Spring has sprung . . .

Spring has sprung
The grass has riz,
I wonder where
The flowers is?

Not sure how well known that little spring verse is in your part of the world, but when I was growing up in the fifties, Iowa, it was a big spring time hit. You would hear it often recited by as many adults as children while they chatted over fence lines and clothes lines on some of those first warm sunny spring days.

And today, as I sit here working at my laptop, the sound of our riding mower and that of our neighbor’s riding mower, are humming away outside my open window. So nice to have the windows and doors open, airing out the stuffiness of a long hard winter. The lilacs are working on blooming--they’re just beginning to “show”, and I’m sure before the weekend is over, their fragrance will be wafting through the house carried on these gentle spring breezes.

All the apple trees, including the Crab apple trees, have been in bloom for part of a week or so. If you go anywhere near them, their scent will intoxicate. Funny how they don’t quite “broadcast” as the lilacs do. However, if you’re out driving with the windows open, once in a while, when you’re passing a large grove, their fragrance will sweep through the car, and your head will immediately turn in their direction, and you will be rewarded with the sight of their white and pink blossoms en masse along a hillside.

Mm, the smell of freshly mown grass has just gotten up to my second-story window. All that mowing is paying off in olfactory delight. For my dear hubby, all of it amounts to heading straight to his antihistamine supply. But for me, it fills me with sensory delight, and memories of a very happy childhood sprawled out on a blanket in our big backyard, watching the clouds roll by. Nothing quite like the contentment that would come from spending a lazy spring day soaking in the warmth of the sun after a winter of little sun, and being bundled to the hilt to stay warm.

I do believe my outdoor flower pots are calling. Today will be a good day to head to the local nursery and pick out my tomato plants, some flowers for my big barrel pots and some to line the garden path borders. Once home I’ll get last fall’s residue of late coming weeds and this spring’s early weeds out of the garden spots around my house. And I can work up the flower pots so they’ll be ready to plant tomorrow.

Ah yes, Spring has sprung, and I know exactly where the flowers is! Ain’t it grand!

Life's Little "oops" . . .

I’m not sure if it’s my age, “the” age we live in, or . . . ? But it seems in the past few years there have been more “surprises” thrown at me.

I know some of it has to do with the age of my mother, and her going in to a nursing home. All those little Life surprises that my two young sons used to bring into my day, have now been replaced by all those little surprises my almost 99 year old mother seems to add. This week, on Monday, bright and early, I received a call they were taking my mom via ambulance, to the hospital. That sent me into a scrabbled morning as I tried to cancel and/or re-arrange MY Monday, and get going on the road to cover the over hour drive to the hospital, so I could be there with her.

And that is kind of how the rest of the day went. There was a lot of hurry up and wait, of course, once you’re in the E.R. and they’re working through tests to determine what’s up. As I entered the E.R. room one of the blood lab technicians was working to get three vials filled with Mom’s blood. Mom is a tough one to find a vein, so the gal was having problems as they’d already started an I.V. in Mom, and that was her one fairly “good” vein. I walked in the door, and as Mom looked up and realized it was me, she let out with, “Thank God you’re here, they’re trying to kill me.”

She had already endured being temporarily catheterized, simply to get a urine sample, which later she sat on the bed pan and could have freely given them all the sample they needed SANS the invasive procedure. I tell you folks, it’s not a good idea to be in the hospital without someone “healthy” and vocal with you--they just take over and do things to their heart’s desire, and you’re just “at their mercy” so-to-speak.

It was finally determined she had pneumonia, and they admitted her into the hospital--and, of course, there went the rest of the day. And there went the next day, and the next. Gratefully she is responding very well to the antibiotics, and they determined they could switch her off the I.V. administered antibiotics and put her on orally given medication. That meant she could go back to the nursing home today. And that meant all the things I was suppose to be doing Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday and today, are being done TODAY as best I can get to them. Needless-to-say, some of it will be finished up tomorrow along with the “usual” Friday venue.

I’m grateful it wasn’t a bigger Life “oops” and that Mom is responding to the treatment very well. I’m grateful that other than being inconvenient driving the two plus hour round trip three times this week, spending money on gas that was not in my weekly allowance, and eating out with funds NOT in my budget NOR in my “allowed” food’s list, things weren’t any worse, and it’s all been covered.

I really need this weekend to be peaceful. I could stand to take the weekend “off”--but I see that spring has finally sprung and the grass is growing up, up, up. Translated, that means I’ll be spending a great deal of Saturday astride my trusty lawn tractor, mowing a fourth of our town (well, our family members own a fourth of the town, so I’m the one who mows all of our properties). I’ll be singing at the top of my lungs as I merrily buzz along. It is just as good if not better than singing in the shower! And in truth, it will probably feel pretty darn good being outdoors instead of sequestered in a hospital room as I was much of this week.

Viva la Oops! As I live through them, I become stronger--well, at least I become more grateful for all the non-oops days.