For My Missed Monday Post--The Barn

Dad gave me a stall in the barn to do with as I pleased.

What could an eight-year old little girl possibly want to do with a barn stall you ask? Well, let me tell you. An eight-year old little girl and her friend from next door could clean out said stall and turn it into a two-story play room.

Treasures with no known history were found in that stall. License plates from states outside of Texas with dates on them older than dirt itself--we nailed them to the walls, cleared out the useless junk, created a desk from old milk crates, added support beams for the plywood ceiling and built a ladder to get from one floor to the next. I'm amazed to say the girl next door and I did this all by ourselves. No boys were allowed!

Everyday she and I would meet at the barn nestled at the corner of our farms. Smiles filled our faces, hammers our hands and we babbled on with endless ideas created from the vivid imaginations all children seem to possess.

I miss those days. Miss watching the sun set over the Texas farm fields. Miss Mom bringing dinner out to us without making us wash our hands before we ate. I miss being a kid.

The barn was torn down about ten years ago, but the good memories live on. I have pictures of my friend and I in our barn stall/hideout/playroom. If I am brave enough, maybe I'll scan and post when I get home.

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Back from Vacation

I'm a slacker, I know, I know.

Wait, no I'm not. I was on vacation, that's why I've missed two of my life story and multiple random blog posts about whatever's on my mind. Don't worry I will make up for it . . . soon. Let me get through this pile of missed work on my desk, and catch up with all my e-mails and I swear I will get back to blogging.

Before I go, let me paint a picture. Imagine waking up when you feel like it, rested, relaxed, happy. Now get dressed, go outside and walk through the warm morning air to the white, sandy beach. Waves rolling in from the Atlantic wash ashore and a salty breeze blows in your face. You inhale, and take a peaceful walk with your family. Smiles surround you. Warmth. Peace.

That was my reality for a week.

Now imagine this.

You've been on vacation for a week; your first day back to work is on a Tuesday. Since you've been staying up until 2 a.m. almost every night, you decide to go to bed early--10:30 p.m.--so you're refreshed. Then your sweet, loving 4 year-old wakes you up at 11:30 p.m. and pukes all over you, your white carpet and bathroom.

That was my reality last night.

I guess more shit has hit the fan--at least this time the shit was figurative and not literal, but why am I always the one cleaning it up? Oh well, happy Tuesday everyone! ;-)

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A Morning to Remember

This morning's blog post was going to be witty, fun and entertaining, but while driving along my fifty mile commute into Washington, D.C. plans changed.

"All roads leading to and around the Pentagon have been shutdown due to a suspicous package--more details to come later," said the radio announcer.

My first instinct was to flee, but I was trapped. A prisoner in the wonderful HOV lanes, surrounded on all sides by guardrails. My hitchhikers and I were only a few miles from the Pentagon when traffic came to a complete stop and there we sat, vulnerable to whatever the terrorists had planned.

Memories of 9/11 surfaced to the forefront of my mind, leaving me almost unwilling to push the gas peddle every time traffic inched forward.

On 9/11 I was stranded in D.C., forced to watch black smoke rise from the Pentagon, forced to panic about how I was going to get home, how I was going to get to my son, how I was going to survive--and this morning I was trying desperately to get there.

Why?

Our society is driven, we will not be stopped by terrorists. That's what they want.

I've spent countless hours of my life developing a strange skill which allows me to understand people--put myself in their shoes if you will--but I have never been able to figure out one of the worst human emotions: hatred.

It scares me to think I've brought children into this world while hatred is so prominent. Scares me for what kind of future they will have, if they will be stuck at work while watching what protects them burn to the ground, knowing innocent lives are lost on a daily basis for that same protection.

My biggest wish for our world is peace. I know it sounds cliche, but it's true. My children, everyone's children, deserve to grow up without fear, without murder, without war. Life should be about love and simple things like fishing, hiking, reading--things that bring joy not hatred.

I pray one day my wish will come true, because I fear for us all if it doesn't.

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Where's The Delete Button?

Have you ever had one of those days where you'd like to rewind and start over? Yeah, me too, but today was not one of those days. Today was a day I'd like to delete from memory, never to have to worry about again.

I don't recommend dwelling on negatives in life because it does absolutely no good, however, I'm about to make an exception.

When my alarm went off at 5:30 this morning my head was already throbbing. That should have been indication to stay home, but no, good employee Krystal got up, got dressed and drove to work. Only the headache was much worse by the time I arrived. So six Ibuprofen later--I do not condone overdosing--the headache was gone, but replaced by shaking, nausea blah blah waah, right?

Well, I sucked it up and put in a full day, then jumped in my car with a twinge of a returning headache and drove home. The look on my husband's face when I stepped through the door sent creepy crawlies all over my skin. The narrowed eyes, the pursed lips, the heavy breaths--all warning signs shit had hit the fan. If only I'd realized literal dog shit had hit the figurative fan I'd have turned and run away.

"What's wrong?" I asked. Why the hell did I ask that?

He cocked his head to the side, eyebrow raised in a do-you-really-want-to-know way. "Bailey was sick."

A string of foul language I'd rather not post here ran through my head, but my children were around so I asked, "How bad?"

Again with the look. "It was fine until he shook."

Okay, so enough details about that. We drew straws to decide who would take care of the kids and who would clean the mess . . . I lost. After I bleached everything in sight, washed the dog, blow dried the dog, brushed the dog, vacuumed the basement, cleaned the bathroom where I bathed him, and showered myself . . . my headache came back in full swing. Grrr!

And somehow I've managed to write this with a smile on my face. Harumph. I guess this just goes to show, no matter how bad things may be I know they can always get worse.

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Public School?

Homeschool ended. My parents did something wrong. As a child I was surprised by this realization, but as an adult I understand we all do things wrong. Technicalities and a general lack of fight in my mom and dad landed my brother and I in public school.

No big deal, right?

Wrong.

Kris and I “grew up” in the city and these people knew it. From the way we walked to the way we talked.

“Go back to Illi'noise’ you damn yankee!”

The deep-rooted hatred behind the insult didn’t register until I was much older, but the insult itself . . . that hurt. Imagine being told to go back somewhere you never knew. Somewhere you were born and had family, but had no sense of home. Texas was my home. I was six months old when we moved there.

Of course, I was more focused on pointing out Illinois is not pronounced Illi'noise'. My constant editing of everything only brought more teasing.

Insults are common amongst children, but things at the dilapidated trailer weren’t going so well either. Dad lost his job. Mom had to find work to help put food on the table. Over the course of a few months I went from having an amazing childhood to having nothing.

The cliché all clouds have a silver lining applied to me in 1988 because that was the year I discovered I love reading and I love writing. I hoarded Babysitter Club novellas in my nightstand. Every day after school I’d sneak a few pages of reading in and when I’d finish a book, I’d grab my spiral notebook and write. Most of my stories were illegible at best, but it was the creativity I enjoyed. The release of all emotion inside me. It’s what I still love.

Did I ever finish one of my novels? No. But I wrote a lot of short stories about cats and dogs and whatever else came to mind. A few stories made me proud enough to take to school and read aloud in class.

If only someone had recognized the energy, the passion I had for writing then and pointed me in the right direction . . . how many books would I have written by now?

I don’t blame anyone. Not my parents. Not the teasing kids who didn’t know any better. Not myself. Everyone does something wrong. And if things are meant to be, they will be. I’m smiling now because I’m writing and it still makes me happy.

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Awesome Blog

Do you ever find yourself saying the same word over and over? I do.

"Hey, Krystal, I just won a new car," someone says to me.

Guess what I say in return . . . I said guess.

You got it! The title says it all. Awesome.

Yes, that's right awesome is my catch word for everything. I've only discovered this during the last couple weeks, but now I hear it coming out of my mouth at least six times a day. My facebook posts, my twitter feeds . . . awesome is everywhere.

Tonight on the way to my four year-old daughter's dance recital rehearsal--boy that's a mouthful--she asked, "Are we going to my big dance class tonight?"

I smiled and said, "Yes. That's why you have too much make-up on." (Okay, so that's not exactly what I said, but trust me I was thinking it.)

She bounced in her car seat; I told her to stop so she wouldn't mess up her curls.

"I'm going to dance on the big stage?" she asked.

I looked in the rearview, her blue eyeshadow was distracting, but I could see the excitement in her big brown eyes. "Yes, Abby."

"This is going to be so awesome!"

She's four. She loves her mother and apparently she talks like me. I couldn't help but laugh. I've been planning an 'awesome' blog for about a week now, but mine and Abby's conversation changed the structure. Originally I'd planned for some ridiculous commentary including the word awesome as much as I possibly could, but Abby made it better with her indirect compliment to me. Awesome.

I love my daughter, I love my life--I think it's all awesome.

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Morning Commute

This morning my commute was longer than normal, but I felt like I was only in the car for a few minutes.

If you've read my About Me then you know I pick up strangers on a daily basis. Today my strangers were fun, exciting and kept my thoughts from spiraling out of control into worlds full of dark, mysterious things.

Hey, I miss those dark, mysterious things. I need to think about them. My books wouldn't come to life without monsters who go bump in the night, but every now and then it's nice to connect with the real world on my fifty mile drive.

Don't worry, I plugged myself at some point during the ride and I'm tapping my toe, refreshing my facebook page every few minutes, waiting for the elusive "Likes" to increase . . . .

. . . Just checked again. Nope, they haven't liked me yet, but I'll keep waiting.

In the meantime, maybe you can go like me? Krystal Wade

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Quick Update

So much to do, so little time. Something I keep as my AIM status message, and Gmail chat status, and--you get the point, right?

Between Twitter, Facebook, Blogger, critting and writing itself my head is spinning. How does everyone juggle all things associated with the writing world? Hmm?

I have friends who do all those things with six kids, others with four . . . you know who you are. Geesh. How do YOU GUYS do it?

Well, even though I have a million things to keep me busy--including three kids--the last two days have been productive. If you keep up with my "Coming Soon" tab, you already know, but I am now happily 43% towards my goal of 95k words for Wilde's Army.

Oh, look at the time. I need to go crit, then write, and don't forget twitter and . . . see ya!

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Good Times

Yips and howls from the coyote’s late night hunting parties made my dreams terrifying. I don’t know why I was afraid of the animals; it’s not like they showed anything more than curiosity toward us, and they visited on only a few occasions, but for some reason the four legged mangy creatures were my biggest fear—well them and spiders.

Fortunately, our day time routines were coyote free. My brother and I would spend most of the morning with our mom. She quit her paper pushing job to home school us when we moved to our seventeen-acre Christmas tree farm. Most of the lessons she taught I’ve long since forgotten, except for one—drawing from sight.

My best creation was a horse. Mom showed me a picture and instructed me to focus on it while I moved the pencil in my hand along a piece of paper. I’ve never been able to draw—I’m creative, but not in that way—so when my rendering looked close to the original I was elated. Over the course of an hour I must have drawn ten or twelve different things, but none as majestic as the horse.

After lessons Mom would send my brother and I outside. Two brave explorers in the unknown, willing to risk it all to catch mudpuppies by the pond, climb trees, investigate the old barn and out buildings which still stood on the property . . . whatever we could get into, we did.

Kris and I grew closer than we had ever been in our time spent together on the farm. I’ll even risk saying we were best friends and when I was with him, most of my fears disappeared.

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