Road Thoughts

    For all manner of reasons, I have found myself in a vehicle, driving to and from Pennsylvania and other shorter trips at least twelve times in the last nine months. Quick calculations put me in the driver seat for about 250 hours. Let that sink in. I think four of those trips were without children. Details blur as quickly as my joints stiffen. I've listened to hundreds of hours of good music and audiobooks. I've listened to children sleeping, yelling, crying and laughing. Sleeping is good and the occasional laughter is encouraged. I've dodged road debris, been sucked into rumble strips alongside the highways, driven through pouring rain, hail, ice and snow. The question of "How do you do it?" from so many friends prompted me to keep road notes. First off, I don't think too much through. I start the day with the GPS destination plugged in and watch the miles and hours go by. I have one overnight bag for our one hotel stop. All other items are in the giant luggage. I have tons of snacks and plenty of water. I've mastered the art of over the shoulder throwing to children. They get loud, I throw food. They get tired of food, they throw it back. And we clean out the vehicle at every stop. All bathroom breaks are about three hours apart. I make no concessions. Everyone goes at the same time. We had a DVD player on all the trips except for the last one, so the three girls were equipped with iPod Nano and Shuffles that were loaded with good music, obnoxious music, The Hobbit, Harry Potter and the Sorcerer's Stone, and Adventures in Oddyssey. It was crazy, but we managed.

~ Missouri, Illinois and Indiana will someday have beautiful highways. Of that I'm certain.The construction on the highway was frequent and had the propensity to be annoying, but no potholes!

~ Ohio doesn't care for road construction. They put all their money into this gigantic "Welcome to Ohio!" sign that stretches across four lanes of highway. And their potholes are thrilled to see you, too.

~ The strangest vehicle accident I've ever seen happened in Missouri. Two lanes of traffic completely shut down (with no exit in sight because people only get into car wrecks that shut down freeways when the nearest bathroom is twenty miles away) because a semi somehow caught fire and his load of lettuce was burning. Wait... what? Yeah, lettuce. Burning. The entire load was torched. That's some seriously hot fire to burn heads of lettuce.
~ Also, Missouri likes their flashy signs and they are quite creative:

• Leave the buzz for the bees, drive sober. 
• Unbuckled? Seriously?
• Turn signals. The original instant message.
• Pass on left, drive on right. (This one was everywhere.)

~ About three hundred miles into a trip, the music selection begins to get a bit crazy. Weird Al saw me past the lettuce truck. Note to self: listen to more Weird Al.

~ Pandora has comedy radio. Jimmy Fallon, Tim Hawkins, Jim Gaffigan and Frank Caliendo are the best. Louis CK is filthy. He'd make sailors blush. For real. I could not skip him fast enough. I blushed for the two seconds it took me to "thumbs down" that selection and was glad I was the only one in the car.

~ I drove through Indianapolis several times. The first time through I couldn't figure out why there were blue horseshoes painted on everything. Sports apparently. It's the Colts. Football. Sports team. Sports pride. Sporting things. If it's not the Cowboys, Eagles or Steelers, I apparently have no clue.
~ Speaking of Indiana. Holy corn. I did not expect that much corn. Matter of fact, I feel I owe Indiana an apology for thinking that much corn only grew in Nebraska. Kudos to Indiana for corn.
~ Also about corn, you can stop in Brazil, Indiana, which is the home of the Popcorn Festival.
~ I like electronica, specifically electronic-swing. About the eighth hour on the road and the Pandora station is switched to Caravan Palace or Daft Punk with lots of Glitch Mob. I have a great respect for Kraftwerk and their innovations in creating electronic/avant-garde sound over the decades. However, their tracks are waaaaaay too long. Case en pointe, and more than likely purposeful, their track 'Autobahn' runs twenty-two minutes... 22 minutes. The road is long. Thanks for the audio reminder, but I draw the line at twelve minutes.
~ Pandora message: You've listened to over 1,000 hours of your Imagine Dragons radio since December. We added some new music to your station! ... I may or may not have a problem.
~ A highway in northwest Arkansas is named John Paul Hammerschmidt. I leave and return to the state of Arkansas on that highway. And I sing John Jacob Jingleheimerschmidt every time.
~ I'm so over fast food. Paxton is a litany of "I want McDonald's" from the back seat.
~ You know you've been on the road too long when McKenna (age 6) starts crying because her sister Caelan (age 7) is pretending to take her picture with a pretend camera and making the click noise with her mouth.
~ You also begin to question the sanity of your children when you hear the six year old tell the three year old "Here, let me teach you how to suck on your big toe. Then you can go to sleep because it's like a pacifier."
~ Or when Evelynn starts yelling "Expecto Patronum!!" at Caelan for drowning out her Harry Potter audiobook by singing "Funky Monkey" from the movie Rio. I like the idea of everyone having their choice of audio, iPod options, but three girls listening with ear buds and talking/singing along to whatever they have on is nuts. There will be a DVD player next trip.
~ I had a lady somewhere in Missouri tell me I was brave for bringing my four children into the gas station. I just stared at her. "Uh, thanks?" (Lady, if you only knew.)
~ McKenna likes to point out hotels along the road. "Look, there's one. That one looks nice. They have a bed, I bet. We could watch TV at that one. That hotel has a swimming pool....." And we had only been on the road for four hours.
~ Paxton closed the van door on his whole hand. That was fun. Only slight bruising but an hour's worth of crying and moaning.
~ Final thought: These trips take a lot of coffee, a whole lot of Jesus and really trying not to think too much about every detail of the journey, because reality kills expectation and that would definitely be insanity. So on a wing and prayer? I guess it works. Travel success.

The Part We Choose to Act On

    Several years ago, I decided a blog was in order to leave a written legacy of the Brannon family type of crazy and I wittily named it Brannon Pandemonium, thinking this aptly described our young family and was a great homage to Bing Crosby. Accentuate the positive, eliminate the negative. Don't mess with Mister In-Between. This blog has fulfilled a number of those kinds of moments and my need to put things in print. We have certainly experienced a good bit of crazy. And then six months ago, pandemonium levels shot through the roof (notice I don't mention a break in the crazy, just an acceleration). The acceptance of a new job, Christmas, planning the move, Chaucer (our dog) passing (and subject of my last post, Capturing Life)........ and then the house hunting trip to Arkansas in February and the return to Pennsylvania to find the temperature outside at 9 degrees and the temperature inside registering at 25 degrees, the home insurance calls that were less than friendly (because, yes, Mrs. Brannon, just because your house is cold does not mean you can't live there and if you just removed the blown up radiators in your house, your house will warm up), a ten day move to a hotel until the house could be thawed out and heated with space heaters, the assessment of damage to include flooring, plaster work and new radiators; then snipping away the ties of life that keep you to a place: dance, church, friends and family; the "move" to Arkansas without our household goods, Keith starting his job in one town, the kids two hours away in another town with their grandparents because no furniture because it was all still in PA; the return to PA four weeks later to finally meet the movers, the chaos of the move (which could hold its own space in a blog); the unloading of boxes on the other end in AR a week later..... And we have a new home! And we still have the other home!
    Three years. Three realtors. Interest ebbs and flows, people show up to see the house but mostly they don't. People serious about it but falling just short of making an offer before walking away. The last listing of the PA house ended last week. We began the re-listing process on Friday with another real estate company. On Saturday, as I finished the last touches on my six year old's birthday cake, I received a call from our neighbor in PA. The key in the realtor lock box was missing and the front door to our house was open. She stepped in and went no further. A white substance covered the hundred year old wood floors and red spray paint graffiti littered the walls and columns on the banister in our living room and dining room (the two rooms visible from the front door). One hundred years ago, a prominent Jewish family built our lovely PA home. The house was blessed regularly by the local rabbi and bits of scripture from the Torah were placed on the door frames in the house; they are called mezuzah. Based on the passage in Deuteronomy 11;13-21 "....You shall therefore impress these words of mine on your heart and on your soul... You shall teach your sons, talking of them when you sit in your house and when you walk along the road and when you lie down and when you rise up. You shall write them on the doorposts of your house and on your gates, so that your days and the days of your sons may be multiplied...", the mezuzah was the daily reminder of His commands and his faithfulness. The graffiti, in stark contrast to the present mezuzah and in some places mere inches away from the mezuzah, was Satanic in nature; upside down crosses, 666 and other variations. I'm struck by this juxtaposition, inherent good and evil.
    The police were called. The graffiti damage is extensive and in most of the rooms in the house. The white substance covering the living room is fire extinguisher residue expended from the extinguisher we kept in the kitchen. The police left, our neighbors went to get new locks to replace the ones on the outside doors, and, I believe, the hoodlums returned while they were gone and locked the house. The spare key was with the company still making the radiator repairs (because, yes, even those repairs aren't completed after four months of delays) and couldn't be retrieved until Monday morning. So what can you do? Life doesn't stop for vandalism. We went to the pool for our girl's party and she had the best day.  As the pool party broke up, our neighbor called. She could see people in our house from her kitchen window. The police had been called yet again. A local friend called also and said he was parked across the street to watch. The police caught two of the guys, teens from what we know. We don't know of any additional damage. The windows seem intact and hardware is still good; it seems they stuck to graffiti and the fire extinguisher.
    There are many phone calls to be made today; police, insurance, realtor, radiator repair company. I  don't sleep well when things of this nature happen (and the last six months have seen plenty of sleeplessness) because I always have to work things out in my mind. We have had the lion's share of stresses (I always thought it was a level of crazy dealt to our military family lifestyle but the last six months weren't all about that, you know... just the new job and the move), but ALL this is just a thing, just stuff. And really, it's just one big inconvenience after another, and yeah, it's really added up. I've stopped looking for the straw that breaks the camel's back. One thing I keep hearing somewhere in the depths of my thoughts is a conversation in which Frodo tells Gandalf "I wish the ring had never come to me. I wish none of this had happened." Gandalf replied "So do all who live to see such times, but that is not for them to decide. All we have to decide is what to do with the time that is given us. There are other forces at work in this world, Frodo, besides the will of evil." I'm certainly not carrying a ring to Mordor to save Middle Earth and as an historian, I would be foolish to assume that these things, however immediately abhorrent, are a permanent affliction. For by comparison to millions of others, these things are merely aggravations, and my response should be fitting to the circumstance, not by what is perceived. Some things have proved to be the proverbial thorn in the flesh, but once the shock of the radiators blowing up, or the move, or this vandalism and all the little inconveniences wears off, what do I have left? I have people. Many tears have been cried from stress and frustration, but so many more tears have streamed from my eyes over kindness, encouragement, and support, a constant reminder that we are His and everything will be fine in the long-run. We have been lifted up, held close and carried so many times in the last few months, that I can say these things are simply inconveniences, however far reaching. We have been blessed.

"But you, O Lord, are a God 

merciful and gracious,

Slow to anger and abundant in

kindness and truth."

Psalms 86:15

Capturing Life

    There are moments in life we seek to capture, hold them close in memory. The life events and milestones, the relationships, conversations, laughter, smiles, an aroma, a touch, a look. We file them away, listing them under what is most precious to us and we go to them frequently to replay the warmth in our hearts.Then there are other moments in life we try to avoid, but they capture us and drag us to a place where time slows and memory files these events with precision and detail we hate, listing them under our nightmares. We rarely visit this shriveled file, shoving it as far from our precious memories as we can. It's full of hurt, anguish and tears.
    One of the greatest tragedies of my adult life took place on Wednesday. I have my own grief, but the event took hold and dragged my family along with it in ways I would have never wanted. It's one thing to grieve, it's another to see your children and your spouse grieve. It's poignant devastation. We started out our week with its usual business, with the exception of my SUV needing work done and Chaucer, our dog, getting sick. Wednesday started with a trip to the dealership to figure out what was wrong with my vehicle (alternator; you know, the one we just replaced in June in Houston). So that happened and the dealership kindly shuttled me back home to find Chaucer had vomited on literally every rug and carpet in the house. He hadn't eaten in two days.
    The vet was able to fit us in at 2:15. I didn't have a car, but we made the snowy walk up two blocks from our house. He perked up a little as we walked. He always loved the snow. We walked in and he was weighed just inside the door. Our always skinny dog had somehow lost ten pounds. It was about this time memory captured me; odd things stood out and were quickly filed in that sorting place of unsureness, either way to be remembered. I found myself in a small room with my two older girls (ages seven and eight) and Chaucer. On the surface things checked out all right. Then the request for blood work. Then the long wait for results. The girls oblivious to what this visit could mean, coloring princesses in their books. The vet returned, glanced at the girls and took me a few steps away to the examining table where she deftly handed me a box of tissues and laid the results on the table. The flash mob chorus of "I can't do this. My girls are here." was loud in my mind as I quickly dumped my unsorted memories into the nightmare file.
    Kidney failure, he's exhausted, he's using less than 25% of his kidneys, we can prolong him maybe maybe a few weeks but then... it's been going on for months he just made up for it in other ways, he can't do it any more... tissue after tissue, silent sobs, the girls still coloring in their books behind me, the vet getting me a new box of tissues... stop... what do I want to do? Call Keith. I left the room to make the call "Come home. To the vet. Now." The ugly choke of sobs, tears and breath vying for their turn. Return to the room, face the girls, the hour long wait for Keith. The tears from the girls, quickly replaced by smiles as they innocently think he will get better. He has to get better. Dad will get here and we will all go home with Chaucer. Wait a bit longer. Chaucer hears Keith's car pull up outside, he slowly gets up, walks the few feet to the door, lays down next to the door in anticipation of seeing his man. He doesn't walk again. The pain, the hurt, the dawning realization for the girls that he won't be coming home. The final decision. The goodbyes. Caelan and Keith choose to stay with Chaucer. Evelynn and I walk out into the office. The song on their radio plays:

Are you, are you

Coming to the tree,

Wear a necklace of hope

Side by side with me.

Strange things did happen here

No stranger would it be

If we met at midnight

In the hanging tree.

Must leave. Outside. In the cold and the falling snow which has a strange affect on burning, swollen eyes. It refreshes. Return to the room. It is done. He's gone. More tears, a last look... Caelan walking away but turning back to throw herself on Chaucer and sob. We are led to a back door to leave. Keith gets in his car. The girls ask to walk home. The snow has covered our tracks from the walk to the vet.

    I don't want these memories. I wasn't given the choice. They are filed away, black and stark, devoid of warmth. Return to the warm memories. I was five months pregnant with Evelynn when we got Chaucer in November of 2005. He was Keith's dog from the start. He picked him out and he rode home in Keith's lap. The were training/hunting buddies from the start. I took him to Shippensburg University and bundled him into a warm bed in my Beetle while I was in class. I couldn't leave that sweet puppy at hope to cry the moment I left. I graduated in December and we spent the next four months curled up in a recliner watching Celebrity Poker and Project Runway (pre-Netflix days were tough). We lost him in Arkansas that first Christmas, we found him, then went to Texas where he got into some rat poisoning. A rough start really. Then along came children. Evelynn and Caelan's first words were Chaucer. We sat McKenna's carseat in the floor when we brought her home from the hospital (we did that with all of them). He paced around her, glancing at her and then looking at us as if saying "Another one?" Then we brought Paxton home. Chaucer walked up, looked once and then walked back the way he came, seemingly shaking his head at having to deal with another Brannon kid. He was the perfect family dog. The many warm snuggles, the playfulness, the way he calmly took to being terrorized by all four of my kids. He would be covered in stickers or run around the house wearing a tutu. Bows added to his collar or covered in toys. He was well loved and loved well in return. We stored our warm memories of Chaucer's life for the day we were captured by his loss and they have spilled over to sooth the broken hearts.