There have been so many times, too numerous to count that someone has said to me..'you should write a book'....pshaw...I would say....I'm not a writer....I do love to read..but write...no way.
As I have been on holidays this last week, the idea has come to the forefront...not that I think I've become a writer overnight but, who else would tell the stories of this huge family that my husband and I have! We're not talking Duggar size...but pretty big by today's standards.
The only thing I ever really write is my blog post....and that of late hasn't been very often, but.....I thought maybe, just maybe I could write a blog post once a week or so...lets not get carried away by deadlines now....that could be like a series...we won't say book...that's just too intimidating...but series,...yes, maybe I could give that a try.....
My husband and I have ten children....yes, ten.....nine on earth and one in heaven....are we amazing, as some people say....absolutely not....are we crazy....ABSOLUTELY!
In thinking about the absolute beginning of this story, we must go back sixty-two years to when I was born.....it was in the middle of the night, a few weeks before my due date that my mother awoke...as most pregnant women do, with the urgent need to get to the bathroom. As she quickly went down the hallway, she was horrified to think that she was peeing as she walked! Upon arriving at the bathroom though, she discovered that she was actually bleeding. As she waited, on a chair by the front door for the ambulance to come, she was scared. I was her second child, ..in the previous year her husband ( my dad) had fallen thirty feet of a bridge, while welding and broke his back in three places....she had been through enough, she thought...but things had just begun.
Upon arriving at the hospital, she was admitted and tests were done...placenta previa was the diagnosis ....the placenta was coming first....certain death for babies back then. She laid in the bed for hours, and then felt something happening...she called for the nurse, and upon examination, the placenta and I had switched places and now I was coming first. And come I did...hands first, my mother says....guess I had to feel my way !
It didn't take them long to figure out that I had a few things missing....like muscles! Not all of them, just some....like 50% of my arm muscles, and underdeveloped deltoids....that would never develop to full strength. My mother, as mothers before her accepted my deficiencies and forged ahead. Over the years, we went through hours and hours of physiotherapy , four surgeries, doctors upon doctors appointments, and ballet lessons! Yes, ballet....due to the arms not working correctly it affected my posture which the doctors said would be helped with ballet!
My parents, but especially my mother, pushed me into being the independent person that I am today....that I could look after the needs if a large family is completely from my mothers total dedication to me developing into a person that could and would function without the help of others....from dressing myself, feeding myself.....to growing up, learning all the domestic chores, to doing crafts, knitting, sewing my own clothes, to playing baseball...yes, catching the ball! I was on the school team...and no, I couldn't catch those fly balls with my hands but I could with my stomach ! (I ended up with extremely strong stomach muscles!)
Throughout highschool, I like every other highschool girl, had crushes on certain guys.....of course, most of them didn't notice.....there were two or three that seemed to but I would immediately be very questioning of their intentions....after all I reasoned....why would any reasonable guy want to date someone with crooked arms when he could have any number of girls who didn't!
After I graduated high school, I got my first job.....something my high school typing teacher said I'd never get....I was a typist! For two years I was a statistical typist for a wholesale hardware company...not very glamorous but it was a job.....
I also met my husband......
The summer after I graduated, my grandparents were going on one of their regular jaunts back to the 'old country' as they referred to it...Ireland. My grandfather had been making little comments that gave me the impression that they might ask me to go with them! I was very excited....the waiting was very difficult....summertime was starting though and still they hadn't said anything, so when I received a call asking if I could come and work at a camp for the month of August, I agreed. It was after that my grandfather confirmed that they had been going to ask me!
So, off to camp I went...it was a camp for underprivileged kids and I was given a cabin of 12 eight year old boys. Myself and another girl were suppose to look after these kids for a week...at the end if the week , a new batch would come...this went in for the whole month if August! The very first weekend my roommate/co counselor was late , by a few days , coming in.....the head of the camp asked this quiet young man to help me....and the rest is history....this past June we celebrated forty years of marriage.....there was somebody for me...someone who accepted and loved me just the way I was.....amazing .
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