Thankful Thursday

Abby posted these on her private site. I'm re-gifting them. We'll be having dinner with these delightful children and other family in a few hours. Happy Thanksgiving!

P.S. I just realized that Miss Buckle, a photographer who lives in Norway and has a fabulous eye, has a weekly feature called Thankful Thursday. So I'm linking up with her today. Her images on this particular day are in-your-face portraits of classmates. She's also great with scenery and with sweet glimpses of her beautiful blonde sons.  

More stuff I wish I didn't know: That beautiful warm sun is not my friend

Don't get me wrong; I love the sun. A shining sun sustains my mood. A sun that stays behind the clouds saps my energy. In the winter, when it hangs so low in the sky that it can't warm anything, I suffer from Seasonal Affect Disorder, the initials of which are no coincidence. But that's a topic for another post.

Sun on my skin warns me and, I'm told, produces vitamin D.

It also produces skin cancer.

I've been lucky so far. Over the past 15 years, I've had six or eight basal-cell carcinomas (very slow-growing, do not spread to other areas), one squamous-cell carcinoma (faster, deeper, can spread to internal organs) and dozens of pre-cancerous bits that my sharp-eyed dermatologist has deftly removed. In most cases, treatment has been little more than an annoyance.

A month ago - just a few days after I fell - I went for my twice-yearly checkup. I pointed to a tiny new red spot just below my nose, which I thought resulted from my fall. It was next to some scar tissue from an earlier fall, which occasionally peels, I said. Hold it, he said.

Scar tissue doesn't peel. What I had was a little triangle, less than a centimeter in any direction, likely a basal cell carcinoma. It was in a dangerous spot (near the nose), I'd had it for years, and the new spot was an expansion of that. Without even waiting for a biopsy, he prescribed flourouracil, a chemotherapy cream that creates a nasty but efficient chemical peel of the cancerous tissue. It also irritates the heck out of regular tissue. I applied it daily for four weeks across half my upper lip, producing a painful, bright-red swath until a couple of days ago, when my treatment was up and I could begin to heal.

I was already feeling a bit old and vulnerable after falling, and this didn't help.

On the other hand, it may have saved me from something more serious. And it reminded me to wear sunscreen. Lots of it, even though I hate the feel and it blocks my pores.

And now I'm reminding you. Wear sunscreen, avoid getting burned, learn what to watch for. They tell you the ABCs of melanoma - assymetrical, brown or black, changing. It's good to know those, because melanoma kills. But especially if you have a light complexion, blue or green eyes, and a history of sunburns, you should know that non-melanoma skin cancers may be white or pink, are often pearly but can take many forms, sometimes show up where there was an injury or an insect bite. Wikipedia and other sites have good info, sometimes with fairly grisly photos. Don't let yourself show up there.

It's been snowing all day and the sun is nowhere in sight. When it returns, I will receive it with joy - and sunscreen. Yes, even in winter.

Stuff I wish I didn't know: falling

About a month ago, enjoying a walk around the lake in Como Park, I tripped and fell. Hard.

I’d fallen once before, so I was very conscious of getting my hands in front of me. Good, I thought, I’ve broken my fall. But my head had momentum, and I couldn't stop it. My cheekbone hit, but not heavily like fifteen years ago when I landed flat on my nose, teeth, and chin.

Two women helped me up and made sure I was okay. And I was, sort of. I’d been in high spirits just before that one false step, laughing at the antics of a little dog being walked by one of the women now helping me. I got up, not quite as quickly as I intended. I took stock.

My hands stung; they were full of tiny cuts from the devilishly jagged bits of gravel embedded in the walking path. I knew I’d have bruises on my face, hip, and shoulder. I didn’t know yet about the pulled something-or-other near my ribcage, but for the next two weeks it would stab me every time I sneezed, and occasionally it would cause me to blurt out a four-letter word. Since I didn’t know about that yet, I mostly worried about the bruise on my face, which turned out to be minimal.  

I walked back to my car and drove to the fish-and-chips shop to pick up dinner.  It felt like the “plucky” thing to do, although I tried to shield my hands, which didn’t look very appropriate to be in a place where food was served.

From that fall, I learned three things I’d rather not know.    

1. Crushed rock used in paving projects is razor-sharp and jagged, and bears no resemblance to the friendly rounded pebbles fished out of stream beds for use in, say, playgrounds.
2. No good deed goes unpunished (okay, I’ve been saying this for a while). I was, after all, trying to get stronger and healthier by walking that path.
3. I have reached an age, or perhaps a state of mind and body, at which falling makes me older. I didn’t feel embarrassed; I felt vulnerable and old. When you feel that way, it’s easy to act that way. My cuts and bruises have healed, but it has taken a while to get my confidence back. This is complicated by that fact that there is always something else that can go wrong…but that’s a topic for another day.

Still, I am reminded every day that I have a great life and that it would be ridiculous to waste it worrying about the small stuff. I’m starting again on efforts to get stronger and healthier. But I’ll be doing that indoors for a while. I don’t do winter.  

Meet Smaug the Dragon...and Bob the Builder

If you're a fan of The Hobbit, you know that Smaug is a dragon who spends a lot of time lying atop his enormous pile of stolen gold, until his chest is almost entirely encrusted with gold.

ViMae's Daddy has passed along his love of this story, and she decided to be Smaug for Halloween. "Maybe a nice Smaug," she says. Still, she wants to breathe fire and scare other children.

We started with a red hoodie and pants, and I built the whole costume on the hoodie.I posted some sneak peeks here.

She was very specific: There had to be gold, jewels, and long, "mean" wings. I bought stick-on jewels at the fabric shop and she applied them.

I glued some pointy wings to the sleeves of the hoodie and drew on them with a gold pen. (ViMae was planning to fly from door to door trick-or-treating; Pa and I were careful to tell her these wings are just pretend.)

She loves that the tail swings when she walks, and in this photo she is admiring the shadow of her spikes, wings, and claws. Pink claws.

Augie decided to be Bob the Builder. Not surprising for a kid who owns a full-size tool box, hammer, screwdriver, and metal measuring tape, and who spends lots of play time constructing roads, houses, zoos, castles, etc.

Peter and I scouted up the necessary garb including "work boots," and Peter fashioned a tool belt using his own father's WW II ammo belt.

Augie brought goggles and some toy tools. The minute he put on the goggles, he was the proudest builder in the universe. He kept them on for hours.

Our trial outing was to the library for story hour Thursday. We knew from last year that lots of children would be wearing costumes. (Pa was the only grownup wearing one: his red sweater and Santa hat.)

Friday evening, the kids and their mom and dad went to a preschool party. These two photos are from Mommy's blog: she reports that ViMae did a lot of fire-breathing, and Augie stayed in character all evening. No surprises there!

A comment on another blog said the real test of success for a costume is how the child feels wearing it.By that standard, these outfits seem to be a real success, and it's the most fun I've ever had celebrating Halloween.