Various & Sundries

Just got home from taking Kikimama to the vet for surgery. She’s had a growth that has grown, to practically triple the size, since I found it at the beginning of the year. The vet has seen her once, and said that since it’s outer, and he can get his hands around it, that it probably just needs removing. It’s better than an internal growth. So. She’s at the vet getting prepped for surgery. They said they would call me when she’s out, around noon.

I slept nary a wink, it seems, until about 6am. What is wrong with my sleep patterns? Lord, I need some good good sleep. Spirit World sleep. I’m so tired but now that I’m up I made some coffee, and I’ve got about 100 pages to read in GO, by John Clellon Holmes, for class today. It’s dense. So it’ll take a while.

Also today is Noodle’s 14th birthday. Fourteen Years. Capitol Letters.

dude.

I remember when Rach called me (not on cell phones) at the house where I was renting a room in Goshen, Indiana. I was in the teensiest tiniest space possible and surrounded by my stuff, getting the car packed and loaded for my trek back to Oklahoma.

“we have a baby girl!!!” she said. “She’s beautiful. It was amazing.”

And I just cried and cried.

The night before was the Seinfield series finale, as well as the death of Frank Sinatra. At first I thought Frank died because that episode was so bad (it really wasn’t, and the internet wasn’t a huge deal then so there was no instantaneous uproar online) but in fact, he had to head up, high five this awesome eye’d child that was on her way down.

I drove for two days, had two flat tires, and a sunburn on the entire left side of my body because my a/c was out, but I got home.

And she was, in fact, beautiful.

And she is still, in fact, amazing.

It’s a hard thing, navigating this new fangled, always connected, hyper technical world. It’s harder still as a teenager.

I thank God daily that there was no internet or social media when I was growing up. Bobby and Deanne almost sent me to right to the hospital, and lacking that, a “poetry” intervention. Can you imagine what I’d have been like if I could see their every move on Facebook???

I’m only mostly kidding.

But Noodle is going strong, growing into such an amazing young woman. I’m proud to know her, and honored to love her.

Happy Birthday, kiddo.

We’ll gather tonight over chicken and birthday cake. We will be grateful for our tribe. May it ever sustain us.

So, Healing thoughts to Kikimama, and Happy Birthday thoughts to Noodle, mmkay?

I’m getting coffee and reading for a few hours.

Happy Tuesday, ya’ll.