A day in Assisi

"and dees ees St. Francis preaching to dee birds"

In 2004, thanks to a big chunk of my husband's life insurance, my kids and I took a 3 week trip of a life-time to Italy.  We did it on our own, took the train all over.  It was great.  In honour of St. Francis of Assisi, I invite you to read about our day in Assisi.  We rented an apartment in Rome for a week and too a day tour (it's about 3 hours away by bus).  Was not the highlight of our trip so you should probably read the whole trip blog :-)

Friday Five - Memories

The folks at RevGalBlogPals are talking about Memories.

1. A treasured memory from childhood?

I did not have a good childhood.  I choose not to dwell on it.   I don't deny it but I do not let it dictate who I am now.  Say what you will about Dr. Laura (and one could say a lot) but she has a saying - you get two chances to have a family, the one you were born with and the one you create.  I did much better with the family I created.  I have wonderful memories of my children's childhood--especially vacations

Like our trip in 1996 to Colorado - this is a stop at the Pony Express Station in Gothenburg, Nebraska

Here we are in the Garden of the gods, with my sister.  I would always make matching shirts for everyone - on this day we are just wearing matching T shirts

Or to Disneyland in 2000

2.  A teenage memory?

I had a high school sweetheart for 3 years.  He was very romantic - copied Elizabeth Barrett Browning's "How do I love thee" for our one month anniversary.   When he graduated from high school he decided to become a Roman Catholic Priest.  It was so romantically tragic how I gave him up for God.  Then he dropped out because he was gay.  We met up a few years later in San Francisco and he lived with a very nice guy for several years.  Then he decided he wasn't gay and lived with a very nice woman for a few years.   Then he decided he was going to become a monk.  I've lost contact with him.  He didn't seem that confused in high school!

In front of Mt Rainier in Washington

3.  A young adult memory?

Driving with my soon to be husband Loren from Coon Valley Wisconsin back to California for my ordination.  We drove up to see my sister in Seattle and then down through the redwood forest to San Francisco where I was ordained.  It was a carefree trip.  No worries.  The whole world was a head of me.  After that trip I think we knew we were going to be married.  If we could survive a week in a car together, we could survive a marraige.

4.  A Memory from this Summer

I took my kids to the Omaha zoo.  Just like old times.

 5. A memory you hope to have? - my 25th anniversary of ordination which is next year, my children's weddings, grandchildren.

Easter Dinner

I like to cook.

My kids are in college now but they came home for Easter.

So I bought an 8 1/2 lb spiral cut ham. Way too much for the three of us but there's nothing like a spiral cut ham and that was as small a ham as I could find.

I was sort of listening to Emeril Lagasse on Good Morning America and this is what I remember of his glaze, besides what I have in the house...

Some lemon juice - maybe a half a cup....about 1/3 cup brown sugar...some honey ...a couple of squirts of honey mustard (he said dry mustard but I didn't have any) ...some ginger..mix it up

Brush the ham with it and then keep basting every 1/2 hour.

Cheesy potatoes. You know that disgusting mixture of hash browns, cheese, cream of broccli (I think you are supposed to use cream of mushroom but my kids won't eat mushrooms and this is the way I can sort of get some vegetables in my son) ...sour cream, butter, and cheese. What I discovered today is that you CAN use frozen hash browns. They were all out of the refigreated bags so I bought frozen and just thawed it out. There's a recipe on the bag. My son loves these.

I roast two sweet potatoes, peel them, mash them, mix with a little cream a LOT of butter, vanilla extract, brown sugar and whip them up then reheat them. This is like a dessert, which is a good thing because I didn't have time to make cupcakes like I usually do for Easter.

I had some left over cole slaw. I cheated and bought the already bagged slaw cut with cabbage, carrots and broccoli - added a little balsamic vinegar, mayo...garlic salt, cayenne pepper ( l like to make it interesting)

Asparagus spears. Now I'm not real fond of asparagus - I used to cut it in the fields as a kid and I watched the geese run through the fields and poop on the asparagus but my daughter loves it. I need to learn to like it since it grows wild in my back yard. I nuke it in just a little water for about 8 minutes, add butter, lemon juice, garlic salt and lemon pepper.

I know -- it's an obscene amount of food for three people.

Today I will simmer the ham carcass and make a ham stock. I use that for making gumbo. Ham stock is what adds richness to gumbo. I make good gumbo.

World Autism Awareness Day

Check out this blog written by the blogger's 11 year old son with Asperger's Syndrome.

My son was a little different. We called him "moody" and "quirky". He had terrible temper tantrums as a toddler and pre-schooler. But then don't all strong-willed children? We took him a few times to a child pyschologist but this was before the ELCA offered mental health coverage for pastors and we just could not afford the $50 a week it was costing us. Wow that sounds like such a deal now!

We all managed and in his small town school my son was accepted as just quirky. Then he turned 11 and puberty hit. And we moved. And his father was suddenly killed in a car accident. And he was having melt downs and crying and throwing tantrums in school. And at first everyone was sympathetic because he'd lost his father.

Then people decided it was time he "got over it" and I "stopped putting up with his antics". I took him to psychiatrist after psychiatrist. He was diagnosed with depression, anxeity disorder, defiant child disorder. He was given all kinds of medications. He just got worse. Kids learned how to pick on him so that he would make a scene which was all very entertaining for them and then he would get in trouble.

Honestly I used to wish he was addicted to drugs because at least then I would know what to do. I was terrified he was going to kill himself, or worse, someone else.

Finally one day at a school meeting a special ed teacher said "You know, he seems like he might have Asperger's Syndrom" I had never heard of this syndrome. I bought a book on it that night and after having read two chapters I knew it was describing my boy. We took him to a testing center and sure enough that's what he had.

It still wasn't easy after that because other than the one teacher, the school didn't get it. They wanted to know how they could make him stop being the way he was.

I moved again and we began to have the same problems in the high school. They were ready to encourage him to drop out and get his GED. I learned that I had to stop depending on experts. The only person who was going to help my kid was me and I had to fight for him. I contacted a special ed right lawyer. It was the best $200 I ever spent. ALl I had to do was mention his name and suddenly every accomodation we needed could be done (This lawyer had recently won a court case forcing a school to pay tuition for an expensive boarding school since they were unable/unwilling to provide what the boy needed).

With the right accomodations everything changed. I found a good shrink who found the right medication to control his anxeity. He graduated from high school. Now he's sharing an on-campus apartment with 3 other boys at a community college. He still struggles with anxeity and doesn't drive. I don't know how self-sufficient he's going to be. I'm just pleased he's come as far as he has.

But let me tell you a story. Back when he was 11 we were on vacation on a tourist boat ride. I told him he could buy a pretzel. They were out of pretzels and he broke down and cried with large sobs. First of all he was just stressed out from being on vacation. But also it was always difficult for him if he was expecting something, to have things turn out different than he expected. Not getting that pretzel threw his whole world upside down. That's very difficult for us to comprehend. All the people on that boat saw was an 11 year old boy crying because he could not have a pretzel. My face still burns when I remember the harsh stares and not so soft murmers of "brat". I stared them down. They didn't know him or our situation.

I made myself a vow that I would NEVER EVER judge situations that I see in public when I don't know the story behind it. You can see a child make a public scene and tsk tsk about what a bad mother that is and congratulation yourself that you are so superior. Or you can offer a sympathetic smile or comment and say a prayer for that family.

A limerick or two on St. Augustine's view of God

My daughter had to present St. Augustine's thoughts to her religion class at Augustana College in a "creative way" so she wrote this limerick. I think it's pretty clever:

God is completely perfect and good
But the world needs more, God understood.
God didn't have to create;
He/She was already great,
But for goodness' sake, God thought (s)he would.

So God saw there was nothing around
And out of nowhere, God made the ground.
God started with nothing
and ended with something:
fish, light, plants, us, potatoes, and sound.