Time for a Wild Ride

I sit here in New Florida (previously known as Tennessee before the great climate change) feeling as though I am in the eye of a hurricane. It is definitely the calm before the storm.

I have no idea how big the "storm" is going to be. I hope it is just a slight sprinkle followed by copious amounts of sunshine. No, I am not worried about the "real" weather, though both rain and snow are in the forecast. The weatherman says we are going to fall hard from the glorious days of Indian Summer that we have been experiencing since the day before Thanksgiving. The poor birds are so conflicted. They don't know whether to stay and chirp or be on their way south. I don't blame them. I really don't know what to do with myself either.

In 9 days, my dad will go in for open heart surgery. They say the procedures are so simple that a 6 year old could do them if he or she was trained. I don't know that I would simplify it that much. They say it will take 6 hours. He is to arrive no later than 5:28 a.m.--no later. Everything is so precise.

Meanwhile, another drama plays out on another stage in another hospital about 1 hour south. It could begin in hours or weeks, but we fully expect that two life-changing events could be happening at the same time. My sister-in-law is 34 weeks pregnant, and as of today, she is 75% effaced. Having had 7 pregnancies, I have some knowledge of these things, and I imagine that, if she behaves herself and doesn't do too much more Christmas shopping, she will probably be having the baby pretty close to the time that Dad is getting a new lease on life.

That's pretty much how these things go, you know. We can't just have one crisis at a time. It gives us patience. We learn how to extreme-multi-task.

I pray that by Christmas Day, the storm is past, and cousins 1-8 are happily playing with their newest cousin, little Emma Elizabeth, as their Pappy looks at the mess of heirs at his feet and smiles. I hope he is strong enough to get up occasionally and wander into the kitchen and give his expert opinion on whether or not the turkey in the oven is done. I hope that Brooke, my sister-in-law, has bounced back quickly from giving birth to a child about 1/12th of her own weight! (She and Emma are both little things!) I pray our brother with a bad case of wanderlust, Don, has made it safely from Germany and is there to complete the gathering of our "little" clan.

Lots of things that generally are priorities this time of year are kind of falling by the wayside. It's times like these that make you realize how silly all of the materialism in the world is in the first place. You can't giftwrap lives.

I walked out in the night air tonight about 10:30, and the smell was different. I think a storm must be coming, but then again, the septic tank may just be acting up again. I feel my life's roller coaster edging to the top, and I have my fingernails dug in, and I am ready to ride. I've forgotten what this particular coaster is like, but I have a feeling I am about to remember very quickly.