My Mom is Amazing and Santa is Real!

          For the past few nights I have had a really hard time sleeping.   Last night as I tossed and turned on the cough so as not to spread my sleeplessness to Maks, I started going over all the reasons I am not able to sleep.   Maybe it's my job, maybe it's all the changes I am going through,  or maybe it's that I just need to lose some weight.  It was at that moment that I had Dolly Parton's Hard Candy Christmas run through my head.  I then had a memory of probably one of the greatest Christmas's I ever had.

        In the year leading up to that Christmas, my father had left us,  I had undergone a very serious heart surgery,  and my very brave mom had moved us across the country to the best little city in all of Central California, Fresno.  I was 6 years old and despite all that had happened, I still had a fine and dandy attitude towards Christmas.  My mom had talked about not having a lot of money and I had told her not to worry because Santa would cover it.  In my mind, Santa was pretty much all knowing and the change of circumstances with the move and all hadn't phased him at all.  He kept up on things like that.  Not to mention, I had just survived a really big surgery so I was pretty confident that I had made the nice list by default.

         On Christmas morning, I was proven right.  Santa had not only brought gifts for me but he had provided for my mom as well.  Thus another year went by with my belief in tact.  It wasn't until I was in my 20's that I realized she had bought those gifts herself.  She had gone to some dollar store or Walmart and bought herself the cheapest perfumes and soaps she could find and wrapped them up for herself.  What an amazing mom I have.  I thought that to myself last night as I laid there over thinking the anxiety of my current life.   Twenty seven years ago, this twenty nine year old woman without a college degree was the single mother to a child with a heart condition.  She had been abandoned by her alcoholic husband.  She had no real support system and no money.  She worked her ass off to provide a home for her kid and with the spare income she had, she put that kid in dance classes.  She had nothing and there truly were no gifts coming for her from anybody that year.  That wasn't what concerned her, though.  She just wanted to make sure her kid still believed in magic.  She wanted me to believe that no matter what, things would work out.   She still does that.  She listens to me rant and rave about the various tragedies  of my blessed life.  She still makes sure that even though it's just us, we have Christmas decorations up.  It's worth repeating that she is an amazing mom.   Later on that Christmas day, we sat in front of our 1985 television and VCR and watched The Best Little Whorehouse In Texas.   It was pretty much the best Christmas ever.   It is still a long standing tradition to watch as many cheesy Christmas movies as you possibly can between Thanksgiving and Christmas.  

          Ironically, Dolly Parton was on Kelly and Michael this morning.  She has such a great spirit about her.  It made me purchase Hard Candy Christmas from iTunes and I have listened to it on repeat for hours.  I think this is how my mom must have felt that Christmas.  She was barely getting through tomorrow and despite  everything that could bring her down she kept telling herself she would be fine.  Rather then see the loss, she saw the possibilities of maybe.  It's why she is today a fully educated  professor with a great following of students who fight to get into her classes.  They, like I do, see a woman with great spirit who works as hard as she can to make others happy and successful.

            Tonight I told her about my memory and she said she was grateful for everything she had to deal with back then.  It kept her grounded.  I suppose that is a good way to look at it.  I would now like to one more time say that my mom is amazing.  She is the greatest role model I could ask for.  She is beautiful and talented.  She gives much more then she gets.   If this blog had a place for a song, I would play Hard Candy Christmas and dedicate it to her.  As stressful as life gets and as hard as times can seem, I am so grateful to whoever put us together out there.  I suppose that is what grounds me.  I'll be fine...

Merry Christmas to all the single parents out there.  Maybe your kids don't see everything you do ight now, but they will someday,   You'll be fine too.

Furry Friends

It seems like a year since I last wrote.  I suppose that is because it nearly has been and truth be told, there is so much to say.  The past year has been full of change and all the new possibilities that life brings with it as you get older and start to actually realize your potential.  Today, however, I want to pay tribute to a friend I have had for a long time.  She has been with me for 7 years which in cat years really isn't that long but when I think about the last 7 years, I can't help but feel a tremendous sense of gratitude for the time we spent together. 

Mishka came to me while I was teaching Kindergarten in Watsonville.  I saw a mouse run across my kitchen while my amazingly kind and overly gentile dog merely watched.  Not knowing how to deal with mice, I walked into the school office and asked my work colleagues what they would do.   The mother of one of my favorite students laughed and actually said, "I have kittens in my car!  Do you want one?" To which I replied an immediate "Yes!"  It didn't take long before I saw that mouse strung out dead in the middle of my kitchen.  For such a tiny sensitive kitten, she sure had a thing against unwanted guests.   Mishka quickly found her way into the coziness of our family.  She would lay on top of Ceili while they slept.  When Ceili felt her presence had been a little too much, she would grab her by the scruff and carry her into the kitchen where Mishka would immediately run back to the couch where I was sitting only to continue the game.  She slept directly on top of you if you found your way onto any soft surface in the house.

When I moved out of Santa Cruz, Mishka came to live in Fresno with my mom.  She was then blessed with the opportunity of being an indoor and an outdoor cat.  While the outdoors didn't really interest her all that much, and other cats were certainly not her cup of tea, she did enjoy knowing she had the opportunity if she wanted it.  After I moved into an apartment community near SF State, my problem with mice reared its ugly head again.  I know it sounds like I am a dirty person, but the truth is, mice are sometimes hard to avoid without the proper defense system in place.  So, I called in my Special Ops. Sargent, Mishka Bear Monahan.  The best part of Mishka hunting mice as a grown up cat was that she had learned to clean up after herself.  A couple of days under Mishka's watch and I found 2 mice in the litter box.  Not only had she committed the clean kills, she had buried them appropriately.  I believe that shows heart.  She was not without mercy.

So, now to the sad news and I don't want to dwell on this part because I really do want to celebrate the life she had, not the one she ended up with.  Over Thanksgiving, I noticed she was limping.  She had been living in Fresno at the time while I traveled for work.  She had a spindle cell tumor growing on her elbow that progressed from the size of a peanut to the size of a tennis ball in just a couple weeks. The vet recommended amputation because the tumor hadn't spread and after some very thoughtful consideration, I decided that 3 legs was better then none and went through with the surgery.  For a while, it seemed all was back to normal minus one needless limb.  However, 2 months ago, she started coughing.  It turns out the cancer had spread to her lungs.  She was given 3 weeks, but she lasted until today.  Today she lays here as nothing but fur and bones with labored breathing.  The change just happened overnight and I can't bear to watch her suffer.  I made an appointment for her at the vet to take her last step.   I dug the grave and laughed about an old friend who thought her father had buried her childhood horse behind their house.  I cried about the loss.  I cried about how unfair this is.  I laughed at the first time I saw her slowly move her way on top of my sleeping dog, and now I am writing about it.  I suppose this is pretty angst. 

Anyway, animals rarely get funerals.  We all know they are so much more to us then pets, though.  Mishka has been a great friend to me over the past 7 years and I am so sorry to see her go.  If you have a free moment today, take a second to honor Mishka or any furry friend you may have lost.  They do so much more for us then we could ever do for them and I just want everyone to know how grateful I am for the time I spent with my little bear.

I love you, Mishka.  Whatever the next step on your path may be, I hope it somehow leads you back to a crossroads with me again someday.