We've had a rough couple of days here, but things seem to be simmering down a little. The chick is having a rough batch of confusion, but we're doing all we can. Had planned to pick up my sister for a couple of days summer visit here on Cape Cod, but with the chick having such a hard time we figured that might not be a good idea. Not knowing what, when, how makes planning things difficult at times. We're making the best of the situation, and next week she'll start a weekday set of groups and courses that might help strengthen her ability to address each complication in ways that work for her.

Had a back to back 2 hour meeting yesterday with two incredibly dedicated members of the team we've put together to get things as situated as they can be. The saddest part of all of this is knowing that everyone involved is trying as hard as they can to do as much as they can to help and knowing that there are still barriers that get in the way of doing what is needed. The system, in a multitude of ways, is set up in a fashion that is geared to wait for complete collapse instead of prevention. It's a system that is willing to take too many risks, and when fallout occurs, it's a system that has the perfect setup for nobody being responsible, as so many facets of the system failed that nobody can be fully responsible. Sadly, that is pretty much how the USA is set up in every way, from business to medical to social to public. It's so Atlas Shrugged it makes me laugh (and cry) sometimes.

The timeline of things that can go wrong is extended year after year, as child after child is misdiagnosed, misdiagnosed some more, and then tossed on this, taken off that, and when nothing helps, rediagnosed with a new misdiagnosis, and the cycle can just go on for so long before anything can make a difference. Even a correct diagnosis can still lead to years of struggle. I'm beginning to understand that sometimes even knowing exactly what is causing a situation can still take a long, long time to take care of. I thought that once you knew what was wrong with any given problem in life that the course would be easier and get better day by day... but as we've taken some time lately to do a 'focus on the positives' we are frustrated to find that not all that much has changed and in some ways things continue to get harder. We do believe, though, that in time things will smooth out and get less complicated and frustrating. While you're in it, though, on a day to day basis, it's sometimes excrutiatingly exhausting. Most of all, for the chick.

We're still waiting to read up on the FDA site about its findings with a product out of Canada called EMPowerplus. I found this website last year, after reading a long and interesting article in Discover magazine. We've considered this to be a last resort if nothing else helps with the situation, but we want to wait to see what the FDA findings are, just to be safe. Not that I hold that much respect for the FDA, but the studies they are doing on it currently in conjunction with the studies they have already done on it would make it something we could try with the chick's doctor if it does get FDA approval. I used to think anything vitamin/mineral/diet was a crock of hopeful nonsense, almost too basic a reason for such complicated conditions, but the more I've read up on this, the more sense it makes. Our foods really are overprocessed and the stuff that's put into them (preservatives, additives, chemicals) could very well be the cause for the increase in mental conditions that have baffled doctors for decades. Soil isn't replenished and cared for as it was in the past, which definitely plays a role in the food that grows there. Overworked farms that are pushed to meet demands for certain crops could be putting out the equivalent of plastic fruits and vegetables that look great to the eye in their visual perfection but have far less of the vitamins and minerals we got from them in decades gone by. If all that has caused the mental health crisis over the years is a vitamin/mineral deficiency, it could so easily be rectified and would also result in a bit of financial loss for the pharmeceutical companies that have created pills to mask over the symptoms but not the address the origin at all (which is why the pharmeceutical companies are going to be EMPowerplus's strongest opponents.) It's just a waiting game now, to see what the results of the double-blind studies are. Oddly, I can't find anything about EMPowerplus on the FDA site, but I do know it's in the process of being evaluated by the FDA or at the very least the studies have begun.

For now, we go along with most of everything taken care of from last year's horrible misdiagnosis by the most incompetent and sadistic doctor we've ever met. With a bad taste still lingering in our mouths from that incident, we've still somehow managed to sort out that doctor's critical mistakes, and are at the very least now working with a doctor who backs up everything he says with facts, test results and a more clinical evaluation. But the road to here was bumpy, and continues to have its own set of small detours.

We continue to do geocaching, and most likely will head to the beach later on today depending on how things are going. Hopefully the rest of the week is a little less tense. We have another (!!!) travel bug we found at the 3rd cache we went to and we've got to place him somewhere with a lot of tourists in the hope that some Canadian geocacher finds him... the travel bug's name is Nanuk and he came with a piece of paper that requested he somehow get up to Canada and Alaska. Here's a picture of Nanuk:




He's sitting on my desk right now, waiting for a new cache to climb into. We have a few printed out to find tomorrow. We've also got to get together some more small items to exchange with each cache, which I've come up with some pretty good ideas for.

All in all, I think this summer will be remembered by the kids mostly as the summer we started geocaching and the cool places we found the caches at. At least that's what I'm hoping for, because in the midst of all of these rough moments for the chick, there have been some great times that she was a part of and I figure that if we just keep going along here trying to do the best we can in spite of the circumstances and make some good, happy memories along the way, perhaps the fun times will make more of a difference for the hard times. It's either that or just sit around and worry what's going to happen next, and I just can't go that route. I want the 'what is going to happen next' to be something positive and interesting, and the kids have selected some really great caches to find. It's been even more fun than I anticipated it would be, and I already had a feeling before we even started doing it that it would be incredibly fun. :)

In closing, a poem by Paula Nancy Millstone Jennings for Hoopy Frood, who has been so helpful to me the past few days as I send him emails that read more like chapter books:

I have found
a find
in you
and me

The we
can do it
we can get
through it

the never giveuppers
the computer geeks
with painted mouses
and glowing keyboards

the pool swimmers
and skimmers
and algae shockers
we make things clear

we are a cache
we exchange with each other
travel bugs and stories
our waypoint's the same

This is how it is
so this is how we go
we coordinated our gps
and just take it slow

First geocaching expidition today, FOUND BUG IN FIRST CACHE!

www.geocaching.com


So the first geocache we decide to go to is at a place we've been to many times. Never knew a cache was there. So we get the coordinates, and off we went, with many small things to put inside the cache.

We're looking everywhere, reading the pages we printed out from the website about the spot. My daughter keeps saying "what does virtual mean?" I say "I think it means pretend?" But, it doesn't dawn on me, until twenty minutes later, twenty minutes being bitten by horseflies and cutting up our legs on pricker bushes while my daughter keeps telling us from the van "you guys... I think the cache is the view!", virtual means that there IS NO cache at this place!

We're laughing about it on the ride home, but now we really want to go to a cache. So, we get some new coordinates, for a place that isn't just a 'virtual cache' (they are listed as 'virtual cache' or 'regular cache'), and off we go again.

After a great hike up a great wooded path, we come to our very first cache. I saw it and just yelled "there it is, yeh! There it IS!" I let the boys (my son and his friend, my chick decided not to go with us for the 2nd try) get it, because I know their excitement about this was something they'd been looking forward to and something KC had worked so hard on (he learned the GPS and was our leader for the excursion.)

We open up the cache, it's shoebox sized and plastic so that it's weather-tight, and we're amazed at how much stuff is in it. The boys pick up something and I immediately see the silver tag on it. My heart leaps up to my throat. I'm thinking, what are the odds of finding a travel bug in the first cache you ever find?

I'm either the luckiest person alive, or some type of universal God decided to really make our day, because I read the tag and sure enough, it's a travel bug!

So, we log into the small plastic-bagged notebook, and take the bug with us to bring an hour's drive away this week. My dad is both shocked and thrilled we found the bug, and is going with us to replant it in a cache he knows about in his town. We put a cool toy car and some post note tabs and a bracelet inside the cache.

We went out for icecream cones to celebrate. It was a lot of fun, and we can't wait to go out again tomorrow to find another cache. We'd planned to do this once a week or once every other week, but we had so much fun today, we're going to go again tomorrow, and with an even bigger group.

If you're looking for a fun thing to do with your kids this summer, or even as an adult with some friends, the geocaching is fun, cheap and interesting! :) It's geeky good fun!

My sister just sent me this old photograph (1991) this morning, which led to us having a very long, cool discussion about the family and everything that has happened within our family structure. Isn't it pretty cool how photographs can sometimes lead to so much clarity? The only person missing from this photo is our oldest brother, and although it may never been that all 5 of us children are in the same place to have a picture taken, I'm going to ask him if I can photoshop him into the picture at some point. Or, because my photoshop skills aren't so good, I may ask a friend to do it, but I think I'd like to try to do it myself to learn how to do photoshopping better than I have in the past.

The Long Over-Due Washington Square Park Blog Post

Holy smokes... I can add pictures to my blog posts. Dunno when that option became available, it sure as heck wasn't an option when I got this blog some time ago. It definitely will save me time putting pictures on the imagedump.com site I usually use... from now on, I'll just put the pictures right here in the blog. Like this view from the Scrabble area of Washington Square Park in New York:



We left Cape Cod at 5:00 a.m. and arrived at Washington Square Park around 9:30 a.m., which was great driving time as we did make a 20 minute stop at a rest area to gas up, stretch and pee.

There were a lot of Chess players when we arrived at the park, but no Scrabble players to be found. The local park people let us know that the Scrabble players usually start filtering in around 11:00 a.m. or so, which is around the time they did start showing up, one right after another.

We'd come to this park because we'd read about it in the Stefan Fatsis book "Word Freak" as well as hearing about the park from various Scrabble players at the Boston Area yearly tournament (some of the parkies, regular players at the Washington Square Park Scrabble area, attend the Boston area tournament.) The movie Word Wars, though, made our desire to visit this park "at some point in our lifetimes" swiftly turn into "we must go there this year." Mainly because of one player... Aldo.

Aldo is a calm, quiet and sincere Scrabble player who did something pretty remarkable. He beat Joe Edley, who'd come to the park for the same reason we did (to meet and play Aldo), during their first game together. Joe Edley is the only expert tournament player to have won the National Scrabble Championship an astounding 3 times in his life (so far), but Aldo does not play in tournaments... only at the park.

I wish I'd been there to see Aldo beat Mr. Edley, the energy and mutual intelligence-respect between them must have been just phenomenal. Two of the world's most powerful Scrabble players going head-to-head must have been like the flutter of a million butterfly wings, creating a positive pulse of sportsmanship, critical thinking and all that can be achieved through dedication and utilizing logic to its fullest. To know both of these men are so in tune with the epicenter of their Scrabble minds... wow, this is reading like I just smoked a huge joint, isn't it though? HAHAHA! Just 2 cups of coffee, I swear... and a few Parliment lights. But anyways... Joe eventually went back to the park to do a 'best out of 7' day with Aldo. In the end, it was tied 3-3, and Joe Edley won the fourth and final game. Most of this, with the exception of that infamous first game between them, is in the movie Word Wars, which even if you aren't a Scrabble player is a fascinating movie to see. Ironically, not many parkies knew about the first game... odds are they didn't recognize Joe Edley, as most parkies do not pay much attention to the tournament circuit. They are there to game, and to, hmmmm... how should I put this so as not to draw any unneeded attention... well, to honor each other when a win is established. Thankfully, Kenny and I knew enough about these players to not partake of the sideline stuff, we'd have left the park broke if we had. What really impressed me is that nobody tried to hustle us, although I think that's mainly due in part to their ability to see right through my 'innocent tourist' act. No matter how much I try to coverup my street smarts, sometimes just my smile and laugh is a giveaway. It also could be, though, that these players are smart enough to just wait to be asked instead of doing the asking, which is the best way to do things... ask any street hooker in New York how they never got arrested and they'll tell ya that patience and never saying anything out loud is key.

A wonderful man with a flat-cap came by and noticed Kenny and I playing a game of Scrabble. He struck up conversation and we told him we were here to meet Aldo if at all possible. He let us know that Aldo would be there soon, and then Kenny and I told him about the Boston Area tournament, how we'd met many parkies but never been to the park, that it was our 12 year anniversary, short-version life story stuff, and he told us his name was Joe.

Joe let us know that he'd taught Aldo everything he knows about the game. This made me want to play head-to-head with Joe, but I could tell by his smile that he was just joshing with us.

So we anxiously awaited Aldo's arrival... as he walked towards the picnic tables, my heart nearly leapt into my throat. I literally put my hands on my chest near my heart, to calm it down. His tall, strong demeanor was just breathtaking, and I am pretty sure my knees buckled at the sight of him, but that didn't stop me from walking right up to him and saying "Aldo, I would love to have your autograph for my Scrabble bathroom, we loved you in the movie Word Wars. That's just incredible, what happened with Joe Edley, we play the Boston area tournament and have watched Joe win so many of them, wow, you are just great." I said probably some more stuff, but can't remember verbatim because once I started talking with Aldo and the way he kept glancing at this strange Yankee-accented chick as he set up his Scrabble board, his eyes had a hint of laughter in them, I could not stop my mouth from just saying everything I'd thought of in the weeks before coming to New York. I kept both of my hands pressed to my heart to stop myself from just reaching up and touching Aldo's cheek, which is something I kept wanting to do the entire time, but I'm a weirdo like that. I'm a contained goofball with self-control. Sorta.

"Scrabble bathroom?" he said with a slightly cocked eyebrow.

"Yeh, it's a bathroom at my house that I wallpapered with dictionary pages. To study from while I pee or anything. I've got a bunch of autographs from my favorite Scrabble players framed and on the walls. Can I have yours? You are great!"

Aldo was staring at me with eyes wide, which I know I come across as a bit loopy, so I wasn't offended or anything, and the look wasn't offensive anyways... he shook his head yes and said "I'll give you my autograph for your bathroom, hold on a second." There's only a few Scrabble tables, and we later learned that those who set up their boards usually remain in place for the entire day, which meant getting your spot situated before you did anything else... like signing autographs for Scrabble bathrooms.

As nervous as I was, I still found the courage to ask Aldo for a game. I don't usually get nervous, but for some reason I was intent on beating Aldo, even though common sense told me I was nuts for thinking it possible. Joe with the flat-cap offered to assist me in a game against Aldo. Two minds against one still felt like it would leave Joe and I six brains short of enough mind-power to tackle Aldo. But I underestimated Joe... the guy perhaps did teach Aldo everything he knows!~ In an amazing case of Joe and I getting every single good tile in the bag and Aldo getting stuck with racks that must have looked like sounds you make when you've been whacked upside the head with a paintcan, the game ended with a final score of ... YIKES! I don't have the final score, it's in Joe's ledger! I just looked inside my Scrabble bag, and it dawned on me that Joe is the one who kept score... so he has the exact results in numbers. But, I do know this... the exact result without numbers is Joe and I somehow managed to win the game. Kenny and I are going back to the park in September, so when we do, I'll get the score in numbers from Joe, who will most likely be there... as all parkies are usually there on nice days without rain to warp the Scrabble boards (a few boards look like they had been caught in downpours, which really made me realize the kinds of Scrabble players these people are... dedicated!)

Here's a picture of me and Aldo:









and the picture of me and Joe with the flat-cap!


There are also some pictures of the orange-tailed squirrels and funky chess art pieces on my mobog area.


Kenny and I walked around the park numerous times during our day there. We saw a great magician show and I got to sit and listen to this young, beautiful short-blonde haired chick sing some songs while playing guitar. We brought a lot of dollar bills to the park. I saw a guy walking around in a viking helmet. We saw a few people passed out in the wooded sections, the orange-tailed squirrels walking around them looking for food in their pockets. We saw hundreds of dogs, as the park has a fenced in dog-run area where the leashes come off and dogs and owners of all shapes and sizes play, socialize and enjoy the fresh air and sunshine. Kenny got asked if he wanted some pot about 3 times (which, of course, he just said he didn't smoke.) I didn't get approached for drugs... I guess because I have the kind of demeanor that says I'm high enough with a mild case of insanity and hyperactivity.

So, the autographs from the parkies got framed and put in the Scrabble bathroom, and every morning when I wake up I get to remember one of the best days Kenny and I have had in 2005.




Initially, we had planned to make a visit to the Washington Square Park a yearly event for our wedding anniversary, but June's visit was so much fun we made tenative verbal plans to go back in September of this year.

After we'd won the game against Aldo, I'd asked Joe for a game but he said I was looking too tough to play... in September, I plan to request a little side-action with Joe to get that head-to-head game. Even though I may lose, it will be worth it. I'm going to study up before we hit the park, and will play as hard as I try to in tournaments. Hopefully I get a little lucky on the draws, as we did with Aldo, because I know that is the only reason we were able to do what I'd dreamed of doing at Washington Square Park.

Kenny and I also had a game against Larry Sherman (who signed his autograph with a question mark after it, which cracked me up). Larry Sherman beat the living stink out of me and Kenny, but we pretty much expected it so it wasn't too brutal to our Scrabble egos. I guess I'll also have to admit, in closing this huge blog post, that Kenny beat me in our first Washington Square Park game of Scrabble, but I then beat him back... we're now tied in our park games, and plan to play the rubber match in September.

If you don't play Scrabble or Chess, Washington Square Park is still a very fascinating and vibrant place to spend a day... for people watching, dog watching, and just the activity of it all is very good for the heart and mind. We plan at some point to take the kids there, because we know they'd love it. I give the Washington Square Park two thumbs up, a 10 out of 10, and a huge silver star. :)

before I blog about Washington Square Park, and before I write about the movie Passionada, and before I write about all the other things that have been going on the past few weeks, I need to jot down something that happened last night right after we saw fireworks in Freetown, Massachusetts.

KC had got this great multi-environment bug and fish holder for his birthday at a party we'd just gone to earlier in the day, so his Aunt Donna gave him two fish from her own aquarium to put inside it. They were cute little fish, white and orange little guys. It was pretty late as we drove home, and KC must have fallen asleep, as there was suddenly this loud thud. I lowered down the music and said "is everything ok?" thinking somebody had fallen off their seat. KC's voice, which went right to my heart, piped up "Oh no. OH NO. Mom. Help."

The plastic container had fallen upside down, the water had drained out the holes, and there the fish were inside the empty plastic area, flopping around for their lives. I shouted out "look for the spring water bottles in case there's any left in them!" and stepped on the gas to get to our exit (we had just passed by exit seven and our exit was next.) KC's voice piped up again, this time with the sound of sadness so deep it made my eyes water. I knew what he was seeing, two fish with no water, and no way to save them. "Mom," he said, and then whatever he was going to say next got caught in his throat. Kenny was looking around for any water in any containers at all. "Didn't one of the kids leave a half empty water bottle in here yesterday? Check the back!" I asked as exit 8 came into view. My hands felt hot on the steering wheel.

KC couldn't move, his grief was so powerfully strong. Kenny gave up looking for water when it became obvious there was none in the van. A sense of sadness, thick with death, took over the entire van, but I kept driving, speeding up even a bit, because at this point the past 2 weeks had been such a weird set of circumstances and incidents, such as this one, that I could not accept another thing going so wrong. I felt like I was literally drowning in the pain and sadness KC felt, but I couldn't seem to resolve myself to just giving up, even though it seemed so impossible to do anything and even though it was just two little fish we could so easily buy the next day for thirty cents each at a pet store. I'd had enough sad moments like this over the past few weeks, and to see KC having one so personal himself, it would have taken an atomic bomb to demolish my determination to, at the very least, try with all my might to make it better, different, and not heartbreaking for him.

As we pulled up to a friend's house, about a block away from our house, I ran up to the door and knocked, knowing how late it was but just unwilling to give up, even if it meant being extremely impolite with a late night logic-less dead-fish visit. "Fuck this sadness," I thought inside my head, even though I knew all the hope in the world can sometimes be so futile. I turned the doorknob and, thankfully, although nobody answered the door, it had been left unlocked.

I ran back to the van, Kenny handed me the small, plastic fish tank with the two motionless, mouth-agape fish in it. As I ran towards the stairs to the house, I looked for any signs of life, as the tank shook with my Olympic running. Nothing moved at all inside the clear plastic enclosure, and my heart sunk as my mind told me to stop being so irrational as to think anything could be done at this point. My heart listened, but some other part of me, some part of me that apparently is bigger and more in control than my mind and heart put together, yelled very loudly "DO NOT GIVE UP." My hands were shaking, as were my legs, at the intensity of this part of myself that I have never quite understood.

I ran in the dark, inside the house, towards the area I knew the sink was. Once I felt the cold steel of the sink, my arms flailed around looking with only my hands and sense of touch for the faucet. I guided the tank opening under it, and just put the water on. As the container got heavy enough with the weight of the water, I shut the water off. I couldn't see anything, there are no street lights on this small block I'm at, and only forest is behind this home that the kitchen window faces. As I walked towards the dim light of the door now in front of me, I fully expected to see two floating dead fish to finish this night off, to cement the past few weeks as the most brutal and disheartening few weeks this family has ever experienced. A two week period that began the day after we got home from New York... two weeks of just unbelievable situations happening one after the other. Some of them great things (Kenny got promoted again, which was great) but the majority of the things... not so great, but things we semi-expected. Two dead fish is what I fully expected to see, and my logic told me to be prepared to just accept it. I'd done everything I could possibly do.

But there they were... swimming around. Literally as if nothing had happened. They weren't gasping in gulps of water, they weren't racing around the tank in fear, they were calmly and casually just gently gliding through the clear water as if they just woke up from a nice midsummer fish nap.

I couldn't believe it. My hands were shaking, and my eyes were burning to cry, but instead, I just opened the door and gave a thumbs up to Kenny and then to KC. They didn't seem to believe me, or perhaps they thought I was just being overly-hopeful to the point I was imagining the fish were alive (which I thought I might be by the looks on their faces), but as I got to the van door and they could see the fish so alive and merry... all the doubt faded. Kenny looked shocked. KC looked at the fish in total disbelief. I stood there not even knowing what to make of what had just happened, I couldn't even speak.

It was in silence that we drove the block to our home. As we walked into the house, I said to KC: "Ok. Here's the thing... those fish looked dead. All hope seemed lost. But remember this night, buddy, no matter what happens in your life, no matter how messed up things may go at times, remember these fish and remember to never give up. Never give up. Just keep going. Just do whatever it takes, even when you are quite sure you can't do anything to change things."

"Yeh. I know," KC said, as he stared at the fish in the light of our kitchen area, baffled and amazed at the fantastic turn of events. "Wow. They were just dead."

I sat in my computer chair and felt like I'd just collapsed. As I watched KC walk towards his bedroom to hit bed, I knew that what has just happened had made a strong impact on him, a positive impact, and I knew that he'd think of it during any moments in his life when he feels like life is overwhelming. "Goodnight, mom," he said, as he looked back at me with eyes that seemed to say "How'd you do that?"

So, I researched online before writing this blog, and others have had fish out of water for the same duration of time come back to life:
http://www.straightdope.com/mailbag/mfishbreath.html

It wasn't mom-magic or some bizarre occurrence... fish can live out of water for much longer than humans could without oxygen. I didn't want KC (and Kenny) looking at me the way they were, or thinking that somehow I'm capable of mystical healing or some crap. They'd both been acting strange around me today, as if I had freaked them out a bit by bringing the fish back to life by just willing it to happen. Now they both know... fish are just capable of surviving.

Anyways... that's my blog for today. I hope to do more writing this week, just waiting for things to be calm inside my head before I sit down for a while to type. Might get up early one morning to just have the house quiet, with everyone sleeping, and spend some time jotting down some of the happier moments that happened in the midst of the harder moments.

And for Mark, my bestest buddy, some more poetry by Paula Nancy Millstone Jennings:

Not enough water, and then, too much
too much again, back to not enough
The weeks have been dry with wet

I'm shaking off the dampness
and quenching all my thirst
Panic, don't... just 'let'

The days have been so set
yet
this and that, you know
how it gets