For the Love of Animals

I watched a brief snippet of a video this morning.  It came out of New Zealand, but really it could have been filmed anywhere.  It was a video of cows being born and then immediately being taken from their mothers and tossed carelessly into the waiting transportation that will whisk them away to the slaughterhouse.  In all of these scenes the mother cow can be seen chasing after the vehicle or the person who is stealing away her baby.  ... ... ... I wish people could see it. I wish people were forced to sit and watch this. The distress on the behalf of the mother is easy for everyone to see, if you care to look closely.  Doctors have been telling us for years that the human body past 18 months of age does not need cows milk.  So why is there such a huge demand for it. Why are the dairy companies still pushing it and doctoring it up to make it more palatable? Why? Why? Why?  SO many questions that demand answers and yet none are forthcoming.  Or those that are talking merely don't care about the animal as a whole.

Now. I eat chicken. I eat bacon. I do NOT eat beef or drink milk. I am a cow lover. I always have been since I can remember.  From seeing the Swiss Browns in the Swiss alps I have been hooked. I have tried my hand at being a Pescetarian (only eats fish) but when my eating habits had to be changed drastically I had to add things back in.  I have eaten soy bacon and I actually really like it.  What I don't like is the fact that soy is not regulated and can be full of GMOs. My 18 month old daughter does not eat cows milk and it will remain that way.  We are an almond milk family. For the health benefits as well as for the sake of all the momma cows out there that had their babies forcefully removed from them.  I don't want to contribute to an industry that treats animals that way. I am working on cutting out the bacon and chicken again. It is indeed a work in progress. 

"The idea that some lives matter less is the root of all the is wrong with the world." -Paul Farmer

Twofer

Wow!  Another one so soon!

I HAVE changed the name of the Blog, it's only been 10 minutes but I forget what it used to be called.  Ha!

The new title is definitely me.  I have this tattoo in French as you can see below.  It has become my life's motto.  I love it.  It says in French "Elle vole de ses propres ailes."  She flies with her own wings.  To me it means, she does what she wants.  I think my hubby can verify that. 

SO.  Welcome. Sit back. And enjoy the ride!

Whoops

Who knew it would take five years for me to come back to this thing.  :)

We've been around the world and back in the past five years.  We've added another family member (or two if you count the cat) and have moved 3 times.  Whew!  Time flies when you're having fun.

To catch everyone up:
2011 We found ourselves moving to Italy for 3 years.  Fun time was had by all.  I'm sure I'll get to posting pictures eventually.
2014 We found ourselves moving back to the States and living in San Antonio, Texas for a year.
2015 We have landed in Northern California for the time being.

Ahh life with the Air Force is never dull.

2014 found us adding another little bundle of joy to our crazy family and it's been a blast ever since.  :)  She's a delightful handful and has aptly been nicknamed, "Cheeks."  This is how she'll be referred to here.  No real names for the babies.

So.  How have you been?

Doing it on my own

Well here we are. Four plus months into a six month deployment. It has honestly gone by faster than I imagined. I'm now worried about readjusting back to having a husband instead of worrying about how I'll handle him being gone. Don't get me wrong I'm thrilled he's coming home. No more lonely evenings (although a friend on Yahoo has helped me with that), no more taking care of a sick child while I'm sick also, no more frantically finding a babysitter when I have class on the weekend. Someone to rub my back and hold my hand and to lay next to in bed even when he's on my side. Someone to complain that I haven't vacuumed in a week. Someone to get upset that the house isn't as clean as he'd like. Someone who bought me a diamond ring for our ten year anniversary just because it was what I wanted. Someone who has helped my dreams come true. Someone with smelly ugly feet but a heart as big as the outdoors.

I've missed having him home for so many reasons. Reasons I'll need to remember as I learn how to be a spouse again in a little less than two months.

I thought I would do better on writing on here. You know the journal type thing, but as life took over my memory got shorter and my time was spent doing other things.

It's been an interesting four months. We've been sick with the flu. We've had more snow than I've seen in years. We'll have a white Christmas, which I haven't had since 1986 when I lived in Germany with my parents. We celebrated ten years of marriage on separate continents and in separate time zones. We've skyped and emailed and telephoned. We've had our good moments. We made cookies together and sent some to daddy. We've gone to McDonald's to play and got bitten yet again. We've missed daddy and his presence. We've bonded and gotten a relationship that will only grow, I hope.

I look at my daughter and I cry because I want to hold onto her now and keep her as sweet and caring as she is today. She's funny and intelligent and creative and thoughtful and sassy (her word) and bossy and she has an attitude at times, but I love everything about her. I've learned a lot about her since hubby's been gone. I've learned she likes to sit in my lap and watch SpongeBob after her bath and before she goes to bed. I've learned she can write an awesome "M". I'm learning again how sensitive she is (I wonder who she gets that from). I'm learning how smart she is and how she loves to read. I'm learning that she likes Max & Ruby almost as much as SpongeBob. I've learned that she is a girly girl, she loves dresses and fingernail polish.

I've enjoyed getting to know her these past few months and I hope that when my husband comes home that my bonding with her continues, only now we have to share that time with daddy. I'll be sure and let you know how that goes.

Deep Thoughts

I'm supposed to be writing a paper. Yet here I am with a mind full of everything but 20th Century politics. I am a huge MASH fan. HUGE!! Just ask anyone who knows me. When hubby and I were cast into hell, I mean living in Havasu, Arizona we watched every episode of MASH from beginning to end. Why you may ask? Because we had no TV reception. Tonight as I sat watching it they closed with a song:
Keep the Home Fires Burning,
While your hearts are yearning,
Though your lads are far away
They dream of home.
There's a silver lining
Through the dark clouds shining,
Turn the dark cloud inside out
'Til the boys come home.

I couldn't even make it through the song. I heard the first few lines of the chorus and I was toast. With hubby gone for his six months, the timeline between hearing those kind of songs and bursting into tears has shortened quite considerably. It has me thinking of war. Part of which I'm doing my paper on, or supposed to be working on. Anyway... I was caught up in the war justification back in 2001. It's been seven years and we are hopefully seeing the light at the end of the tunnel. Was it successful, I think that is justifiably questionable. It's been said that the media take was dampened quite a bit in the Persian Gulf War. George Bush the elder made sure that the bad news didn't get to us as readily as it has this war. Technology advances have us finding out within minutes what is going on on the other side of the world. Most of the time it's so completely blown out of proportion that you have to take it with a grain of salt. These days I can talk to my hubby on the phone through the use of morale calls. Or I can skype with him and see his pretty face... (lol) or they have the phone centers. We know we are blessed. A friend of ours wasn't so blessed. Her hubby's last few tours were of the non communicado type for the length of the tour. Where am I going with this you ask. Where am I going with this... ? As I sat reading my daughter her bedtime story. She picked the book, Old Turtle by Douglas Wood. I highly recommend these. We got to the middle of the story and this is what I read: "But the people forgot. They forgot that they were a message of love, and a prayer from the earth...and often the people misused their powers, and hurt one another. Or killed one another. And they hurt the earth...Because the people could not remember who they were, or where God was." It's naive for me to assume that God can make all things better. In the ideal world, before the fall, maybe. But in this world we live in where there is much evil and much hatred we have to be stewards of what we are given. Taking care of the earth and of each other. I believe in that God would shine through. We don't need to shove it down people's throats, no standing on street corners thumping our ten pound bibles in peoples faces. What happened to living by example? I think we as American's have neglected our duties of stewardship, drilling for oil in the Arctic, denying that climate change is real, forcing our version of democracy on other people? American's are an ethno-centric people. We think people should accomadate themselves to our thinking. Spread democracy and everyone will get along? Who are we to think our way is better than anyone elses? I love being American, please don't misread what I'm saying. I value my freedom's of religion and speech and many more. Nowhere on earth can I voice my opinion and let it stand as that without some sort of consequences. That's all I'm doing here, I want people to be educated about other countries, our way is not always the right way.

One Moment In Time

Many of you may remember the song by Whitney Houston that came out in the 80's called, One Moment In Time. I think the original music video showed clips from the Olympics, they redid it showing the Challenger disaster years later. Anyway.... tonight I had my moment in time. First I have to set up the day. I am currently taking classes for a Master's Degree. This program is different in that we have our classes on the weekends and the University flies in it's professors. I'll write more about these at a later time. So, this weekend was my second class in the program and my first class with hubby deployed. My class meets Friday night, 9-5ish on Saturday and 9-4 on Sunday. So I have been gone pretty much the whole weekend. Tonight (Sunday) I also had the Contemporary Worship Service which I have to be there to practice at 5:00. *sigh* Needless to say it's my first 12 hour day in a while. I didn't get home until 8:15sh and I left the house this morning at 8:30. Sheesh!!!

With my hubby gone I had to find someone to watch my daughter. I was able to find a great girl from the service and my daughter loved being with her so much she didn't want to come home yesterday or today. The girl watching her took her out to the car and saved me much crying and screaming... my daughter still did her share of crying but I think it was better then yesterday. So tonight we had our service, a little more stressful this first time without hubby, but I made it. Our daughter did her running around thing and just being herself, wanting to be with all her "friends." She had her new fairy outfit on which included her wings, so as I'm looking at her in her seat I see her wings. Enough to make you smile right there. So a friend of ours and her husband help me get her to the car because she had skinned her foot on her shoes. We head home. She immediately asks for Spongebob on TV after we get home and I clean her up and brush her teeth, I do give in and say yes. I stopped it after one episode which led to more tears, to avoid the arguing and crying I knew was coming I turn on the TV, but I tell her no story tonight. Knowing that it's probably not going to work out the way I want it anyway. So as Sponbob, as she pronounces it , goes off she asks for another one. I'm firm in my no this time. And she starts to whine about wanting a story. So I tell her yes. You knew when you read the above that I would actually read to her didn't you? So I pick the book, a nice short one, and she's crying. No tears, but she's crying. So I give it to her to read and she dribbles her way through it. We say our prayers, remembering daddy and wanting her to sleep well.

As I turn out the lights and lay her down I just held her. Nothing more. It wasn't planned, I just wrapped my arms around her and held her. Just for about two minutes. I then layed down next to her and she wrapper her arms around me asked me if I missed daddy. It was all I could do to keep the wrenching sobs inside. My heart was aching so much. I told her, yes I missed daddy. She then reminded me that we take care of each other and that daddy will be back for her birthday and then her friends will be at her party. :) (She remembers the important stuff.) So I just held her. I wrapped her in my arms and she fell asleep as I sang our song to her.

I write this here and share it because I am #1 at rushing through my day and putting off the times when she needs me. I get anxious about getting things done and wanting me time. I don't want to look back when she's 20 and say if only I had spent more time with her. Maybe that's what I'll get from this six month experience... an appreciation of my own daughter.

Day by day

We're making it through one day at a time. A long time ago I was a newlywed. It will be ten years in December. Holy cow!! I can hardly believe it myself when I think back over the past ten years we've had together. Somewhere along the way I gave my hubby a note. I used to do that a lot. Much more than I do today. Somehow family and work and careers got in the way of our road to happily ever after. We realized this the other day as hubby got ready to deploy. We were holding hands more and watching each. We were sleeping huddled together instead of in our separate corners. This note was a quote from a book a dear friend had given me, The Notebook. This was before it was glamorized on the big screen of Hollywood, back when Nicholas Sparks was just being discovered. Here is what I gave him:

"In times of grief and sorrow I will hold you and rock you, and take your grief and make it my own. When you cry, I cry and when you hurt, I hurt. And together we will try to hold back the floods of tears and despair and make it through the potholed streets of life."

I wish I had written the date on the note so I know when it was given. So as I look back on what was to come after this note, I'll not take him for granted. We lost a daughter after this note. She never made it into the world, but we mourned her as she if she had. We made it through life in the desert, our wilderness experience, out of which came the biggest blessing we've ever seen- our daughter. Career changes have come. Economic lows have come. Now we've arrived at a huge growing experience. Six months of being away from each other. The longest we've ever been apart is ten weeks and then he was only right up the road. This time he's very far off. We're only three days into it. He's my best friend, we tell each other everything. We lay in bed at night and talk about our future together, about our daughter and how fabulous three year olds are. Our plan is to grow old together... "as we make it through the potholed streets of life".