Birthday Memories by Konnie Enos

This morning I woke up way too early to the jarring of my alarm. As I started moving through my morning I contemplated how that was the usual way to wake up, unless you didn’t have obligations like work or school.

Then I realized what day it was and clearly remembered waking up rather suddenly on this very day and it was fairly early in the morning. Not as early as today but considering at the time I had no place to be that day, I had no reason to get up before seven a.m.

I looked at the time while I wondered what had bolted me from sound asleep to sitting up and then I contemplated returning to sleep since it was so early. But then I decided I could just start tackling my nice long to-do list which I was bound and determined to finish before the pending arrival of my first child who was due in three days or better yet my husband, whose ship was due back in port the next day. I wanted to get most of it done that day.

So I got up and started with a bath.

While bathing I noticed when I moved sometimes I seemed to lose control of my bladder and squirted, just a little bit. It was bothersome but not irritating. Then while I was eating I felt a contraction about the same time I “squirted” a little bit again. Only this time I knew I didn’t have to use the bathroom.

Well it wasn’t that gush everyone had told me about and I had been having those “practice” contractions so being totally unsure I did the most logical thing I could. I called a nurse. Specifically my stepmother.

I called home and Dad said she was at work though in explaining why I was calling he said he thought I might be in labor and told me to call my stepmother at work. I did.

I told her why I was calling, even asked if she could get off early. I was in luck. It was a slow day and she’d just asked to be let off early if possible. She also believed I was in labor. By then I was starting to be able to time the contractions.

Since I wasn’t about to drive anywhere while in labor my to-do list went out the window. I don’t think I did much other than sit around and try to keep myself calm and entertained while I waited for her to get off work. I did call my best friend and she came over and kept me company while I waited.

Fortunately this was, after all, my first baby. We all figured I had plenty of time to get to the hospital.

Mom put in eight, rather than twelve hours, before she got off work then came right over. But my contractions were still far enough apart that the three of us just sat, visiting for some time after she arrived.

At around dinner time we finally took my friend home, then went to get gas and Mom some fast food. Then we started the half-hour drive to the hospital.

The funny part is because of my having a contraction, she missed the exit and we had to do a turn around. And we still made it to the hospital in plenty of time.

Clarissa Anne Enos Plagmann was born a few minutes before midnight, twenty-six years ago today.

Happy Birthday sweetie.

Smile. Make the day a brighter day.

Stream of Thought by Konnie Enos

Do you ever have one of those weeks with all the best intentions and a nice to do list but then it just doesn’t happen. Seems to me this week there have only been two things I really needed to do other than the normal errands, and I haven’t gotten either one of them done.

One thing I’ve needed to do is finances, which I have worked on, but not completely updated, nor have I done my usual preparations for the new month and payday is coming fast upon us. I’m behind schedule. This means I’m going to be spending, well I’m assuming as much of today and tomorrow, and Friday, and possibly Saturday and again on Monday and probably still on Tuesday as possible updating my checkbook registers, balancing accounts and paying bills. Yes, it takes me that much time. If it was just my own accounts I could do it in a day, but I have to deal with the men in my family too, and their accounts. I could spend all day on how frustrating my husband is and another day on how frustrating our oldest son is, which is almost as bad as his dad.

Then again, I won’t get to spend any full day on finances anyway because my family won’t let me. At some point they’ll need me to run them somewhere or go to the store or there’ll be some reason they need my attention and of course it’ll be more important than getting the bills paid.

The other thing I’ve needed to get done this week, and I even started, at least three different times, was writing this post. Now writing anything has its own set of problems. There is still the very real issue of interruptions, but there is also the problem with losing your train of thought.

Three different time I started this post and got a fair piece written than last my train of thought. I couldn’t finish it. I couldn’t even make sense of what I’d already written. Scrap that. Start again. Then that one didn’t even work.

I can easily blame my distractions. Most of the time I was in the middle of writing and one or more family members would either come in to talk to me or they’d insist I needed to be doing something else. Okay so at least once that was taking them to a doctor’s appointment and another time it was going to the store because we were out of things. But honestly none of those ideas worked because they weren’t well thought out to begin with. Or maybe they were too well thought out. Sometimes just typing what you are thinking works far better than trying to focus on a topic.

I’ve been told, more than once that steam of thought writing can simulate the creative process. Maybe it can. It can sure help get a post written when no ideas are coming to you.

On the home front two special things have arrived in the mail since I last posted. First, and just this week, I received a wedding announcement from my oldest child. The other one was a letter to our youngest daughter accepting her into the program at her college she wanted to get into, her first step on becoming a veterinarian.  

And lastly, next week we celebrate the birth of our nation. I saw a post on Facebook asking what symbolized the Fourth of July to you. My first thought was birthday cake. Bonnie and I celebrate our birthday the next day.

Have a Happy Fourth. Happy Birthday Bonnie.

Smile. Make the day a brighter day.