It's a Friday night, the kids are in bed, and I am up working on a case that is bothering me very much. I can't divulge much about it, but suffice it to say that it involves a young child who wants desperately to be with her mother, and is grieving because the powers that be won't let her go home.
Suddenly, I've started thinking about this puppy that I had when I was 14 years old. Her name was Chubby, and she was one of a litter of six that came from our family dog, Bowsey. Although Bowsey was "our" dog, I never really felt like she was "mine." I loved her, but we didn't have that special connection. We gave away most of the dogs in the litter, but my parents let me keep Chubby. I thought she was a boy initially. She was so cute, as puppies can be. As you can guess, she got her name because she was a fat ball of fur. I tried to resist, but as soon as I was told I could keep her, I loved her with abandon.
Now that I am older, and I look back on the way I loved my puppy, I sort of marvel at the fact that I already knew to be cautious about love. Although I was only 14, I already knew about the pain of loss, albeit in a limited way. Maybe I subconsciously experienced the grief bourne of loss when my father had to leave the Philippines ahead of us and we were separated for a year, or when my maternal grandmother died when I was only four. Maybe those experiences already primed my heart to be reticent. I'll never know for sure.
But my first conscious experience of grief was when I was around 10. My cousin, Ate Betty, had come from the Philippines and was staying with us in California. She had had a teacherous journey from the Philippines and made her way via Mexico, where she encountered some very bad people. I heard about the dangerous situations she had endured and was very relieved when she finally arrived. When she made it to California, she came to stay with us, and I thought it was for forever. Ate Betty was wonderful. She obviously adored me, my sister and brother. She helped me organize my special Avon perfume bottles on top of my bedroom dresser, told me stories about our cousins in the Philippines, taught me how to give myself a manicure, and laughed at things that I said that I intended to be funny. She used to say "by and by" when she meant "later" and "come again" when she didn't hear something we said. I loved her so much, and I didn't know anything about holding back to protect myself from hurt.
One day, Ate Betty's "grandparents" (technically, the woman was a sibling of a grandparent, but in the Filipino culture, your great-aunt is regarded like your grandmother) came from San Diego to take her to live with them. Ate Betty was my father's brother's daughter. She was very close to my parents. So I didn't understand the factors that went into the decision for her to leave us and move to San Diego. I remember that she went reluctantly. I remember crying so hard I could hardly breathe. I remember someone saying to get me water so I could calm down. I remember flinging myself on my parents' bed and refusing to get up to say goodbye to her. She came in say goodbye, and I remember being so distraught that the only thing I could manage to say between sobs was "don't go." But she explained that she had to go. Then she was gone.
We still talked to her, and she eventually got married, moved to Texas, and visited us regularly. In fact, I am flying out to see her in October. But it wasn't the same as having her live with us, and the memory of that separation was painful to me for a long time. That experience taught me to hold back just a little bit.
But Chubby was the most adorable little dog in the world, and when I learned I could keep her, I couldn't help but love her completely. As you've probably predicted, my story about Chubby had a sad ending. She got sick before her first birthday and died in her sleep. When I first realized she was dead, I called my mother at work crying. She tried to console me, and I pretended to be consoled. By then I had become pretty good at hiding my feelings and for the most part cried only in private. Perhaps no one in my family realized it, but I was extremely heartbroken. Almost 30 years later, I still cry when I think about Chubby. At a young age I developed a sense of empathy for anyone who loses a pet. Even at age 14, I knew, through personal experience, that losing a pet is just as painful as losing a person. Some people think that losing a dog (or any other kind of pet) doesn't have the same impact. But trust me, your heart breaks into just as many pieces. If you have ever lost your beloved pet, you and I share a bond, for we know the terrible feeling of grief for the selfless creature who brought so much happiness into our lives and asked for so little in return.
I'm not really sure what the point of this post is. I guess it's a vignette of the way in which a young person learns to be a little bit afraid to give her heart so readily to someone she loves. I guess it's my mind pondering the ways in which the little girl in the case I'm working on will be scarred by the forced separation from the mother she desperately loves. I guess it's my ode to a puppy I loved so intensely even if only for a short time. I guess it's only the tip of the iceberg on the topic of grief and loss.
Saturday, August 21, 2010
Monday, August 9, 2010
Adventures In Flying
My family and I are attending an out-of-state wedding in October, so I booked our flights last week. I haven't been on a plane since March of 2009, when I was three months pregnant with Jagger and we went to California so I could be with my mother, sister and brother for the anniversary of my father's passing. When I reached my sixth month of pregnancy, my obstetrician ordered me not to travel too far. Orson Welles once said, "There are only two emotions in a plane: boredom and terror." Poor Mr. Welles. Perhaps his problem was that he placed too much emphasis on the ride itself instead of the destination. Surely, he never flew with a baby. As for myself, I have a special fondness for the invention known as an airplane.
Coming To America
My new life in America began with a trip in an airplane in 1976. At the age of six, my mother, sister, brother and I boarded an international flight from the Philippines to America to reunite with my father, who had gone ahead a year earlier to establish a home for us. Prior to boarding, the pilot of the Philippine Airlines plane first had to undertake a special mission: to carry my younger sister onto the airplane. My mother had her hands full with my one-year old brother. When my sister, who was only three at the time, saw the jumbo jet, she planted her bottom on the ground just outside the portable stairs leading into the cabin and refused to board. Fortunately this was long before 9/11, so her demonstration was considered "cute" rather than a potential act of terrorism.
Imagine how challenging it is to take care of a baby during a flight. Multiply this by three. Add the transcontinental factor. The fact that we were leaving our extended family for an indefinite period of time to move to a foreign country raised the emotional toll of the trip exponentially. This gives you an idea of how difficult that flight must have been for my mother. Fortunately, she met a very sweet Canadian couple on the flight who offered to watch me so that my mother could focus on my brother and sister. At least she was able to subtract some of the stress, and seeing my father again after year apart with limited telephone contact was well worth all of it.
What Not To Wear
We took a fair number of trips by airplane when I was growing up to attend weddings or go on vacations. Once my cousin from Texas sent me a ticket so I could visit her. It was my first flight alone. I was a goofy teenager and had just watched a movie where the heroine wore high heels and a short skirt on a flight. I thought it seemed sophisticated and worthy of imitation, so I put together a little get up that included high heeled pumps. Having been accustomed to wearing little white Keds and having had very little experience in heels, I had a difficult time walking. To make things worse, back then carry on bags did not have the little wheels that make them easy to tote around now. Teetering on high heels while a heavy bag hung from my left shoulder, I walked more slowly than an 80-year old with a cane. It took me so long to get from point A to point B that I missed my connecting flight.
Look Homeward, Angel
After I moved to Maryland I flew to California around three to four times each year. My memories of those trips back home are very happy ones. Being away from my family was hard, but each visit home was special. I am certain that I was able to be that far away from my family only because I knew they were only a six-hour plane ride away. Looking back on it, I wish I had gone home more frequently. But I was young and felt like I was on an adventure of sorts; at that age I didn't think about the fact that my immediate family was on the cusp of dispersing. Soon, my brother would join the Navy and leave for another state as well, and my sister would finish college and settle down where she found a teaching job. My father would take an early retirement, and he and my mother would begin their empty nest years. Although I was able to fly home, I couldn't ever really go "home" again. Times were changing. After I finished law school and got a job, it became harder and harder to take time off to fly back home. And then after I got married there were two work schedules to accomodate, and visits tapered off to twice a year -- once during the summer and another time during the holidays.
Headline News
It wasn't just our work schedules kept me from flying back home. Randy and I wanted to do some traveling before we started a family. Our first vacation as a married couple was our honeymoon in the French West Indies (with a stopover in Florida). We were seated near the wing on our flight out. At one point Randy leaned over me to look out the window and commented on an unusual brown fluid on the wing. A few moments later the pilot announced that the hydraulic fluid on the plane was leaking and we had to make an emergency landing in Puerto Rico. Ever the fatalist, I immediately began to imagine that Randy and I would be the newlywed couple whose tragic and early demise would be the subject of Katie Couric's feature on the Today show. In every plane crash there seems to be a newlywed couple off to start their new life together when tragedy strikes, and they sink to the bottom of the ocean, holding hands in death, their wedding bands serving as the means by which they are identified by recovery crews. It would be a cruel and ironic death, the story used to illustrate the truism that you never know when it's your time. Fortunately, that was not our time. We landed in Puerto Rico, where emergency response teams were waiting for us on the runway. The plane had lost so much fluid that there wasn't even enough to power the door. The plane was not immediately reparable, so we had to continue our trip on another plane. The flight attendants knew we were on our way to our honeymoon, and they compensated us with a nice bottle of champagne.
Flying With SARS
Randy caused a bit of a panic when we flew out to Puerto Vallarta on vacation in 2003. It was the summer of the SARS epidemic, when people were dying after catching a dangerous strain of the flu. Right before our flight, it was announced in the news that the Center for Disease Control believed the virus originated in Asia. As a precaution on our flight. Randy decided to don a surgical mask to cover his nose and mouth. I opted not to wear the mask he had brought for me because it made my face sweat. We were one of the first people to board the flight, so as others boarded, they saw Randy in his get up. Seeing a random man wearing a surgical mask sitting next to an Asian woman evidently set the bells off in many passengers' minds, and soon the plane was abuzz with nervous chatter about the SARS virus. Feeling somewhat like a leper, I nudged Randy hard with my elbow and pleaded with him to remove his mask or risk a mutiny on the plane. Some people even asked us point blank if he was wearing the mask because of SARS. Eventually he became uncomfortable with the attention and he took it off. If you ever want to get a lot of attention, put on a surgical mask and take along an Asian woman when there is a potentially life threatening strain of the flu that originated in Asia.
Let's Go Paris!
We planned a trip to Paris before I discovered that I was pregnant with Skyler. Although I would be unable to drink wine or eat cheese, we decided to go ahead and take the trip, predicting (correctly as it turns out) that our ability to travel would be severely curtailed after we had a baby. My goal on that flight was simple: to be as close to the lavatory as possible. One symptom of pregnancy is the frequent need to urinate. So mine was a good goal to achieve, because I spent what seems like the entire flight in the bathroom. That trip was special for a couple of reasons. First, I had always wanted to go to Paris. Second, even though we only had to buy two plane tickets, it felt like there were three of us on that trip. I was only four months pregnant, but our baby was already the most important thing in the world to us, and we talked a lot about our baby (we didn't know we were having a girl). It felt like I was seeing Paris for the first time with my baby. Skyler reads about Paris in some of her books, and she shows a lot of interest in it, so I promised her that we would take her there for her 14th birthday and we would sing happy birthday to her atop the Eiffel Tower.
A Different Kind Of Carry-On
Skyler took her first flight when she was six months old. We went to California in May of 2005 to visit my family. My mother came to Maryland to help us after Skyler was born, but my my father had yet to meet Skyler, and his birthday was in May, so I had the idea of taking Skyler out ot him as a birthday present. Nothing makes a person feel more like a responsible adult than flying cross-country alone with a six-month old baby. Security was tight already at the time because of 9/11. I went through security with my diaper bag, which doubled as my purse, extra bag of toys, breast pump, baby sling, and stroller. I had to put all of the items through the conveyor belt, including the Baby Bjorn, remove my shoes, and fold up the stroller, all while holding Skyler. On the first flight I held her in my lap. That was difficult only because there was so little room for moving around. Skyler was an easy baby, though. She maintained her regular eating and sleeping schedule. I took out brand new toys to keep her distracted and walked up and down the aisle when permitted in order to lull her to sleep. It was a surprisingly easy flight. When I needed to go to the bathroom I just kept her in her sling attached to me. Southwest Airlines doesn't have changing tables in the lavatory, so the flight attendants set up a makeshift changing area on the floor in the front of the plane. The most awkward part of that flight came when I needed to pump breastmilk. I don't know what possessed me to think that I could use my battery-operated breastpump while in mid-air (I had a non-stop flight). Like I said, Skyler was in my lap. Needless to say, there was no privacy. Fortunately, the gentleman sitting next to me had just had his first baby, too, and his wife was nursing their baby (albeit in the comfort of her own home). So, I simply covered up with a blanket and nursed Skyler for a little while and then used the pump single-handed.
Caution: Barfing Baby Ahead
As Skyler got older, flying became both easier and more difficult. I bought her her own seat, had to bring more complicated toys to keep her interested, and it was more difficult to change her as she became mobile. Still, she was good flier. I also learned that I could use her to try to discourage passengers from sitting next to us on flights that weren't full so that we could have the entire row to ourselves. For example, because we were permitted to board first because I had a young child, we had our pick of seats. To discourage people from sitting next to us, I would have Skyler make a lot of noise as other passengers were boarding, in hopes of having people think she would be noisy on the plane so they would avoid sitting next to us. One businesswoman didn't take heed, though. She sat at the window seat next to Skyler. She took out her laptop to do work, and Skyler, thinking it was a dvd player, ever so gently reached over and positioned it so she could have a better view of the screen. What could I do but shrug my shoulders at the woman. On another occasion, I told Skyler to hold a barf bag near her face, thinking that if people thought she was prone to motion sickness they would let us have the entire row of seats to ourselves. That worked. Sneaky, I know, but if you've ever flown on a plane with a child, you understand the desperate measures one takes in order to be more comfortable.
Family Vacation
One of the happiest times in my life was when Randy, Skyler and I went to Cancun, Mexico, on vacation with my parents. It was a long and crowded flight, but the excitement overtook us, and the all-inclusive resort where we spent a week was well worth it. It's always sad to end a vacation, and the flight back home was slightly more nightmarish, mostly because the airport in Cancun seemed totally chaotic, prompting my father to shake his head in disgust and say to Randy, "This airport is no good." He was a seasoned traveller himself. Despite the hassle, I am so grateful to have taken that trip, as it was the last vacation I would ever go on with my father before he died.
Frequent Flyers
By the time Skyler was four years old she had been aboard a total of 40 airplanes. She received frequent flyer ticket from Southwest when she was only three years old. She knew how to give the safety demonstrations that the flight attendants give at the beginning of each flight. She understood the diagrams on the emergency landing pamphlet at the back of each seat. I knew she had become a seasoned flyer when at the age of three she knew to take off her toy jewelry and purse, place them in a bin on the conveyor belt, and remove her shoes before going through the metal detector, her arms outstretched so as to reveal her weapon-free torso.
The longest flight Skyler ever took was to Bulgaria for Gergana's wedding ,where she was a flower girl. It was 17-hour flight, with two plane changes, one in Frankfurt, Germany, and the other in Switzerland. We expected the trip to be a nightmare with a 2 1/2 year old, but with a portable dvd player and Skyler's favorite DVDs, new coloring books and crayons, and a few new toys, she did exceedingly well. I think flying is in her blood.
Enjoying the Ride
The flight out to attend the wedding will be Jagger's first airplane experience. We are very excited to see a lot of family members that we don't get to see very often anymore. It will be the first time Jagger will meet most of his extended family. We are leaving just a couple of days before his first birthday, so we will have a small birthday celebration at our destination, and our flight home will be on the evening of his birthday. For all of these reasons, this flight will mark the beginning of a special celebration. God willing, it will be just the first of many flights we take together as a family.
Sorry, Mr. Welles, but you got it all wrong. Flying these days is not terrifying. In an airplane, when you're en route to your destination, it is easy to forget for a few hours the fact that you are in a man-made machine defying the laws of gravity and travelling at a rate of speed that at which perhaps human beings were never intended to move. And flying is anything but boring. Even in the days before a scheduled flight everyone's emotions begin to bubble over with excitement. Flying is a prelude to joyful reunions, new experiences, relaxing vacations, and sometimes even the fulfillment of lifelong dreams.
Coming To America
My new life in America began with a trip in an airplane in 1976. At the age of six, my mother, sister, brother and I boarded an international flight from the Philippines to America to reunite with my father, who had gone ahead a year earlier to establish a home for us. Prior to boarding, the pilot of the Philippine Airlines plane first had to undertake a special mission: to carry my younger sister onto the airplane. My mother had her hands full with my one-year old brother. When my sister, who was only three at the time, saw the jumbo jet, she planted her bottom on the ground just outside the portable stairs leading into the cabin and refused to board. Fortunately this was long before 9/11, so her demonstration was considered "cute" rather than a potential act of terrorism.
Imagine how challenging it is to take care of a baby during a flight. Multiply this by three. Add the transcontinental factor. The fact that we were leaving our extended family for an indefinite period of time to move to a foreign country raised the emotional toll of the trip exponentially. This gives you an idea of how difficult that flight must have been for my mother. Fortunately, she met a very sweet Canadian couple on the flight who offered to watch me so that my mother could focus on my brother and sister. At least she was able to subtract some of the stress, and seeing my father again after year apart with limited telephone contact was well worth all of it.
What Not To Wear
We took a fair number of trips by airplane when I was growing up to attend weddings or go on vacations. Once my cousin from Texas sent me a ticket so I could visit her. It was my first flight alone. I was a goofy teenager and had just watched a movie where the heroine wore high heels and a short skirt on a flight. I thought it seemed sophisticated and worthy of imitation, so I put together a little get up that included high heeled pumps. Having been accustomed to wearing little white Keds and having had very little experience in heels, I had a difficult time walking. To make things worse, back then carry on bags did not have the little wheels that make them easy to tote around now. Teetering on high heels while a heavy bag hung from my left shoulder, I walked more slowly than an 80-year old with a cane. It took me so long to get from point A to point B that I missed my connecting flight.
Look Homeward, Angel
After I moved to Maryland I flew to California around three to four times each year. My memories of those trips back home are very happy ones. Being away from my family was hard, but each visit home was special. I am certain that I was able to be that far away from my family only because I knew they were only a six-hour plane ride away. Looking back on it, I wish I had gone home more frequently. But I was young and felt like I was on an adventure of sorts; at that age I didn't think about the fact that my immediate family was on the cusp of dispersing. Soon, my brother would join the Navy and leave for another state as well, and my sister would finish college and settle down where she found a teaching job. My father would take an early retirement, and he and my mother would begin their empty nest years. Although I was able to fly home, I couldn't ever really go "home" again. Times were changing. After I finished law school and got a job, it became harder and harder to take time off to fly back home. And then after I got married there were two work schedules to accomodate, and visits tapered off to twice a year -- once during the summer and another time during the holidays.
Headline News
It wasn't just our work schedules kept me from flying back home. Randy and I wanted to do some traveling before we started a family. Our first vacation as a married couple was our honeymoon in the French West Indies (with a stopover in Florida). We were seated near the wing on our flight out. At one point Randy leaned over me to look out the window and commented on an unusual brown fluid on the wing. A few moments later the pilot announced that the hydraulic fluid on the plane was leaking and we had to make an emergency landing in Puerto Rico. Ever the fatalist, I immediately began to imagine that Randy and I would be the newlywed couple whose tragic and early demise would be the subject of Katie Couric's feature on the Today show. In every plane crash there seems to be a newlywed couple off to start their new life together when tragedy strikes, and they sink to the bottom of the ocean, holding hands in death, their wedding bands serving as the means by which they are identified by recovery crews. It would be a cruel and ironic death, the story used to illustrate the truism that you never know when it's your time. Fortunately, that was not our time. We landed in Puerto Rico, where emergency response teams were waiting for us on the runway. The plane had lost so much fluid that there wasn't even enough to power the door. The plane was not immediately reparable, so we had to continue our trip on another plane. The flight attendants knew we were on our way to our honeymoon, and they compensated us with a nice bottle of champagne.
Flying With SARS
Randy caused a bit of a panic when we flew out to Puerto Vallarta on vacation in 2003. It was the summer of the SARS epidemic, when people were dying after catching a dangerous strain of the flu. Right before our flight, it was announced in the news that the Center for Disease Control believed the virus originated in Asia. As a precaution on our flight. Randy decided to don a surgical mask to cover his nose and mouth. I opted not to wear the mask he had brought for me because it made my face sweat. We were one of the first people to board the flight, so as others boarded, they saw Randy in his get up. Seeing a random man wearing a surgical mask sitting next to an Asian woman evidently set the bells off in many passengers' minds, and soon the plane was abuzz with nervous chatter about the SARS virus. Feeling somewhat like a leper, I nudged Randy hard with my elbow and pleaded with him to remove his mask or risk a mutiny on the plane. Some people even asked us point blank if he was wearing the mask because of SARS. Eventually he became uncomfortable with the attention and he took it off. If you ever want to get a lot of attention, put on a surgical mask and take along an Asian woman when there is a potentially life threatening strain of the flu that originated in Asia.
Let's Go Paris!
We planned a trip to Paris before I discovered that I was pregnant with Skyler. Although I would be unable to drink wine or eat cheese, we decided to go ahead and take the trip, predicting (correctly as it turns out) that our ability to travel would be severely curtailed after we had a baby. My goal on that flight was simple: to be as close to the lavatory as possible. One symptom of pregnancy is the frequent need to urinate. So mine was a good goal to achieve, because I spent what seems like the entire flight in the bathroom. That trip was special for a couple of reasons. First, I had always wanted to go to Paris. Second, even though we only had to buy two plane tickets, it felt like there were three of us on that trip. I was only four months pregnant, but our baby was already the most important thing in the world to us, and we talked a lot about our baby (we didn't know we were having a girl). It felt like I was seeing Paris for the first time with my baby. Skyler reads about Paris in some of her books, and she shows a lot of interest in it, so I promised her that we would take her there for her 14th birthday and we would sing happy birthday to her atop the Eiffel Tower.
A Different Kind Of Carry-On
Skyler took her first flight when she was six months old. We went to California in May of 2005 to visit my family. My mother came to Maryland to help us after Skyler was born, but my my father had yet to meet Skyler, and his birthday was in May, so I had the idea of taking Skyler out ot him as a birthday present. Nothing makes a person feel more like a responsible adult than flying cross-country alone with a six-month old baby. Security was tight already at the time because of 9/11. I went through security with my diaper bag, which doubled as my purse, extra bag of toys, breast pump, baby sling, and stroller. I had to put all of the items through the conveyor belt, including the Baby Bjorn, remove my shoes, and fold up the stroller, all while holding Skyler. On the first flight I held her in my lap. That was difficult only because there was so little room for moving around. Skyler was an easy baby, though. She maintained her regular eating and sleeping schedule. I took out brand new toys to keep her distracted and walked up and down the aisle when permitted in order to lull her to sleep. It was a surprisingly easy flight. When I needed to go to the bathroom I just kept her in her sling attached to me. Southwest Airlines doesn't have changing tables in the lavatory, so the flight attendants set up a makeshift changing area on the floor in the front of the plane. The most awkward part of that flight came when I needed to pump breastmilk. I don't know what possessed me to think that I could use my battery-operated breastpump while in mid-air (I had a non-stop flight). Like I said, Skyler was in my lap. Needless to say, there was no privacy. Fortunately, the gentleman sitting next to me had just had his first baby, too, and his wife was nursing their baby (albeit in the comfort of her own home). So, I simply covered up with a blanket and nursed Skyler for a little while and then used the pump single-handed.
Caution: Barfing Baby Ahead
As Skyler got older, flying became both easier and more difficult. I bought her her own seat, had to bring more complicated toys to keep her interested, and it was more difficult to change her as she became mobile. Still, she was good flier. I also learned that I could use her to try to discourage passengers from sitting next to us on flights that weren't full so that we could have the entire row to ourselves. For example, because we were permitted to board first because I had a young child, we had our pick of seats. To discourage people from sitting next to us, I would have Skyler make a lot of noise as other passengers were boarding, in hopes of having people think she would be noisy on the plane so they would avoid sitting next to us. One businesswoman didn't take heed, though. She sat at the window seat next to Skyler. She took out her laptop to do work, and Skyler, thinking it was a dvd player, ever so gently reached over and positioned it so she could have a better view of the screen. What could I do but shrug my shoulders at the woman. On another occasion, I told Skyler to hold a barf bag near her face, thinking that if people thought she was prone to motion sickness they would let us have the entire row of seats to ourselves. That worked. Sneaky, I know, but if you've ever flown on a plane with a child, you understand the desperate measures one takes in order to be more comfortable.
Family Vacation
One of the happiest times in my life was when Randy, Skyler and I went to Cancun, Mexico, on vacation with my parents. It was a long and crowded flight, but the excitement overtook us, and the all-inclusive resort where we spent a week was well worth it. It's always sad to end a vacation, and the flight back home was slightly more nightmarish, mostly because the airport in Cancun seemed totally chaotic, prompting my father to shake his head in disgust and say to Randy, "This airport is no good." He was a seasoned traveller himself. Despite the hassle, I am so grateful to have taken that trip, as it was the last vacation I would ever go on with my father before he died.
Frequent Flyers
By the time Skyler was four years old she had been aboard a total of 40 airplanes. She received frequent flyer ticket from Southwest when she was only three years old. She knew how to give the safety demonstrations that the flight attendants give at the beginning of each flight. She understood the diagrams on the emergency landing pamphlet at the back of each seat. I knew she had become a seasoned flyer when at the age of three she knew to take off her toy jewelry and purse, place them in a bin on the conveyor belt, and remove her shoes before going through the metal detector, her arms outstretched so as to reveal her weapon-free torso.
The longest flight Skyler ever took was to Bulgaria for Gergana's wedding ,where she was a flower girl. It was 17-hour flight, with two plane changes, one in Frankfurt, Germany, and the other in Switzerland. We expected the trip to be a nightmare with a 2 1/2 year old, but with a portable dvd player and Skyler's favorite DVDs, new coloring books and crayons, and a few new toys, she did exceedingly well. I think flying is in her blood.
Enjoying the Ride
The flight out to attend the wedding will be Jagger's first airplane experience. We are very excited to see a lot of family members that we don't get to see very often anymore. It will be the first time Jagger will meet most of his extended family. We are leaving just a couple of days before his first birthday, so we will have a small birthday celebration at our destination, and our flight home will be on the evening of his birthday. For all of these reasons, this flight will mark the beginning of a special celebration. God willing, it will be just the first of many flights we take together as a family.
Sorry, Mr. Welles, but you got it all wrong. Flying these days is not terrifying. In an airplane, when you're en route to your destination, it is easy to forget for a few hours the fact that you are in a man-made machine defying the laws of gravity and travelling at a rate of speed that at which perhaps human beings were never intended to move. And flying is anything but boring. Even in the days before a scheduled flight everyone's emotions begin to bubble over with excitement. Flying is a prelude to joyful reunions, new experiences, relaxing vacations, and sometimes even the fulfillment of lifelong dreams.
Wednesday, August 4, 2010
Skyler Says...
Skyler: I'm going to train Jetsam to hunt for Easter eggs.
Me: Okay.
Skyler: And I'm going to train her to do twirls.
Me: Okay.
Skyler: And I'm going to train her to do twirls.
Food Is An Important Part of a Balanced Diet
-- Fran Liebowitz
Tell me what you eat, I'll tell you who you are. ~Anthelme Brillat-Savarin
For our honeymoon, Randy and I went to the French West Indies, to St. Maarten/St. Martin, known as the gourmet capital of the Carribean, and with good reason. Our honeymoon was one gastronomical feast after another, with breaks to lay out on the beach of Anse Marcel. I loved the onion tart, goat cheese salad, pate, and duck confit. I wore a size 4 at my wedding and returned from the honeymoon a size 6. I can't wait to go back there.
But happiness for me does not always come from dining in a fancy restaurant. If I were on death row, my choice of a last meal would be fried chicken. If the warden would deign to purchase it from Royal Farms, all the better. Just give me a side of Mafran (the Filipino ketchup) with it and I would die with a happy tummy, never mind the circumstances of my passing.
One cannot think well, love well, sleep well, if one has not dined well. —-Virginia Woolf
Here is something I will never understand: Women for whom a complete meal consists of a small salad with the dressing on the side. That may sound sexist, but I have yet to meet a man who orders just a plate of lettuce. There are few worse experiences than looking forward to eating out with a friend, anticipating and dreaming about the cuisine that will be transporting me to nirvana, finally seeing the day of our outing, getting to the restaurant, and having my companion order just a salad with the dressing on the side. Once my lunch companion ordered a house salad with just a wedge of lemon on the side for dressing! When this happens to me I view it as a mini-tragedy, because though I love to eat, I can't indulge in a full meal if the person sitting across the table from me will be nibbling on a carrot. It makes me self-conscious and pressured to eat quickly, lest my friend end up watching me for an hour passionately devouring the full meal I have ordered. When I eat with someone like this, my joy dissipates, and no matter how much I may enjoy my friend's company, I spend the whole time slightly distracted by thoughts of what I could have been eating.
One of the delights of life is eating with friends, second to that is talking about eating. And, for an unsurpassed double whammy, there is talking about eating while you are eating with friends. —Laurie Colwin
Subconsciously, I must screen potential friends for their style of consuming food. I don't mean the ability to pack away as much food as possible -- I'm not advocating unhealthy gorging. I'm talking about people who relish their food and savor each morsel without thinking exclusively about the calories. My late friend Dian took real pleasure in a good meal. One of my most enduring memories of her is of a meal we had with another friend in Cape May, New Jersey circa 1995. I don't even remember the exact meal, but I know it involved several delicious courses and took us nearly three hours to complete. We shared a bottle of red wine whose name has long escaped my memory, and talked and laughed throughout the meal. If only all dinners could be like that one.
There is no love sincerer than the love of food. ~George Bernard Shaw
Occasionally, when we can each take a break from our respective two kids as well as our jobs, my former roommate Brian and I get together for lunch or dinner. One of the many things I love about Brian is that he loves the Cheesecake Factory as much as I do (I am not a food snob and I like some chain restaurants). I can always count on sharing crab dip, potstickers, or southwestern eggrolls before our main course. He is an appetizer aficionado, so I always let him pick. Likewise, Christine and I share the same size appetite. Free and unhibited would be good words to describe me when I eat with Christine. Our regular spot is Banthai, where she orders Thai iced coffee and I order Thai iced tea, we each order soup, she gets Larb (minced chicken with lime juice and spices), I get ped pad kaprow (crispy duck with sweet and hot sauce, basil, and Chinese broccoli). Dessert is sweet rice with mango. It should come as no surprise that my friendships with Brian and Christine have endured extreme highs and lows of life. The power of a bond formed over a tasty dish is not to be underestimated.
I have long believed that good food, good eating is all about risk. Whether we’re talking about unpasteurized Stilton, raw oysters or working for organized crime ‘associates,’ food, for me, has always been an adventure. —–Anthony Bourdain
It's no surprise that I love food as I do. I grew up in a family that loved food and was not afraid to try even the most exotic treats. The only challenge I could ever hope to win on Survivor is the food challenge -- I am fearless when it comes to food, and I have a cast iron stomach. We Villamars were born and raised that way. I've eaten dinnuguan (involves pig's blood), goat, snails, squid, beetles, frogs legs, duck embryo, and tripe. We are a tolerant people, the Villamars, but we have no patience for those who show weakness in the face of unfamiliar food. The fastest and surest way to be accepted into the family was to feast heartily on the concoctions served at our table. The boyfriends my sister and I brought home -- the smart ones, anyway -- picked up on that right away. We immediately took pity on the ones who said they would just have some salad.
Tuesday, August 3, 2010
The 2010 4-H Fair
The 4-H CLub held its annual fair last weekend. The four H s' stand for "Head, Hands, Heart, and Health." The 4-H Club members pledge goes like this: I Pledge My Head to clearer thinking, My Heart to greater loyalty, My Hands to larger service and My Health to better living for my Club my Community my Country and my World. The fair is held every year at the Caroll County Farm Museum.
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| Welcome to the 4-H Fair |
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| Farm scenes such as this one were on display. |
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| My favorite event this year was the antique tractor square dance. There was a "caller" calling out square dance positions, and the tractors would "dosey doe".   Check out this guy's outfit, complete with cowboy hat and boots.  Looks like this little piggy is taking a little nap.  A youngster prepares to display his prizewinning ewe "Monster".  Fashionable female sheep farmers.  "Jagger, meet your future source of milk." |
Jagger says he prefers mommy's milk.
Snack: Dutch style funnel cake and lemonade
Who says size doesn't matter? This corn collector is the biggest
piece of farm equipment I have ever seen.
piece of farm equipment I have ever seen.
I was willing to move out to the country, but I draw the line at driving giant tractors.
The tire is big enough to sleep Skyler.
I call this "Filipino American Gothic."
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