December 22, 2010
Here we go again! Suspicions found on my mammogram
How do I start this post? I’m usually in a positive state
of mind when I receive negative results. But this time my nerves
are shot. But why? Let me back up a little and catch you up to
speed. I recently went back and had a mammogram done. It was a
follow up from a negative result a year ago. At that time the
radiologist said he had some concerns and wanted me to repeat the
mammogram test. After the second test they decided to do an
ultra-sound as well. The ultra-sound confirmed their suspicions. So
I was scheduled for a needle biopsy on my right breast. Well as it
should happen the tests were all being done around my anniversary
(36 yrs) and Christmas. I had to wait until after the New Year to
get the results. That seemed like the longest wait time to endure.
But at the end, thank goodness it was benign. That brings us to
today. After my year follow up mammogram test. (btw, my follow up
was suppose to be in six months.) I was called back this Monday
Dec. 20th and told the Dr needs me to come back and have another
mammogram done. He has some concerns. So here I am sitting in the
car as my husband drives me to my appt. I’m glad I’m not alone.
Last year I went to each and every appointment alone. Thinking it
would be a piece of cake. But it was anything but easy. It was
mentally taxing. So ‘here we go again’ it’s My anniversary, 37 years this this time and Christmas is but three days away. I’m sitting in Simon
Med Imaging waiting for my next mammogram test. Ok, Esther time to
think positive thoughts. The power of positive thinking really does
work. So that’s what I will do. Believe everything is going to be
ok. That this second test is just to double check that they really
looked me over well.
November 10, 2010
Aloneness has many faces doesn’t it? But it seems to have come at a cost…
Where I go in my dreams 
When will I learn to get a good nights sleep? I said, self no staying up late working online and then writing on your blog. Well that didn’t happen. I ended up staying up until 2am. And now I’m paying for it big time. The question is, was it necessary to stay up that late? Did I really accomplish anything? No on both. I kept asking my self last night. Why do you have such a hard time going to bed at a decent hour? Maybe it’s because that’s when everything around me is at it’s calmest. There are no distraction, no one pulling me in hundred different directions. It’s all about me. It’s my personal time. I have to admit I do enjoy my quite times. Around this house it doesn’t happen to often. lol Would I really want it too give up the sounds of laughter, loud chatter, discussions about which is the best way to lose weight, or hey Dad, do you want to send for your DNA swab to see where you came from? Or the tiny voices and giggles of my favorite ones, the grand kids? Absolutely not! I guess I’ll just have to shorten the duration of my aloneness. Not make it an almost all niter. Enough of this dragging the next day, and wishing for straight black coffee to keep me awake enough to function. Where’s the toothpicks when you need them? I need to see with my eyes and even they are turning against me.
OK, then maybe I’ll try some sleeping pills tonight. Hopefully I will dream I’m resting alone on the beach, hearing the waves break in the distance. And no one else is there but me. Calgon take me away….
November 8, 2010
The Cloud I Hide Behind
This morning began a little different than my usual one. I usually wake up at 5:30 am and lay out my husbands clothes. Then head to the kitchen to make his breakfast. And right about 6:15 sharp, he is kissing me good-bye as he heads out the door. But not without me adding our grand daughters favorite send off, “be safe.”
Not on this particular morning. I had a restless night and couldn’t sleep. I think I finally fell asleep around 2am. My mind was so busy I just couldn’t get comfortable. As I got into bed and lay down next to my husbands side. I could hear the new sounds as he breathes. Ever since he was released from the hospital he hasn’t sound the same. As he exhales there’s a loud paa sound. Before he got his c-pap he would snore so loud. I just couldn’t sleep. I remember a few times holding his nose and he would wake up and look at me, like what the heck are you doing? Id say, you were snoring. Then he’d roll over and go back to sleep. There was another time he was so loud I tried placing my pillow around my ears but that didn’t help. It only made me more upset. So I got this idea. What if I roll him on his side? The first time I tried to roll him on his side I rolled him right off the bed. I couldn’t believe what I had done. Oh my gosh, babe are you ok? My husband responds in this very sarcastic annoyed tone, “yes!.” Umm you were snoring so loud I thought if I just turned you on your side… He interrupts, “turning me on my side is different then throwing me off the bed.” I want those moments back. Last night I missed the silence of the c- cap. Heck I even missed the snoring but only just a tad.
What does this new sound all mean? Is this the beginning of bad things to come? No I can’t allow my mind to go to dark places like that. It’s to much to bare. I have a hard enough time blocking out the what if’s of my sister’s illness. I need need my trusted clouds. They bring me comfort. Because I can hide behind them and never see the truth that may a wait me. Sadly, last night no matter how hard I tried to go to happier times and moments. The storms kept rolling in like lighting bolts. Nothing seemed clear to me.
There is this song I’ve sung to my own children and to my grand children. When they come to me asking so many questions about the future or their own. It goes like this:
When I was just a little girl
I asked my mother, what will I be
Will I be pretty, will I be rich
Here’s what she said to me.
Que Sera, Sera,
Whatever will be, will be
The future’s not ours, to see
Que Sera, Sera
What will be, will be.
So I guess it’s my turn to say to my self, Que Sera, Sera,
Whatever will be, will be…
November 7, 2010
Tomorrow is Going to be a Wonderful Day
Today was a very productive day.My husband and I went over to our daughters home to help clear out what use to be a storage room. But now had become an extra bedroom. See my grand daughter is driving here all the way from Florida. Hoping to better her young life by finding a better paying job. Florida can be a beautiful place to visit. But finding a good paying job is hard to find. I can’t wait to see her. I’ve missed her so much. I feel like running over to my daughters home right this very minute. Because it’s around the time she’s suppose to arrive. But it’s getting late, and I need to wake up at 4:30 am and take my sissy to the Mayo Hospital for surgery.
Tomorrow is going to be a wonderful day! I finally get to hold my Brittany in my arms again. ~ <3 ~ <3 ~
October 18, 2010
Fall Into You
This is a very sad song called…”Fall Into You.” Made me think of my life and the choices I’ve made. What if I lost everything I love the most? Would I be able to go on and be strong? Would I turn away and put blinders on, become so weak and not be able to see there was a higher being there who was waiting to catch me when I fall? Would all my hearing disappear and I just crumble? Which direction would I fall? What a powerful and touching song!
One of My Special Girls!
I remember the day I found out I was expecting you. I was so scared and unsure if I would be a good Mother. Before I knew it, you were breathing your first breath of air and crying out for me.” Hold me Mom, keep me safe.” I took you into my arms and quickly your crying stopped. I looked at you in my arms. You seemed so tiny, so fragile. I was afraid I might break you right in my arms. I thought there is so much to learn about being a Mom. I had only one great example to go by. But I never saw her with anyone as small as you. But still, I remember she held me in her arms when I was sad, scared or sick. So that is what I’ll do. Hold you close in my arms until I know your alright. I realized as each day passed. You don’t need to be a perfect Mom, just a loving one. The rest will come naturally.
Turn Around
My baby, my own.
Turn around and you’re two.
Turn around and you’re four.
Turn around and you’re a young girl.
Going out of the door.
Turn around, turn around and you’re a young wife.
With babes of your own.
Your beautiful from the inside in
And even though your all grown up
You’ll always be
My Special Girl
This post is dedicated to my first born, Jessica.
Love,
Mama
October 15, 2010
Take You Back
Isn’t it crazy how one song can take you back instantly to a moment a person or even a spirtual place. No matter what else has changed in you or the world…that one song stays the same, just like that moment.
I can remember back when I was 12 years old hearing this song sung in church. “I Believe.” It effected me so deeply. The impact was so profound. I found my self at complete peace. Something I hadn’t felt for a long time. I had just lost the only Mother I had known at 11 years of age. Moved to a new home, new family, new city and new church. I had felt so lost. Then this lady stood in the choir and sang this song – “I Believe” and something in me change for the better from that day on. Years passed and I never heard that beautiful song again. Then two weeks ago while I was cleaning my house what song comes on? That’s right, I Believe. But this time sung by Aaron Neville. I’m not embarrassed to say I got emotional. I actually weeped with joy. I was hit with that same peace I felt at 12 years old. On that same day two ladies knocked at my door and I let them in. Something I don’t normally do. But now i am glad I did. They enriched me with the their knowledge, grace and left me in spiritual peace. I had felt like something was missing in my life, but couldn’t put my finger on it. Until I heard this song then all the pieces to the puzzle fell into place.
Try and remember a place, a person, a smell a memory or a song that can take you back instantly to a good place. What’s your’s?
I Believe
I believe for every drop of rain that falls a flower grows
I believe that some where in the darkest night a candle glows
I believe for everyone who goes astray
Someone will come to show the way, I believe, I believe
I believe above the storm the smallest prayer will still be heard
I believe that someone in the great some where hears every word
Every time I hear a newborm baby cry or touch a leaf or see the sky
Then I know why I believe
March 21, 2010
My Son the Artist
Portrait of Esther Huff – By Randall Huff (My Son)
My Son
Randall Huff
This post isn’t just any ordinary post. It’s near and dear to my heart, because it’s about a very talented young man, my son. I can’t wait to share with you all his talents. I am bursting at the seams and have butterflies in my stomach.
Even as a small boy, I realized he had natural abilities. Whether it was drawing, making money or sports. it all came naturally. Drawing is one of his strongest points. When he was about four years old, I noticed he wasn’t drawing the typical circle with one or more lines in order to represent a human figure, which typically start out looking like “tadpoles” and then gradually become head-feet. His pictures looked similar to the average child at his age, except his pictures of human figures had ears, nose, and hair. Now, when it came to the concept of space, he was the normal four-year old (this continued until he was four and a half). He started to become more aware of the world around him, and any objects in his environment. I started to notice that the objects in his drawings weren’t organized on the page as you would expect. His typically appeared to “float.”
I was still a young mother not familiar with children’s spatial organization. That came a few years later when I started working at a Child Development Center/ Preschool. I decided to take some classes in Early Childhood Development to help me become a better teacher and to aid in my own children’s development. I still had a lot to learn about how the small mind works. With all the hands-on and book smarts in early childhood development, I learned to have an eye in early childhood development in art. I wish I would have known back then, what I know now. One of things I learned about creative development is that you don’t tell a child his pictures are wrong or out of place. When it came to my own son placing objects like houses and trees in the air, I knew it was better for him to discover they do not float in the air on his own. Children need to discover this themselves. This helps bring out their creative development. If we interfere, it can stifel their creative development. Through the years his pictures developed into skillful master pieces. The one that stands out the most to me is the one I posted in the beginning of this post. It’s a portrait of me. I feel so honored. Then I was blown away by the second picture which was a self-portrait of his own face. How incrediable is that?
I don’t know if it was me allowing him to develop his own creativity or this talent was already there and just needed twinking. But he went on to college and majored in Art. He was on the deans list throughout his college years. Several of his oil paintings and pencil drawing were on display in the gallery at the college he attended.
I am so proud of the young man he has become. When he feels the passion running through his blood, he acts on it. Each piece becomes a work of art.
I once asked him, “Why don’t you do this as a full time job?” He replied, “Then it would become more of a job and I wouldn’t have any passion for it anymore.”
I thought about it. that makes sense. How creative can we be if it’s no longer fun, just a job?
I want to touch people with my art. I want them to say ‘he feels deeply, he feels tenderly.’
March 13, 2010
“Is Your View of the Bible the Right one?”
It is still interesting to me how people need proof something is real or not. It got me thinking, why is that? Is it in our up bringing, our envirnoment?
Take my children as an example. You bring then up from birth in the church, prayer before dinner and a private christain school. So you think with all those exposers, they will continue attrending church when they get their own place and family. But that wasn’t the case. Out of five children, two continued to attend. The envirnoment they were expose to was the same. Yet some embraced it and some didn’t. It’s the same thing with their belief in the Bible. Some believe it’s infallible, and some believe parts of it. Some believe that different men put different interpetation to certain passages. My self, I never questioned it. I never had the need to disect the bible the way that they do. My beliefs in the bible and it’s teachings are pretty clear and complete. I have no doubts.
What makes people different in their beliefs? Is it how they were raised or how their environment was? Is it group beliefs or individual doubts?
John 1:1
In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God.
A LITTLE QUIZ for a SUNDAY
There is a very, very tall coconut tree and there are 4 animals,
A Lion…..
A Chimpanzee……
A giraffe…
and A Squirrel;…
They decide to compete to see who is the fastest to get a banana off the tree.
Who do you guess will win?
Your answer will reflect your personality.
So think carefully . . ..
Try and answer within 30 seconds. Got your answer?
Now scroll down to see the analysis….
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*
If your answer is:
1. Lion = you’re dull.
2. Chimpanzee = you’re dense.
3. Giraffe = you’re a complete moron.
4. Squirrel = you’re hopeless.
*
*
*
……A COCONUT TREE DOESN’T HAVE BANANAS……
Obviously you’re stressed and overworked.
You should take some time off and relax
March 10, 2010
Baby in a Bubble
Love watching my grand children discover new things. Here is my grand-daughter Brielle, very curious about the balls inside the round bubble. She tried desperately to touch the balls in the bubble. Unfortunately, they were encased in plastic. My daughter (her mommy) helped her up, so she could get close enough to touch the them from the outside. It was so cute watching her press her tiny face against the plastic pane. As she did this, she caught us looking back at her so she pressed her face even harder. Children at this age are curious about the world around them. It’s wonderful to take these opportunities to allow them to discover. I titled this post “Baby in a Bubble,” because that’s actually what she looked like – a baby inside a bubble. I hope you enjoyed this little piece of my heaven.
A child’s new discoveries is life’s way of letting our old eyes see what we take for granted!
Esther
