Taking Inventory

Minimized at the bottom of my computer screen is a spreadsheet labeled “Home Inventory.” Corey and I are using it as a means to take stock of the things we currently own, the things we want to own forever, and the things that we could honestly do without.  Man, we’ve got a lot of things!!  Have you ever really thought about what it would take to make a list of all those things? 

A few years ago I was shopping with a friend who found 5 perfect somethings among the wares we were browsing in the store.  As we got back in the car she announced that she would now have to find 5 items in her home to get rid of to make room for the new ones.  I admit, I had never once considered the impact that bringing things into my home would have on the simplicity I crave, the cleanliness I can never seem to attain, or the aesthetic quality of the home of my dreams.  I have lived among stuff for so long, I cannot fathom which things in my life are necessary and which things I am just too lazy to let go of. 

On the radio the other day, the DJ put the question out there: What if you had to whittle your belongings to only 100 things (of the thousands if not, hundreds of thousands of things you already own) for your every day needs.  Could you do it?  As I start my day with my cell phone’s alarm and realize it can only operate correctly with its charger, I am highly aware that I’ve already thrown 3 things onto my list ; unless I don’t have to count electricity, then I’m down by two.  Add Shampoo, conditioner, soap, hairspray, my Mary Kay® Timewise™ cleanser, moisturizer, hand and decollate complex (with SPF 20 of course), Day Solution, and Night Solution, I’ve already claimed 10% of my allotment and I haven’t even started on my make up yet!   I’m afraid I’ll be out of options before I even make it downstairs to start on the coffee. 

I’m struggling a little with how I should respond to the stuff I’ve amassed through many shopping expeditions, gifts, and the generosity of others.  Should I be embarrassed that I have so much and be ashamed of my greediness?  Should I give it away to those who need it more? Should I liquidate it all in a yard sale and use the funds for a more lofty purpose?  I tell you, I will have to come to grips soon with every single item we own.  We are expecting orders to Korea any day and will have to account for every single thing in our home.  Does it go overseas?  Does it go in storage?  Does it get thrown away?  Given away?  Sold?  Every magnet on the fridge and every coffee mug in the cupboard will soon have to be given a designation and a value.  The very thought of the tedious process is beginning to exhaust me. 

But this will be an opportunity to determine the personal value of our things and whether or not they make our lives easier, happier, more organized, more fulfilled, or more frustrated.  For now, I’ll try to take it one thing at a time and not get burdened by the process, but I can’t help but realize that I am way more blessed than I can ever fully report on a spreadsheet.  By the way, we’re having a garage sale Labor Day weekend!

The Art of @#$%& Big Words

My 17 year-old said it best—“I don’t need to cuss.  I know lots of big words!”   It reminds me of a time when I was still in high school.  Some friends and I were going to hang out at the river and swim.  I, having been raised to not be a pansy, decided I would “break the ice” and be the first to jump in.  There would be none of this trying out the temperature and slowly acclimating one body region at a time.  I knew the trick was to jump in over my head and get it over with and that’s exactly what I did! 

The expletive I uttered actually came out in multiple syllables.  But you have to understand, that water was really (really) cold, and I made sure to get the warning to my comrades waiting patiently on the shore for my assessment.  Through half closed eyelids and rapid intakes of minute levels of oxygen, I could make them out as they processed my report.  I was the only one who ended up in the water that day.  Evidently, if it made me cuss, it was just too dang cold! 

I do remember consciously making the decision that I wasn’t going to cuss, but my motives weren’t exactly pure or moral.  It was just that I had noticed far too many of my peers did and I hated to be just like everyone else, so I opted to describe more eloquently how I felt about the current state of the union or the weather that day.  I wasn’t really sure that anyone had even noticed the absence of 4-letter words in my vernacular until that day at the river. 

Imagine a world where, instead of the stock, one-syllable response to a square hit of a hammer on the thumb, one exclaimed, “For the LOVE of all that is good and holy, my thumb feels like it’s just been stung by a bee, sliced with a knife, and burned on a red hot coil! I have NEVER hated an object more than I loathe this HAMMER and it’s all I can do to prevent myself from HURLING it at our sliding glass door and giving it a PERMANENT burial in the back yard!!”  I actually feel better already, and it’s been years since I’ve hit my thumb with a hammer!

I find it a bit entertaining when a soldier apologizes to my husband, a chaplain, for abbreviating his feelings to a one-syllable sentiment.  As if he’s never heard (or said) it himself or that somehow God only cares if he cusses in front of clergy.  Cussing is like a second language in the military and it’s so common place that many feel self-conscious if they don’t speak the lingo.  I guess the best argument in favor of it is the expediency of the communication, but as for me, I’ll stick with the big words!  It’s way more entertaining from my perspective.  

Thanks of a Grateful Nation

I just love a man in uniform.  More specifically, I love my man in uniform.  I love a woman in uniform, too!  And from what I’ve been able to tell, lots of people do.  On the occasion that our family is out and about in the community while Corey is in uniform, inevitably someone will want to shake his hand and tell him “thank you for your service.”  Maybe you’ve done that, too.  But have you ever wondered exactly what you’re thanking them for?  I never understood why our military was so important (except for having been told it was) until we joined the ranks ourselves.  The next time you tell a member of our military “thanks,” you should know that it will be taken to heart.

When you offer your thanks for serving, you are actually saying thanks for choosing to put a nation’s priorities and safety above their own.  You’re saying thanks to their family for never being able to choose where they are going to live regardless of how far it is from family or friends.  You are saying thanks to their children for being willing to have their hearts broken every couple of years as they say good-bye to good friends, and for being strong enough to say hello to new ones.  You’re saying thank you to their children for sharing their mom or dad with, not only the entire United States of America, but also with another country to whom our nation is offering its services.  You’re saying thank you for the birthdays that get celebrated with one missing family member, the Christmases that get celebrated on Skype, the anniversaries that come from the florist delivery guy with a sentiment attached in someone else’s handwriting.  You’re saying thanks for walking into a new, empty home days or weeks before their belongings arrive, only to begin making mental preparations for moving out in a couple of years.  You’re saying thanks for living “on the edge” when orders are about to come due and they have no idea where the military is going to send them next, except that it probably still won’t be near family or friends.  I could go on, but I’m not sure how long a paragraph should reasonably be in a well-written blog post.

It never gets old.  It’s the simplest, least expensive thing you can do, but when you walk up to my husband—especially when we are all with him—and tell him “thank you!” we know you mean it.  And when one of us says, “It’s an honor!” you can be sure we’re not just saying that. 

1-32 Cav Ball



It doesn't look it, but the gown is actually purple.




















This is how I still get pics out that we want to show off!   

Had to get both sides :)



The ball was held at the Bruce Convention Center in Hopkinsville, KY on 08 July 11.
Photog credit goes to Connor Arnold.  Go read his blog--"Adagio for the Computer Keyboard." http://www.adagiokeyboard.blogspot.com/ 

Life Without Cable: or Why Theater Makes me Cry

I don’t know how she does it, but theater extracts tears from my ducts like no movie or book ever has.  I think it’s because the stage taps into more of the senses than the screen or the page.  It doesn’t matter whether it’s “a rhapsody, a symphony, a comedy, [or] a play” (Stewart, 1977), being surrounded by the result of thousands of man (and woman) hours of rehearsal, prop building, directing, and lighting brings some emotions to the surface.  It’s probably because I have ADHD.  It may be because I secretly want to audition for the role of Desdemona in a local theater production of Shakespeare’s “Othello.” 

It’s actually probably because we haven’t had cable TV since 2006 and can barely channel a signal to watch even a snowstorm version of local broadcasts since the conversion from over-the-air to digital a couple years ago.  (Don’t lecture me about a converter box.  We have one.  It doesn’t help.)  So my news sources have come primarily from friends who post on facebook and now, Twitter, since I’m abstaining from facebook for the time being.  We have since discovered Netflix, which allows us to catch up on almost any show we may have missed in the past 5 years sans commercials and in a fraction of the time.  It also has eliminated the anxiety-producing wait time in between episodes.  I still rely on all of you for my newsfeeds though.

Today, my husband and I enjoyed a local production of “Joseph and the Amazing Technicolor Dreamcoat” at The Roxy Theater in downtown Clarksville.  Our friend, Courtney Collins, was featured in the ensemble, so there was extra incentive to see it before it was too late.  At the Roxy, there’s not a bad seat in the house—unless someone with an obnoxiously tall hat sits in front of you. I’m not speaking from experience here.  Even in the second to the last row, I’m pretty sure the reflection from the sequins on Joseph’s amazing dreamcoat rippled across our faces when the stage lights hit it just right.  Generally, it’s a funny production, but when the entire cast poured its heart and soul into describing the hues present in the object of his brothers’ jealousy, “Yellow and purple and peach and violet . . . “ I felt a tear make its way down my cheek. 

I’m sure it was just an especially bright, targeted sequin reflection from Joseph’s coat thanks to the expert position of the spotlight.  I’m sure that’s what it was. 

Does anyone know if a local production of Othello is in the works?

The Sound of Summer

I begrudgingly participated in exercise this morning. Don’t get me wrong—I looked for many reasons to politely decline, but it was a mild 71° at 8 o’clock am here in Kentucky, so the weather wouldn’t provide me with a reasonable excuse.  Neither would any imagined or real injuries.  Nor would I be able to claim less-than-adequate REM since according to my husband, I was sound asleep by 10pm and I return your attention to the moment of deliberation—8am.  You do the math, I already exercised today.

Corey,  in his determination to come in at Army required weight allowance, had left with the beagle and I quickly calculated that I had approximately 12-15 minutes before he’d been one lap around his usual course to meet him.  After donning the appropriate foot and body requirements for a jog, I set out to “surprise” him and offer my company for his morning jog (read: give him an excuse to slow his pace.)

It was on the quarter mile stretch to the bike path from our house that I heard it, The Sound of Summer.  I must describe first the overcast heavy air that surrounded me for you to hear what I heard.  The sun’s light strained behind a wall of clouds preventing it from producing any shadows on the ground.  One by one, I picked up the rhythm of my shoes meeting the pavement in a squishy, labored sort of song.  I heard it in the brassy timbre emitting from a fellow jogger’s headphones as she and I passed each other on the way.  I wondered what song was providing her motivation to keep going.  A lonesome sounding bird was cooing to my left in the wooded area across the street.  And though I couldn’t hear it, I’m sure a deer lifted its head in awareness of the vibrations of potential predators nearby and, satisfied, returned to snacking on the abundant undergrowth.  Behind me, the soft crackle and whirring of a bicycle’s wheels caught up with me as an 8 year old boy passed me on his bike.  I silently approved him for wearing his helmet, whether or not it was his idea.  In the background, critters chirped, clicked, and scurried, barely audible, providing a layer of mood music for an oblivious audience.  I passed another jogger with headphones in her ears.

Up ahead, I saw my husband rounding out the first lap of his jog, followed by our beagle panting with tongue hanging out eager to sniff, investigate, and mark every vertical object he encountered.  “I thought you might like some company,” I offered. 

He smiled.

Three Days into My Self-imposed Facebook Fast



HHT soldiers being honored in Union, KY




Corey with Union, KY Mayor saying thanks




Corry and Connor before the Reds v. Indians game in the 104* heat




It's hard to tell, but he's up there on the big screen :)




Waving to 41,000 or so adoring fans

 I picked the worst month to abstain from facebook.  It’s not even July 4^thand already Connor has provided me with at least six status-worthy quotations, my husband was in a parade as a guest of honor along with 9 of his comrades from the 1-32 Cav HHT troop in Union, KY, we were treated to an astounding fireworks display that rivaled Disneyland’s, and were featured at Saturday’s Cincinnati Reds game on the big screen which was televised by Fox Sports. 

It’s only July 3^rd and already, I have volleyed a ton of photos to my in-laws one by one so they could enjoy the pictures I normally would have posted on facebook.  This Friday, we will get all dolled up for our first military ball—we’ve been to formal events, but never a full-fledged ball!  I can see myself now peering over Corey’s shoulder as he browses his facebook page for photos from the event.  And scrambling to get an email off to family again to make sure everybody gets to see us all dressed up.

I’ve made note of a few observations during my measly three day fast.  This first one is one I find most fascinating—facebook is a type of community.  No, it’s not a place where you can fulfill all of your social needs or make the kinds of interactions that deepen friendships.  It’s a public conversation barely comprised of complete sentences and proper punctuation.  But participating in a conversation with a friend on facebook says more than the words you might post under their status.  It says, “Hey! I know we don’t talk much, but I read your statuses and I like to let you know I was ‘here!’” 

I imagine more revelations will seize me over the next 27 days, but for now I’ll record my thoughts here.  I wonder if I’ll ever be able to revert to short concise thoughts and status updates again.

PS—Does it count if I post this link on facebook?  I mean, I won’t be lingering on the page or anything . . .