It was great fun. We picked a lot of apples. Here are pictures of that event.
Now, on to other more pressing matters.
For the past several months ... I've lost track, but for sure since July, I've been sick. Sometimes, the kids are sick too, but they'll get over it in a couple days and I'll have it for a month. I'll come down with what seems like a cold, but it will plaster me. I'll lose my voice, and my sinuses will kick in to overdrive, and my lungs get gunky, and I'll go through two boxes of Kleenex a week and sleep with my nebulizer by my bedside.
Honest to God, every other time I talk to my mother, I'm sick. And she'll ask, as soon as she hears my voice, "Oh my gosh, are you sick again?!" Then she'll ask me about how I'm sleeping and really, I'm not sleeping so well - but I keep blaming it on this whole aging process.
For as much rest as I know I should be getting each night, I'm finding it impossible to lay down and actually sleep for the requisite 8-hours. I'll go to bed at a decent hour (for me, that's before midnight), but like clockwork, I'm awake by 4:00 every morning. Then, I'll toss and turn for another two hours thinking how I should just get up and start my day - but instead, I think about things like where we'll be in a year, or two years, or five years and how will I feel about the mothering decisions I'm making today, in 10 years? Perhaps my inability to really feel settled is the impetus to these ailments!
Is tomorrow trash day? Did anyone remember to bring out the trash?
Maybe if I turn on this side. Or that side. Or flip over my pillow.
Then I'll wonder how is Charlie sleeping so soundly? He's older than me. Why isn't he awake? Charlie? Charlie?! Are you awake??
My mother also tells me I need to go see a Naturalist about why my immune system is so suppressed because there's obviously some underlying reason and we need to get this sorted out.
I actually went to see a Naturalist / Homeopath once, 9.5-years ago, when my nose would get this mysterious infection and one of my nostrils would erupt in a sore and hurt for days. I finally resorted to a homeopathic approach when my mother, who is a nurse by training and swears by natural healing, convinced me.
The homeopathic doctor's office was in an old victorian house. I remember there were hard wood floors, and worn area rugs, and comfortable chairs. There were also bright prints on the wall from India and China, and hot tea served to all visitors. The smell of healing oils hung in the air.
The doctor spent at least two hours asking me about my health history, which at the time included my nostril inflammation, struggles with infertility, before prescribing for me a little pill, made from the liver of a puff fish, that I'd place under my tongue three times a day. I laughed to myself wondering what my pharmacist father and two pharmacist sisters would think of this goofy treatment. The whole thing wound up costing me $600.00 out of pocket because it wasn't covered by insurance, and I thought it was a total racket so took a card and told them I'd call at some later time to schedule a follow-up visit.
After I finished my puff fish liver pills, I began to notice I never had another painful nostril episode again and maybe there was something to be said for homeopathic remedies. Oh, and then I got pregnant with triplets. But then I was so busy with my three children that were born less than a year after my consultation, and my fourth child that came two and half years beyond that - I never did make that follow-up appointment.
