurry, listening to the news for further updates.  I heard that a plane had crashed into a field in Pennsylvania, and it was thought to have been headed for another, unknown site and may have been foiled by passengers.  I also heard that they were closing schools in the area since we were so close to DC. 

I stopped by home to see if Dave had gotten home or if I needed to pick him up.  He was there watching the news.  I grabbed him and we hugged, I was crying.  We discussed what was going on.  He was the one who told me the two towers had indeed fallen, just a short time before I got home.  We watched a short bit of the news on TV, then he went with me to get Camden at school.

There were already quite a few parents at the school, getting their own and neighbors kids.  When I picked up Jake at KinderCare, the teachers explained that one child had come in to school after having heard about the crashes on TV and had told the children what had happened.  But the teachers had given the children a basic, matter-of-fact account of the happenings (almost exactly what I ended up telling them later) and they had seemed happy with that.  Ah, the bliss of the four-year old!

I told the kids on the way home, that all the parents were worried and scared today cause some bad men had stolen some airplanes and made them crash into two different buildings.  That made lots of people die and it was scary, but that WE were safe and sound at home and they shouldn’t worry.  Camden seemed a bit concerned, but Jake was fine.

Wes came home for a short period of time to make sure we were all safe (he couldn’t get through on the cell phone — lines were tied up), but then had to return to work to restore order and normalcy!  The rest of the day was spent watching news reports in my room, and try to make life normal for the kids.  School resumed as normal the next day.

Over the next few weeks, I tried not to listen to news accounts on the radio or watch extensive amounts of TV coverage in front of the boys.  I didn’t think their young minds needed to be crowded with the images and horror of it all.   But I still kept them updated when something big happened, and they saw some pictures of “ground zero”, so they knew what was going on.

It was awesome to see how the country came together at this time.  Stores with changeable signs all had a patriotic saying, “God Bless America” or “Pray for the victims families” or “Proud to be American”.  Everyone was flying flags right off the bat.  It was so inspiring.  This was the first time in my life that I wanted to fly an American flag, and I was ashamed that I didn’t own one.  They flew off the store shelves, too, and were hard to find.   I did find a car flag within the week.  I found a big one to hang in my bedroom window within a few weeks. 

Even three months later, at Christmas time, flags were still part of the decorations.  And red, white and blue Christmas lights were the norm, it seemed.  It was so cool and touching to see such extended shows of patriotism.

Holy cow, I’m SO behind in updating.

Well, I guess that the biggest news is that after 4 years of homeschooling, Jake is back in public school.  He had been talking of going back for 7th grade, but when Camden transferred from the science magnet to the school in our district, Jake decided he’d like to go back at the same time.  He’s doing really, really well.  He had a rough start, because of things like having no clue about how to work a locker, poor guy.  But his grades now rival Camden’s and he’s completely comfortable.  We’re really proud of him for being so adaptable.  He’s going to be in band next year, and at try outs last week he settled on the trumpet.  This should be fun!

Like I mentioned above, Camden transferred out of the science magnet program he had been attending so he could finish out 8th grade at our local school.  He’s finally got his head out of his butt, and is doing well and getting good grades again.  Thank goodness, because he’d been grounded and without a cell phone for the last 9 months and it was getting really old.  Ha ha. He already knew most of the people who go to this school, so he had no trouble fitting in.

Believe it or not, Camden will be in high school next year.  Gosh, where did the time go? He’ll be going to the newest high school in the district and we went there for orientation and it’s really pretty.  Gorgeous architecture! He hasn’t settled on a schedule yet, still trying to figure out what electives he wants to take…

Did you hear Wes got really sick a couple months ago? We had all gone to the beach (a really nice day in March, oh, the joys of living in Houston) and on the way home he started feeling bad.  He ended up in bed by dinner time and … excuse me saying this … but he had bloody diarrhea by bed time.  We had him to the emergency room the next morning and they ran all kinds of tests, pumped him full of antibiotics and pain meds and eventually sent him home with a referral to a gastroenterologist.  That doc ended up doing an endoscopy and colonoscopy, and came to the conclusion that he had gotten a hemorraging e-coli from eating some raw oysters the Friday before he got sick. He’s back to normal now, thank goodness.  That was pretty scary.

Wes’ job is going good … for now.  Even though his job is to supply builders with things like appliances, windows and doors (and most builders are not doing well right now), he’s doing pretty well.  He’s a real hard worker and is always out looking for new ways to get business.  He’s been working with apartment buildings recently since apartments are hot right now.

I’ve been looking for a job (outside of running my websites) since Jake went back to school.  It took 5 months, but I finally found one.  I just started working at PetSmart here in League City.  The people all seem really nice and I think it will be a fun, part-time job.  We’re hoping I can earn us some vacation money so we can go back and see Dave and Jen, or have them all fly down here to visit.

Speaking of Dave, Jen, and Max … Max will be 1 year old on May 28th!  Hard to believe a whole year has already gone by. We talk to Dave and Jen and she sends up pictures frequently.  She’s a good daughter-in-law!

John and Pat visited in February.  While they were here we went to the Mardi Gras down on Galveston.  It was our first time to do Mardi Gras and we had a blast.  There were day time festivities, including a parade, so we were all loaded down with necklaces, crazy hats and goodies.  We also checked out some boutique shops here in League City one day, then went out to Kemah, which was also hit hard by Hurricane Ike, and hit up some shops out there.  We had a fun day of shopping that day.  Another day we went to Old Town Spring, where there are a lot of craft and antique type touristy shops.  I’d never heard of it, but Wes told us about it and even met us for lunch that day.

Wes and I are both on Facebook now.  If you look to the right, at “Our Links” you can find links to our Facebook pages.  We both update frequently so you are more likely to be up to date with us if you friend us there.   I post pictures there, too, so you’ll see more of us as well.

I think that’s about all for now.  Hopefully I’ll update again before Christmas. 

Love,
Sherri

Birthday Boy

Happy Birthday to you!

Happy Birthday to you!

Happy Birthday, Dear Jakie,

Happy Birthday to you!!!!

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