China Trip April 2007

Well I'm not going to write anything but thought everyone would enjoy some pictures. So here you go.

Moving

Moving is a scary and at the same time envokes excitement. Where am I going, what will the kids be like, wonder if the school is any better, especially the lunches. I have never met a regular kid who has moved any where close to the amount of times I have in my life and would top most military brats I met.

My dad and step mother where what you would call a little different. Insteed of taking a stinking vacation they would move. It would usally start right around the 7th or 8th month of being at our current address. Typically conversation would start around the dinner table or one Friday evening when we would go out for our traditional Friday evening out for dinner and the mall circute. It would always seem to start out something to the effect of "You know what they just don't have any good resturants in this town" or "The shopping here just isn't the quality we expected". The worst one you could possibly hear would be "Remember when we lived in -fill in the blank- they had great resurants or shopping".

They were always looking for the proverbial pot of gold at the end of the rainbow. My true beleif is they were so unhappy in thier relationship this was thier way of diverting thier attention away from each other to something else which would take months of planning and doing.

I have lived in more homes then I can count. Whats weird my brother and I when describing an event in our lives would always seem to go "Yea I remember that it was when we lived on this street or that street".

The Basement Apartment and the Pumpkin

I am jumping ahead a little but will return. I have thoughts and memories I want to make sure I get down. I hate remembering something and going "Oh yeah that would be great", then not remembering but racking your brain trying to conjure up those thoughts that were so fresh just a short while ago.

Dad and mom had gotten a divorce. I know what dad said but never had the courage to ask mom why thou. I am not sure if I really want to know or not. It was so long ago I don't think it matters and besides I'm chicken to ask. I only remember moving after it happened. I wish I remembered how I felt. It would be such a help I believe for me now that my children have and are going thru the same thing.

This is where my seemingly endless moving adventure started. Dad choose a 1 bedroom basement apartment for the 3 of us to live in. Dad had the bedroom, I had the sofa bed and Mike I don't remember where he slept. It was an older building, we even had the old fashion radiators. I kindly called them heaterators. With a brick exterior and a large yard with one of the best trees a boy could hope for in the front yard. Just so there is no confusion the building was a converted house with several apartments with ours in the basement.

The tree in the front yard captivated me to the point I felt I needed to conquer the tree. This could only be done in the one way a little boy could could imagine, Climb It. Boy did I. Everyday to be honest.

We battled often in that front yard. I lost a number of times, requiring the need to call in reinforcements. Screaming from the top of my lungs for dad (aka the Reinforcements) to come rescue me from the evil and maniacal tree. Victory days were most often celebrated by sitting from a branch I had not yet conquered and viewing my bounty from a level that gave me a view of the whole yard.

Dad was not a very good cook I believe, because we seemed to eat Hamburger Helper 3 or 4 nights a week. Sitting from his chair he always did proclaim what a good cook grandma was thou. Pies and cakes is what he talked about mostly. This was a man who did not believe dinner was anywhere close to being completed unless there was something sweet to follow the main course.

One day after going on a kindergarten field trip to a local pumpkin farm, I brought home my prize pumpkin I was allowed to pick. It wasn't huge by any standard but it was the one I choose. Showing off my pumpkin to dad, it immediately made the man think desert for some reason and he had the idea that if we bring it to grandmas house she would turn this orange ball into pumpkin pie. I was sold instantly and agreed we should do this.

Dad could be a really cool guy but sometimes I wondered about him. As an example and to complete my pumpkin story is one of the reasons I often wondered about the man.

Like I said the guy came up with a an awesome idea of turning the pumpkin into something sweet and yummy but the follow thru, well sucked. He did call grandma and tell her but a complete stroke of dumbness swam over him which compelled him for some reason to place the fresh picked pumpkin on the heaterator/radiator. I assume you picked up on the fact it was fall and we still lived in Maryland at the time, so the heaterator was on every night, especially in the basement apartment.

Are you laughing yet? I still get a little chuckle from it even today. If you can only imagine what my poor pumpkin had to combat every cool evening. It gave a good fight but after several weeks of fighting off the heat from the heaterator it finally succumbed and became just pure mush. It wasn't till the orange corpse began to stink to the point even my father could no longer stand entering the kitchen he decided to give the pumpkin a proper burial. The burial involved several trash bags, a paint scraper, several rolls of towels and my dad bitching about what a mess it was.

Funny thing is this story made me think back and I don't believe in my entire life I ever had had the chance to taste one of the wondrous creations my father always and probably still brags about my grandmother's cooking. I don't have a doubt she made great pies and cakes, but I sure would have liked to have tried one for myself before she passed away.

Feelings

I think many of us have a hard time feeling complete. What I mean is that feeling we all seem to search for everyday of our lives that would give us that warmth inside that allows your your mind to be calm, your heart to beat slow, your muscles to relax, and allows your eyes to see past the minor conflicts of the day.

I have not found this state yet but have had a glimpse of it from time to time. The day my first son was born it overwhelmed me. The moment I saw him I truly discovered this calmness as well as was introduced to unconditional love. Have you ever seen one of those movies where the dad takes a bullet for his child or when someone says they would stand in front of a train for the one they love? This is what I mean, it is a love that that does not allow you to think for one instance for yourself if a situation was upon you such as this. It is an action you have no control over. It becomes encoded in your DNA at the very millisecond of your child's birth.

Religion/God is what many subscribe to as the only way to become complete. I understand the line of thinking that God introduced this into us as a way to turn to him, but he also gave us the ability to think for ourselves or free will is another way of putting it. The two seem to almost contradict each other many times. So he programed us with this need in hopes we would choose him but gave us this proverbial loaded gun as well saying you have to choose for yourself as well and if you don't you will never be happy.

Take for instance another one of these paradoxes that bother me. First lets set the scene as described in the bible. God is good, perfect and allows nothing unholy in his presence. Thus a simple conclusion can come from this that God can not or will not create something unholy or evil. If we jump ahead now and God has created the earth all the animals and man. He then gave them the directive to turn the whole earth into a paradise and be fruitful and be many. Here is were the glitch comes in. God then told them you can eat from any tree but from this one tree called the tree of Good & Evil. Why Why Why did he even make this tree and then tell them no, and then allow this one called the devil to actually tempt his most wondrous creation. It just doesn't make sense.

Would you turn the stove on to it's highest setting with no apparent reason, then tell your child don't touch it or you will be burned badly, then allow another adult to trick your child into placing it's hand on the stove while you sit back and watch knowing full well your child has no experience with a stove, no concept of what hot is or a what a burn feels like, and obviously isn't mature enough to see a deception being placed on a silver platter garnished with every conceivable and luscious candy that can be imagined.

Don't take me wrong, I do believe in God and am very thankful for many of the things I have been blessed with in my life. I just don't understand why sometimes. I almost feel like it is wrong to ask why. I do enjoy that feeling you get during and after church, I do think God warns us and protects us from many pitfalls.

I must move on to another part of my thoughts because I get riled up at these internal feels of conflict over God, or is it Religion?

A feeling I do love is the one you get when you meet a beautiful girl (or the politically correct word is woman) and you feel that spark in your brain. Oh and if she actually pays attention to your either dumb ass line or forgives the fact you trip over your tongue saying your very own name.

I remember one of the first girls I liked. She was the daughter of my parents friends. Leslie was a looker to a 5 year old (not positive I was 5 but pretty close). She was fun and the best part was she liked me. I don't mean in the boyfriend girlfriend way, but in the best friends way.

I only have three memories of Leslie.

First I had fun with her, second I remember one instance of us playing together at my parents apartment. We thought we were hilarious this day. We took wads of tissues from the Kleenex box and would place them under our nose and use our upper lip to hold them in place. Kleenex mustaches we had invented for ourselves. We posed in front of the mirror showing off each others white tissue paper mustaches. Our brains were then infected with the awesome idea our parents would think it was really cool or funny what we were doing. Running to the living room to show them off we were abruptly informed what a waste we had made. Oddly enough I don't remember actually getting in trouble, just told it was a waste.

My last and final memory of Leslie was a number of years later as a teenager. My father and wicked step mother got a bug up their but to move back to Maryland where Leslie lived. By the way my dad and wicked step mother I am totally and absolutely convinced raised these moving bugs and rather enjoyed sticking them up their rears.

Well anyways I was at a JW convention (if you don't know JW is short for Jehovah's Witness and probably is the reason for much of my God/Religion confusion) and low and behold there was Leslie. She had turn into a very beautiful girl, but seemed to not notice me or remembered me. I think to my misfortune she was now old enough to only like much older boys. I will always remember Leslie.

I will end it here today, but I will tell more of my experiences with Religion/God, feelings in general, my children, and yes of girls.

Memories

Plastics as you might be able to tell have played a role in my life. They have touched all of our lives from the Tupperware your mom used, the 45 records you owned, to my first toy I remember the "Big Wheel".

Mom "aka Emma" as she likes to say was in the kitchen making me lunch. My bottom was sitting safely in the high chair as my flailing arms pounded on the white glossy plastic tray attached to the chair.

For some reason I remember the jar mom was stirring with that rubber coated spoon was filled with green peas.

Memories are funny. Your mind decides to keep some, get rid of others and worst yet keep just partial memories.

I wish I remembered more of this moment in time. Did I like the peas, did mom have to use the spoon to recover the majority of the meal from my face, or did I show the first signs of the stubborn streak that is so apparent in my adult life.

The one thing I know today is I am happy I have this memory.

First Memory

It was a warm evening, happy thoughts along with sharing potato chips with my mom and dad seemed to be the best it could get. It was one of those evening where the air was warm and the sky had enough clouds. Watching just the right amount of commercials that day had me begging my parents with the unending barrage of questions and deals to get the best toy I had every seen, "The Big Wheel".

A "Big Wheel" was about the closest a young boy could get to owning a custom hot rod. With it's red chassis, yellow forks, mag wheels in the back, and that really cool blue storage box behind the adjustable seat back.

Dad and Mom for some reason succumbed to constant begging for that awesome vehicle only a child was able to take on the many million of adventures possible. I remember my dad taking it out of the box and complaining about the some assembly required. I was trembling with excitement as dad put it together at a pace that is totally unacceptable to a child. I was ready before the box was opened to take this Big Wheel to speeds unattainable to most kids, take corners at break neck speeds, and most of all show off my new vehicle which the world of plastics had made available to me and me only.

I am 4 years old living in Silver Spring Maryland. My life as a child is somewhat a fog accept for a few choice memories. This day is one of the few i remember. Oh I was happy this day, I had two parents who loved me. Look at my my beautiful mother who holds me as a baby. You can see the love and happiness in her eyes which is reflected in my smile. My dad works for UPS and I am not sure if mom worked or not.

After dad had finally gotten it all together he took it outside and placed the 3 wheeled wonder on the side walk in front of our apartment. Straddling the red plastic body, immediately placing my feet on the peddles, I was off to my first taste of independence. My heart was racing as I took the first turn the side walk allowed, streaking to the other side of the courtyard. Coming around the 3rd corner and suddenly realizing this machine needed to come to a stop in front of the stoop my mom and dad were sitting on, I slowed my peddling to a pace which allowed me to be viewed in my full glory.

I was in heaven this day.