I am not Alone

When this world's unkind,

Please keep this in mind,

I will always be standing close behind

With a hand to hold

to keep you from the cold

I will be with you,

until we grow old.

You are not alone

Blue Dogs

25 years ago in May I walked off the auditorium stage a graduate of Charlotte Latin School. I was  exhilarated that I graduated, nervous about entering a new chapter in life, and heart broken that my fellow graduates and I were heading in different directions.  Daddy always tried to tell me that, although he understood I was close to my high school friends,  I would be just as close to my college friends, and then work friends, and so on.  He was trying to implant in my heart that it was okay to move on, exciting even.  The summer after graduation we played hard and loved hard, and come mid August we said our goodbyes.  On the night before our departure, after the group had given their last hugs and gone home to prepare for the next day, one  of my very best friends and I sat in my driveway on Country Lane and,  unwilling to accept our fate and wishing time could stand still,  cried until the early hours in the morning.

As I have mentioned in earlier posts, my friends played a huge role,  more than they  knew, in my high school years. Those years are hard for any teenager.  Throw in some dysfunction and   insecurities on top of that and you have me.  A lost soul.  They were my escape from the drama of the home. To me they were my security.  They helped transform that scared and insecure girl into who I am today. My senior year, when mom died, they rallied around me and tried their hardest to protect me from even more hardships.  So where many of them were excited about what the future held for them and the independence they were about to encounter,  I felt as if enough change had come to my life. I would have preferred to stay right where I was, with everyone else right there by me.

We went off to college. In the beginning we wrote letters. We cried for hours on the phone together.  We visited each others colleges.  We got together over Thanksgiving and Christmas and summers. And then we got settled in our own schools.  We made different friends. We went weeks, sometimes months with out speaking.   We went to Law School, Graduate Schools, started jobs, moved to different cities.  We got married.  We had children.  We got busy with life. We sent Christmas cards.

Since my 20th reunion we have made great efforts of meeting up once a year.  Ironically, everyone is back on the east coast, within driving distance to Charlotte.  We talk some of the children, jobs and current events. Mostly we laugh.  We laugh until tears are strolling down our cheeks.  We remember things that we haven't thought of in years. Most of the sentences start with, "Can you believe we did this?" or  "I would never let my children do that".   And they always end in hugs and "I love you", and "I can't wait to see you again".

This past weekend was my 25th.  I got in the car on a Gorgeous Friday afternoon and shouted out a giant WOOHOO.  Partly because I was in need of a break from playing taxi, cheerleader, house manager and maid, but mostly because I was excited for the visit. Feeling particularly emotional and  vulnerable lately,  I was ready for their embrace. Throughout the entire weekend I was welcomed with warm, familiar arms and smiles, and drawn in by more stories of the days when. 

I ran into my pre-algebra teacher who taught me to love math(at least for a year) and without knowing it was my own guidance counselor.  Within 30 minutes of mom's death he was at my door, reaching his arms out, asking what he could do for me.  My French teacher was there,  who taught 3 of the Fletcher kids french, but alas, struggled the most with me.  She looked amazing, as if she could have graduated with us.   I spoke to my Physical Science teacher, who, on several occasions, asked to see me after class just to make sure I was okay because he saw the sadness in my eyes. The good ole Doctor was there, a math teacher that taught math above my level, but taught David and Richard too.  He was always full of jokes(he even admits how bad they were) and always stopped and talked to me in the halls, even though I was not a student of his.  And lastly, the current events/economics/history teacher and my advisor for 4 years stopped by.  I walked around the campus with him on  many cold mornings listening to him try to me and inspire me to do better. He loved me, and my family.   How grateful I am to have been surrounded by caring faculty during such a volatile time of life...Not only were my friends of high school a large impact on my life, but the staff was as well.

As the night went on, I felt a sense of extreme sadness.  The majority of our class had left, leaving behind the same folks I cried over 25 years ago. The same friend I cried with in the driveway began to cry again.  And as that group began to wind down and head home, I cried harder with every hug.
Daddy was wrong.  Although I did make great friends along every path I travelled, there is simply no replacement. These  guys were family.  They are family still. Goodbyes were still hard.

Over the next couple days I have received texts from them...  "love you Fletch!"  "great to see you bud!"  My favorite was from a friend, recently sober... " I was down today since it was all over.  That was the most fun I have had in years.  Love you"

And in the mailbox I received a letter from my advisor... Addressed to : Happy Cathy Fletcher Himan.
... Your enthusiasm and self confidence shows how far you have come since I first knew you...

The enthusiasm and self confidence that he was writing of  took root in my high school years.  Though during the time I was dealing with unfortunate things, the love of my friends and the faculty kept me above water and showed me that I could battle any circumstance.  As years went on, they never failed to continue the love and faith, no matter what life dealt us, or how many states divided us.  I always know that they have my back, that they are  still surrounding me and protecting me, like they did so many years ago.

Spring Cleaning

Tippy Toed

The urge has hit me. Clean, declutter, organize...Every several years the feeling overcomes me and I know I must act NOW before it quickly passes and I wait a couple more years. Yesterday I accomplished the family room, laundry room and kitchen, and today... the office. The room where all accumulates in no form or reason and piles of my life sit in the closet, or on my desk, neglected and unloved. There is only one way to do this.... Pull it all out in the middle of the room, go through what stays and what goes, find a better way to store it and alas, put everything that stays back in its place...

The hardwoods are barely visible with all that I have pulled out. One side of the room is trash, the other side, treasures. As I look up in the closet to see what was left, there is just one rather large black book sitting on a shelf . It seems unfamiliar to me as I am reaching for it, but the moment I start to pull it down my heart begins to sink. I find the only spot in the room to sit down with the album containing some of my deceased brother David's belongings, photos and notes people sent me... My head starts to spin and my eyes beginning to well... It has been so long since I looked at this, I even forgot I had it. And then in my hands were the Eulogies that Richard and I delivered. As I read them over again the pain was as fresh as the day we wrote them. Cramped in that cluttered room, I found myself hysterically wailing for the loss of my brother almost 4 years ago, but it was long overdue. Once I  put that book up in the corner shelf, hidden deep in my disorganized closet, I had stopped my crying. It was time to move on. But today clearly proved that the pain was just as fresh. I try to live my life every day in gratitude and love. I laugh OFTEN. I thank God many many times a day for the blessings he gave me in my boys and Brock. But though I know that "God has a reason" I still feel cheated by his death. I have searched for ways that I have found growth by his dying, and there are plenty... but in my childish immaturity I think, " could you have not taught me another way??" More often than not I feel God's love right then, comforting me, gently bringing me in closer to him and simply saying, "Trust Me". And today, with puddles on the hardwoods, I did just that. I pulled myself up and trusted. And though my room is a disaster, I feel "spring cleaned""

Richards Eulogy:

Believe when I say, (only half jokingly, if you know anything about our family) WE HAVE GOT TO STOP MEETING THIS WAY. Seriously, I started my family late in life and I am running out of children to to name people after. ..So, the way guilt works on me , IF this keeps going I will be trying to have children well into my 50's and I know my beautiful wife Tiffany, as pregnant and as tired as she is right now, wants absolutely nothing to do with that. ( I hoped you chuckle. I know David would have wanted you to. ) So I now invite you to laugh and cry with me as we celebrate David's life.

As a child, David was the classic big brother and I was the classic younger brother. Almost every stereotype fit. I was always trying to stay competitive, but I was rarely ever a close match for him. He was far more gifted than I in so many things that really mattered at that age... Space Invaders: he could more than double my score. Rubik's Cube: he solved it while I was working on my second side. In Indian Guides our given tribal names were, Big Turtle(my father) Little Turtle(David) and Little Turtle Two(myself). That's how we rolled. I would have followed my brother to the ends of the earth, drawn to him(excuse the old adage), like a moth on a flame.

I watched his bright flame with awe and wonder and more than a few times with childhood envy. David was a mystery, and I never quite knew what would come next., but imagined he would always have some fantastic story to tell. Either about the people he had met(many of whom are here today) or the faraway places he had fallen in love with, especially his beloved Hong Kong. It always boggled my mind to watch him carry on in fluid Cantonese when I barely got by in French 2. In fact, so long a shadow was cast by David that I learned in early High School to steer my life in a completely opposite direction, to find my own interest far away from his, lest my own flame never cast a shadow of it's own.

You see, my brother, David is without question, the most complicated person I have ever known. He spiritual but not religious. He had a scientific mind but was constantly on a quest for answers to questions he knew logically he could never find. He loved Jimmy Buffet and cut his teeth to John Denver(Don't tell) but was far more passionate about the Stones and absolutely ravenous about Snoop Dog. He was both David and "Fletch" and as noted at his wedding's rehearsal dinner the two were completely different. He was both UVA prep and Hong Kong Hip Hop. His life was full of trials and pain, but, in 42 years, I never once heard him whine or complain.

David was sometime Bacchus and sometimes Socrates, but he was in all ways a traveler. Whether on a spiritual, intellectual or physical journey David was happiest when in motion. His stamina and appetite for all thing that life brought him were legendary. Most of all, David loved to laugh. If a joke was really good his laugh would be accompanied by the now famous "Fletcher hand rub". He was childlike in his enthusiasm( and if truth be told, even as an adult he still got up at the crack of dawn when he came home for Christmas to see what Santa had brought him).

It is somewhat amusing to me that in the last photograph ever taken of us ( a picture of David meeting our son Mac for the first time), I noticed that David was much taller than me. I looked at the photograph more closely, thinking, competitively,"David can't possibly be that much taller". Then it hit me. He was standing on his toes. He had that sparkle in his eye and that Fletcher grin on his face. It was an old one-upmanship trick of ours, but in the excitement and the grand moment of introducing my son to his uncle for the first time, I had been off my game and quite literally, not on my toes. So now, and for eternity David will be taller than me... and it will always make me smile.(the picture is at the top of the page)

I close with this:

Dearest David,

It seems the old adage may be true that " a flame that burns twice as bright burns half as long" , but others carry the flame that you ignited. You go now on a journey where I cannot follow. Know, however that a huge piece of my heart goes with you. I will celebrate your life in all things and tell stories about you to my children, family and friends until I draw my last breath.


My Eulogy to David

So, as you gathered from Richard's elegant words, the Fletcher's were a competitive family. The stories could go on and on about the battles on the tennis courts, basketball court and even the kitchen table where games like Risk and Bat Gammon became quite tense. With that being said, put this picture in your mind... We grew up across the street from the school we attended, Charlotte Latin, and walked most days. At 7:45each morning mom would shoo us out the door and appropriately tell us to be good and walk together. Yeah, yeah, we would mumble and out the door we would go. David,14,  Richard,12 and me 10(Chris was still in pre-school) would begin our 7 minute trek to school. The minute we stepped foot on the driveway, the race would begin. Someone, inevitably, would try to walk faster than the others. Then the others would join in, all of us breaking a sweat, in the attempt not to be the last. Now David, he never had that worry. He would smirk as he briskly walked ahead of us and every once and I while looking back with the Fletcher grin, exclaiming "Run, Run Run"... I would sulk in my chair when I got there in defeat, while David, I am sure, would enter his classroom completely satisfied.

Someone asked me the other day which brother I was closest to. As I stand here in front of you , I can assure you that was one area in life we were not competitive with. We loved together, we hurt together, we laughed together. I am a better wife, mother and friend because of my brothers. They have each played a monumental role in my life and I am so fortunate to be loved equally by each of them.

I can so easily picture him now. Newly 16, driving his red prelude, golden blond curls and tan skin, blaring either the Stones or Buffet in the tape player. He would be carting me, a very scrawny and awkward, 12 year old around staring in  in admiration.  "Man, he is so cool, I would think to myself".  Later in life, tan gone, curls cut, and he would come relive some of his ferrarri driving experiences, or share his Hong Kong adventures, still, in awe, I would think, "Man he is so cool".

When I found out about  Fletcher Barnhardt and Whites 40th reunion, the boys and I hopped in the car and drove down to spend a couple of days with him. For the first time in 3 years David, Richard, Chris and myself spent an amazing evening together, recapturing moments of history. As the evening came to a close, I believe we all had the feeling that we did not want it to end. It was a night of perfection. From there David followed me home to Asheville to spend time with our family. He spent 6 incredible days with us, sharing every activity and soaking in as much time as he could with us. At night we would sit on the back porch relaxed and exhausted from the days activities and engage in conversation as deep as politics and religion or as light as the boys sporting events that day.

July 30th I drove David to the airport. As I got out of the car and embraced him, he simply said, "Cathy Lou, I love you." I drove away from him that day with tears in my eyes knowing that the time spent with him was priceless and unforgettable. I also knew it was a gift.

So, in this moment, I visualize David running down Providence Road, looking back at us and grinning infectiously. He won. He won in life. He lived it large, he lived it happy...And with that smile he is quoting the song we heard earlier,

Cathy Lou,
Some of it's magic
Some of it's tragic
But I had a good life all the way...

Home sweet home...

 

As I turn off of Highway 17 onto Johns Island it seems time has stood still.  The twenty miles of road are canopied by the beautiful, gigantic oak trees and the Spanish Moss swaying in the breeze.  Any tension I may have felt from the drive have diminished, and the stresses from home forgotten.  I roll down the windows and breathe the air as the boys in the back simultaneously chant," ahhh, I love the smell"...

The excitement builds as we enter the island.  "Look, that is new! I wonder if we will see any alligators sunbathing!  Have you rented the bikes? Do I have to unpack or can I go straight to the beach?"  The bags are eagerly unloaded and doors slamming as they each go their own directions to the favorite part of the island.  I, on the other hand, absorb. My senses are alive and I am taking in every last thing.

Kiawah Island, South Carolina.  For thirty five years I have been returning to the same incredibly old, wood paneled beat up beach home.  Anyone I have loved deeply has shared this home with me in some capacity.  I am surrounded by ghost. Amazing ghosts.  The kind that when I walk into this house embrace me and laugh with me and say, remember when?...

This place was my mom and dad's favorite.  Mom loved the sun and dad loved the sand.  So joy was in the house that we could never find in Charlotte.  A relaxed joy.  My brothers and I felt such freedom when we arrived here.  The same kind of freedom my boys have...  The freedom of exploring the island, finding the best waves or sneaking out at night and looking for loggerhead turtle laying eggs...  But our freedom was different as well.  We were free from the shackles of mom's drinking and dads stress.  The emotions we felt at home were left there, and we were happy.

Over the years I have shared the house with those I love most.  I feel as if it is a way to open my heart to them.  Even though when they walk in the door they don't smell what I smell or  feel what I feel they do see the expression on my face when I am there and they get to experience a slightly different me.
I have brought them home.

We have a boardwalk that leads to a porch overlooking the ocean.  Early in the morning my father would take his coffee out there and reflect.  In my early 20's I would jump at the chance to get out there with my coffee and join him, so for part of the day it could be just the two of us.  I treasured that time with him.  Since he died, when I was in my mid twenties, there is not a morning I miss when I am there, going to the porch to join him for coffee.  I know he is there reflecting, and listening to me and my recaps. It is a standing date.

Richard, Chris and I reunite here  with our families every summer.  The children bond and form new traditions while  the adults share in some of the same traditions year after year. My heart is full, overflowing in fact.  No matter what tragedies we have endured in the past, we share a place that heals and continues to bring us closer together.  They do say, "home is where the heart is"....

Dont Mess with me today

To a fault, I hold my tongue.  I am passive aggressive on occasion, because it pains me to actually express my feelings. When asked to do something that I really don't want to do, but will do to please everyone else, I answer with a stern, "that is fine".. Brock really loves it when I say that.  OR without even knowing it, I sigh deeply in disapproval.  Often, when really upset, I shut down completely.  I will show them, I just won't talk to them for a couple of days... 

Do you know what the danger to all of this is?  One day, every few years you have a vomit at the mouth day.  Along the road you have held it in just one too many times.  Your sighs are becoming more like breathing techniques, and you have isolated everyone.  And one fatal day, it just happens.

You blow up.

Yep, that happened to me today.

Usually there are regular triggers that cause these.  For some it could be financial issues.  For others it could be work, or children.  And in some rare cases it could be irritating little brothers that cannot for the life of them get their act together. 

Can you guess what my trigger is?

There is also someone who usually takes the brunt of the blow up.  In many cases it is the significant other.  Yet,  maybe it is a best friend.  And in other more unlikely scenarios it could be the irritating little brother that, FOR THE LOVE OF GOD, cannot get his life straight.

Yep, bad day to mess with Sis.

My more rational, intellectual brother says that I am the insane one because I keep expecting different results.  When the same thing keeps happening over and over and over again yet I keep getting angrier and angrier and angrier, then really I am the fool.  I agree.  No doubt about it, I am the true definition of MORON.

I will spare the details of what happened today or what he does that sends me off my rocker. I love my baby brother very much and for that I will protect him.  But years of my being passive aggressive and silent did not serve him well today. 

The topper of my day was the text I received from his landlord today, of whom I have never met or shared a conversation /text with before.  It read:" Your brother lives with me and my husband.  You have the wrong impression of him and it is killing him."
My response was as follows..."I have known and loved my brother for 37 years.  I don't have impressions, I have truths... unless an emergency, do not contact me again."

THE WHOLE TIME IT WAS JUST THAT I HAD THE WRONG IMPRESSION.  MAN, THAT WAS SIMPLE...

As I reread, and realize that this whole entry is a case of vomiting at the mouth, cut me some slack.  It only happens every few years...

What a Wonderful World..

I am celebrating 13 years with Brock today.  On our first anniversary we went to eat at a fine french restaurant  in Charlotte.  We lavished each other with gifts and ate the last piece of our wedding cake that was thawed out from the night before.

Yesterday Fletcher reminded me that today was our anniversary, and asked what we were going to do.  I answered simply by saying "What we love to do most, watching y'all play baseball."  He had a fit, exclaiming "Mom!  You watch all of our games.  Go out with Dad, I want you to!"   "Fletcher", I replied, "there is no place your father and I would rather be than cheering you on.  You are a reminder to us of how amazing our 13 years have been together, and I would not miss it for the world."

It is true.  No gifts are needed.  Not even a card.  All I wanted was Brock, settled in next to me at the ballpark, cheering the boys on. With my peanuts and coke. What a gift.

************

16 years ago I was sitting at the receptionist desk at the new office when two men came around the corner to get on the elevator.  I had met Bill, one of the men, but not the other.  The other man put his arm around Bill, looked at me with a mischievous grin and asked , " If stranded on a deserted island which one of us would you choose to be with?"  As I turned bright red and was without an answer, the bell rang, the elevator opened and the two men got on.  Within ten minutes they were back up again, this time with introductions...  " Hi, I am Brock.  Welcome!"

From that moment on, all I wanted was Brock, settled in next to me, making me laugh. 

I am a shy, sometimes insecure, unorganized mess.  He is outgoing, confident, humorous and methodical.  I drive him nuts. But we are a perfect mesh. The common ground that brings us so close together is our passion.  We are passionate about life....  Our relationship with God, the children and each other.  It is that passion that makes sitting on the ball field, that could be interpreted as boring to others, an incredibly amazing night.

As in every marriage, there have been battles that we have had to fight, and thankfully conquer.  But at the end of the day I still feel like the luckiest girl in the world. I am saying good night to my best friend, usually laughing at one of his antics. I sink into sleep thanking God for his amazing gifts to me, which includes that day in the office when I was left speechless.

If we couldnt laugh we would all go insane...

It usually takes the beginning of summer to crank up his tunes, but once I do, I am engulfed in the story of my life.  Folks, I am a Parrothead. I have been since first time I heard Jimmy Buffett, probably the second grade.  My older brother , David, had all his vinyls and the words spilled loudly out of his room and put smiles on the faces of all the family.  It was not long before all 6 us were whistling the tunes of Son of a Son of a Sailor throughout the house.  His words oozed sunshine and sand, love and heartbreak, and the stories of peoples lives that made you want to meet them. 

For those who don't know me, life in the Fletcher household was not often oozing with the happiness that sunshine and sand makes you feel.  Oddly, Jimmy Buffett brought us closer.  On long trips we would blare him in the car, making a game out of his ballads...Like... Who could list all the items he liked on his cheeseburger from "Cheeseburger in Paradise", or the "stuff" in "This Hotel Room".We also loved to see who could recite "God's own Drunk" verbatim.

He was the first concert I went to with David chaperoning me and my cousin Kara.  I remember listening to the words of Margaritaville, and wondering what in the world they were and why you would need a shaker of salt. I went to his summer concert every summer after that , usually surrounded by my buddies. Sadly, time took a hold of me and I quickly found out what Margaritas were.  My senior year, in grand style getting ready for the concert, I decided to have a couple of those great drinks..  While walking into the concert I was approached by a policeman , escorted off he premises and thrown in jail for public display of drunkenness.  I was really too inebriated to remember the experience (except for the many songs we sang loudly in the cell) but I do know it was a humiliating one.  I had some great companions that forfeited the concert and raised up enough money to bail me out, around 1am.  The next day, I begged my brother Richard not to tell my father.  He found great satisfaction in holding that over my head all summer long, and every night at dinner sang"Swing Low, Sweet Chariot", a song that symbolized wanting to be free from bondage and was often sung by inmates.   Although Dad sometimes asked why he was singing that song, to Richards loyal credit, he never did  tell him- I did finally tell him, years later.

Jimmy Buffett weaved his way into our family life regularly. Our beloved Labrador's were named after him.  My Chocolate lab was named Buffett and my black lab was named "Spooner", the name of an old hound dog in one of his songs.  Through the years, David continued to love him.  His senior year he used a family favorite, "He Went to Paris" as his yearbook quote.

        " He went to Paris, looking for answers to questions that bothered him so.
         He was impressive, young and aggressive, saving the world on his own.
         But the warm summer breezes and French wine and cheeses, 
         put his ambition at bay
         And the summers and winters, scattered like splinters,
         And four or five years slipped away..."

David graduated from UVa shortly after my mom's death and proceeded to head to France as the gentleman did in the song.  He often sent me postcards in college with quotes from Jimmy Buffett on them, such as "If we couldn't laugh we would all go insane" .  My favorites was, "The weather is here, I wish you were beautiful".  That was all he wrote on the card, and I saved it to this day. It still makes me laugh.

When I met Brock he was not a fan.  He associated his radio hits for what he sang and was not all too impressed with "Fins" and "Volcano".  But a transformation was made and he has been known to play some of his songs over and over again. On summer nights we have danced under the Magnolia Trees to "Stars fell on Alabama"

       "I never planned in my imagination, a situation, so heavenly.
        A fairyland, that no one else can enter, and in the center,
        just you and me, dear.
        My heart beats like a hammer, my arms wrapped round you tight,
        and stars fell on Alabama last night..."

When David died several years ago we found it only appropriate to have the song "He went to Paris" played at his service.  And I ended my Eulogy with a quote from that song that seemed perfectly fitting.

         "Some of it's magic, some of it's tragic
          But he had a great life all the way"

With the boys I am afraid that the radio station of choice is 20 on 20 XM.  We are often cruising down the street with the radio blaring to Lady Gaga, Kanye West or Eminem.  But I have managed to intertwine a little Jimmy in there and find great satisfaction when I hear them arguing about which Jimmy Buffett song is their favorite.  Oh, they would make my family proud!

I am a long way away from the girl arrested at the concert 23 years ago. And though I can laugh and enjoy songs such as "My head hurts, my feet stink and I don't love Jesus"  his songs mean more to me than parties and hangovers.  His songs tell my life story, full of mishaps and heartaches, tragedies and laughter.  His words keep me connected to people who have long left this "big round ball". In the short time we were given, he brought my family together, and that is a gift that will forever be appreciated.                    

a prayer for my boys... inspired by Tina Fey

Dear God,

I have always been told that I should approach you in prayer with everything.  During the day I am in constant chatter with you to help soothe my heart, to guide me in difficult decisions,or to pray for those on the prayer list.  I realized the other day that I seldom asked you for specific things.  There are really very few things that I specifically want... Okay I take that back, if I am honest with myself, there are A LOT of wants. Mostly, they pertain to the boys. If you will, be patient with me, and don't roll your eyes at some of my requests.  I am just a mom who wants the best for her children.

To begin with, I pray that they don't kill each other.  I know that they would never do this intentionally, but  I turn it over to you that one of them won't completely implode and in a weak moment just pummel the other until it is too late.  If  one should implode, I pray that the 3rd one has the wisdom to call interference instead of cheering the temporarily insane one on.

Please instill in them the basic cordials of lifting up the toilet seat then putting it back down.  And to go even further than that,how about working  on their aim as well?  I personally can deal with the absolute disgust of sitting on a previously used Himan boy toilet...  but my unexpected house guest? Really?  I guess I should throw a prayer in for those guest that stop by and I have not cleaned the bathroom that day-  I pray that they will find it in their heart to forgive me...

God, no tattoos please. I don't judge people with them, but I would really prefer that my children do not have them. Whenever asked why I feel the way I do, I simply say that when they are looking at their 80 year old wrinkled body and there are droopy tats, there will be regrets.  I don't care if the tattoo they want reads "I LOVE MOM".  None whatsoever.

You thought it would be wise to give me all boys, and I respect that. I have often thought that how great it will be to have a daughter in law and possibly a granddaughter.  But can we wait for that?  They don't need girlfriends anytime soon, until maybe 18?  There is a town in Massachusetts that is offering condoms to children in ELEMENTARY school.  I trust that the town is educated enough to have a reason for this and it is simple...  There are elementary children who are sexually active.  As much as that makes me want to vomit, it is a truth.  I just am asking you God, to not have MY BOYS interested in girls until a later date.  I know that Fletcher is already girl crazy, so can you work on him first?

I would NEVER ask you to do my job,  but it would be nice if other than my nagging voice they hear when I am telling them to brush their teeth, clean their rooms, don't play xbox for too long, put their book bags and shoes where they belong, eat their vegetables, do their homework, STOP BICKERING, use their manners, make wise decisions, when I say NOW, I mean right then, not "in a minute", be respectful, anytime, all the time- it would be awesome if they could hear your soothing voice as well.

And God?  I would never ask that you give my boys a struggle free life... Struggles bring on character and hope which leads to a life dedicated to you.  I just pray that they find happiness and the wisdom to know that you are with them every step of the way.


Proverbs 13:10


Pride only breeds quarrels, but wisdom is found in those who take advice.