Category Archives: Travel

A poem I wrote at the children’s hospital

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I wrote this while we were in the waiting room at Children’s National Hospital earlier this month. I don’t know if the quality is that great, since I wrote it and didn’t really edit it at all, but I felt like I had to try to capture the space, and the mood, and the feel. It was one of the most poetic places I have been in a while. The poem doesn’t seem to follow many writing rules, but it was what was happening around me. I wrote this in the notes app since I didn’t have any paper.

Children’s hospital

Forgotten crayon on the floor
Yellow, alone on polished cold tile
Mickey and Minnie frolic on tv
Above a woman with her head in her hands
Children’s cries. Cranky. Tired.
Kids’ waiting room at the surgical center.

Bright painted walls. Blue, green, purple
Elmo, Moana, colored carefully or scribbled
Equally displayed, Scotch taped to doors
Edges flap as blue paper cap wearers
Rush through. Hurry, hurry
Kids’ waiting room at the surgical center.

Quarts of hand sanitizer
Join tinsel and gnomes by the silvery tree
No eating
No drinking
Kids hunger and thirst, parents must too
“Take it out,” warns reception. Offenders comply.
Kids’ waiting room at the surgical center.

Filling out forms, swiping through phones
Texting ‘no news yet’ to loved ones at home
An empty car seat at the feet of Grandma
Waiting for good news
And a small one back in her arms
Mom with tan backpack called out with her teen
Kids’ waiting room at the surgical center.

Dad grips white bag of somebody’s clothes
Twists the band strapped to his wrist,
Bar code printed by somebody’s name
Mama brings in a very small wheelchair
Warm jacket and marble game tucked
In the seat
Speaks on her phone in an unknown language
Smiles and laughs, then her voice goes soft
Kids’ waiting room at the surgical center.

My child hungers. She closes her book
And now scrolls cat memes, sharing a curated handful with me
“I think that’s A.I.” I say, and
She doesn’t mind. Her leg bounces lightly
Betraying her calm cool classy demeanor
Our pager lies silent, useless, as we shift in hard seats
Kids’ waiting room at the surgical center.

A beautiful moment in nature from the year

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Well, well, well, “December Journaling if you feel like you haven’t achieved anything this year,” we have made it to Day 29: A beautiful moment in nature from the year. And today is Dec. 30, so I’m practically caught up. I think I’ll save the last two for tomorrow though. I’m enjoying writing at the library but I intended to work on my novel. I always tell myself that blogging is my time to warm up, but it’s really a delay tactic. Real writing is HARD, ya’ll.

So my first thought was Spring Break, when we went to Roman Nose State Park and took a super long hiking trip. I should have put that, and Krislyn and my walks in Oklahoma City on my accomplishments in an earlier post but no turning back!

Anyway, Roman Nose. It was Ben and me, Krislyn, Lenora, Belinda, and Sarah. Krislyn and Belinda were super in shape and ready to hike the 10 miles or whatever we did. Sarah was the worst off. The rest of us lay somewhere in the middle. We were just getting a geocache. But wow, what a long, not well marked trail it was – especially since the normal trail was closed for construction, with nary a sign with that information until you were upon the closed area!

We also had a beautiful moment in nature at Gatlinburg, when we were outside the public library. It was just so very pretty.

This last one was from one of Krislyn and my walks (or maybe there was just one walk, that’s a little blurry now). Anyway, there was a lot of not pretty stuff on that walk, but there were a few pretty moments. Krislyn probably took this picture.

A memorable journey from the year

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“December Journaling if You Think You Haven’t Achieved Much This Year” Day 28: A memorable journey from the year.

One thing that was memorable was Belinda’s final dance nationals competition. I got credit cards to pay for it, which I know wasn’t the smartest thing to do, but I was unable to even consider not letting her do it. Getting to see her dance like that one last time was so wonderful. It was also really special to have that week where it was just Ben, Belinda, and me. We didn’t go too crazy with spending but we ate out a few times and I bought passes to go to Ripley’s Believe It Or Not, the Ripley’s Aquarium, and some Ripley’s mini golf thing. I really just did it for the aquarium, but the other things were interesting too. And Belinda loves mini golf. We got to go with her duet tap partner and her family. It was fun hanging out with them. We also went to the library, rode the free trolley a LOT, explored, went through the national forest, saw a lot of cool things. And I got to spend time with just Belinda. I am so glad we had that time before she went to college in August. I can treasure that forever. One thing I did not do is post any pictures onto facebook about it, because I was waiting for the dance media to go along with the post, but now I can’t even remember what I’ve done with that now. I’m sure it’s all saved on the hard drive, but I would like to do a post about it, so it will be in my memories each year. I’m thinking I will do it on the one year anniversary. Along with Bennett and Mia’s wedding. One year anniversary isn’t even a month away for that, so I need to gather my photos now!

Another memorable journey was Karlene and my journey to support Sarah’s first year in marching band. We went to almost all the football games (Northwestern Parents Day got in the way one time, and the haunted house at the theater was the other) and not only did we get to see her perform, we also got to watch the Tigers have an undefeated season and win state! Sarah had never been to a Tuttle football game before this. What a way to start! Not only that, we got to see the band perform their routine at competitions and I really enjoyed that. Sarah was always so happy to see me there. Made my heart joyful! And Karlene and I traveled to out of town games, had dinner together at interesting places, and stayed the night in a very odd motel. We spent the night because the next day we all buried Sarah’s stepmom’s ashes, and that was quite a journey in itself. And it’s not quite over, since she doesn’t have a headstone yet. That can be a 2026 project.

And it’s not really traveling, but this journey through being “poverty people” (a Righteous Gemstones reference that I adopted) was extremely memorable. Food pantries, medical issues, financial assistance, cutoff notices, watching our bank account dip below zero once again, pushing pride to the side to accept help from other people, and still knowing that God has held all of us through all of it has been so good for our family. I would have rather learned these lessons without being so strapped, but I know that if this is the path God chose it was the right one for us! I am so thankful for everything that has happened this year.

Last Day in DC

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It’s eleven days after we left DC, but I still wanted to post that last day on here.

We woke up and packed up all our stuff. Then we went downtstairs and the front desk checked it so we didn’t have to haul it around all day. From there we ubered to the Rayburn building at the Capitol. We had an appointment to meet Tom Cole at 12:30. We got there early and that gave us more time to figure out where things were. We had a nice sit down meeting with him. We mostly talked about Belinda and about things in Oklahoma – just a social visit, really. It was nice meeting him. He seemed impressed with Belinda, and said if she was interested in being an intern in the future, she could apply with his staff.

He gave us each one of his coins, which is like coins people in the armed services carry. For some sort of bar thing. This was Belinda’s second coin like this; she has another from when she was very little and Jim Inhofe gave her one. She did not realize this because when she got old enough to try to play with it I hid it from her.

After that we walked around a bit. Belinda got a headache so we walked to a CVS. Then we got an uber again and went back to the hotel to get our stuff, then went to the airport. We volunteered to check our bags because the flight was so full, which we hadn’t done before. It was kind of a drag getting them afterward, but it was also nice not hauling them around right after the flight.

Belinda was on her laptop the whole time, writing. I don’t remember what I did. Mostly concentrated on keeping my elbow away from my neighbor’s elbow.

Lenora and Ben R. came and picked us up and the airport and that was very nice. They were hungry and so were we so we went to KFC, then home!

Belinda said the dilation didn’t help very much this time. Bummer.

Library of Congress

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We got to a slow start this morning because Belinda wasn’t feeling well. But around 11:30 am, she started feeling more up to going out and seeing some things. We talked about uber or metro, and then ended up walking the 2.2 miles from our hotel to the Library of Congress. Belinda wanted to see the books!

We went to the Jefferson building, and you have to sign up to get inside. So I got online, signed us up, and inside we went! There were several displays and galleries inside, and the artwork on the ceilings was beautiful.There was also a big beautiful Christmas tree. But Belinda said, “Where are the books?” At one point, we went to an area where you could look out over the area where the books were. There were librarians and a few patrons in there. Hmm. Then we saw a sign that said that you had to apply for a library card to use the reading rooms, and it had to be done in advance. So we scanned the QR code, filled out the quick forms, and found someone who could tell us what to do next! Nice that Belinda is 18 now so we didn’t need to print out anything for me to sign for her to have her own card. The lady made sure that we had already signed up (we didn’t mention it was five minutes before) and then sent us to check our coats and bags, then down three long hallways to an elevator. We rode that that, then asked the man there what to do, and he sent us to another room where we showed our drivers’ licenses and they took our photos and gave us our new library cards! They expire in 2027, which is a good thing since after our walk my hair looked like I’d stuck a fork in a toaster. But how cool is that!

We went in to the reading room at the Jefferson building. You can’t take any books off the shelves yourself – you have to look up what you want and tell a librarian and they get it for you and you read it there. They have a lot of genealogy things there and I have wanted to see Library of Congress materials before but never knew how to do it. Now I know!

Belinda wanted to see the law library collection most of all, so we left the Jefferson building and went across the street to the Madison building. This building was much more quiet and there were no tourists (except us, ha ha). We figured out the layout, checked our coats and bags, and went and found the law library. Everybody was so nice there! The librarian helped Belinda find the section on Space Law that she asked about, and the bookshelves were all pushed up together but they came apart with a crank on the side (it was seriously the coolest thing ever) and then she left us to that section – you can take books off the shelves yourself in the law library. Belinda got a Space Law book and I selected one on Maritime Law – the law of the sea (for all you Arrested Development fans out there). We found a cozy place to read and it was nice and quiet, with other patrons browsing, researching, and readings.

After looking at entries on shipwrecks and piracy, I became weary of maritime law and picked up the Library of Congress magazine on the table in front of us, and that was really interesting. I discovered that there used to be a tunnel between the Jefferson Building and Congress, so the Congressmen could have quick access to the library holdings, but it was closed when the Capitol Visitor Center was built. And that got me thinking about National Treasure and 39 Clues type of things, and how much I would like to read a book that included some sort of exciting secret with that tunnel. I guess I should write it!

We never ate lunch, so we went to a place called Good Stuff Eatery and had chicken strips and fries. We sat up on the second floor and the place was empty except for us and we looked out the windows and all the people coming and going. I have been guiltily getting chocolate milkshakes lately from McDonalds (I had no idea they had gotten so good!) and so I really wanted a chocolate milkshake, but they also had a toasted marshmallow flavor and so I got that. It was okay, but I think the chocolate shakes from McDonalds are better! I guess I like all those fake ingredients, I don’t know.

At home, the family was having a funeral for Nutmeg. Belinda and I were sorry that we couldn’t be there, but glad because we did love on her while she was with us. Sweet kitty.

Anyway, we took an uber back because it was getting dark and we were tired. The man who drove us was from Ethiopia. We haven’t been making small talk with any of our drivers but this man took the lead and so we chatted with him. It was interesting learning about his life and we told him a little about Oklahoma. He was surprised to learn that no one really honks their horn much in Oklahoma, and that we felt personally victimized when people honk their horn around us. He said there’s so much honking in DC that it’s like music to him, ha ha! We had to pretend to hear him sometimes over the noise but we did okay.

Now we are back in the room and hanging out. It’s nice to just be with Belinda.

Washington DC

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Yesterday Belinda and I flew into Washington DC and today we went to Children’s National for her procedure. It was an endoscopy with possible dilation (they did that). We are here because she still goes to the pediatric surgeons that performed the POEM procedure for her achalasia.

So yesterday we got to the room and didn’t want to do anything. After a while we bundled up and walked to Domino’s and got pizza. Belinda did not wear gloves and her hands were so cold! I considered giving her mine and then I did not.

Beautiful view from our hotel room

This morning we called an uber and got to the hospital early. We went to see the chapel and the Healing Garden, which were underwhelming. But I’m glad I saw them because I had wanted to see them for a long time. There is allegedly something on the roof as well, but I wasn’t brave enough to try to find that.

We were in the waiting room for a really long time. I wrote a poem that didn’t rhyme, after an abandoned yellow crayon under a chair piqued my interest.

Waiting

Anyway, I made a bunch of notes of the day, mostly so I can keep the facts straight and remember which doctors and nurses worked on her (which came in very handy today with the phlebotomist).

Belinda told Dr. Kane that she had no symptoms and every thing was good and I told her to really tell him, and then she talked about how things were getting stuck sometimes and how she was having spasms. He told her that stress can make achalasia worse. So when she was unable to swallow in the cafeteria at school, that made her have to regurgitate, which made her even more anxious the next time. I am very thankful the school released her from the meal plan. I cook and freeze meals for her, and she makes herself an egg for breakfast every day.

Anyway. The nurse came and talked and talked. She was very nice but it was a long chat! We were both getting tired. Then the anesthesiologist came in, and he checked out Belinda’s veins and then she said not my hands, please, and he said what about your foot and she said sure and I DIED but he got it onthe first try and Belinda wasn’t even bothered. I felt nauseated but made it.

Shot in the foot time

Dr. Petrosyan came by to say hi. He and Dr. Kane are both her surgeons, and they performed the POEM together. Her last scope and dilation was also with them. Today Dr. Petrosyan was the surgeon who was doing all the emergency surgeries. We talked about languages a little with him. He knows Armenian, Russian, and English. He’s very smart!

So it took a bit longer because the consent form didn’t include the dilation, and so the nurse couldn’t let her go to the OR until that was fixed. So Dr. Kane fixed it, Belinda signed it. She was glad to get to sign it twice because she got her digital signature to look better the second time.

Dr. Kane said everything looked great and the dilation they did was very small, but they of course did it while they were in there. It looks like it went from 9.4 mm at the narrowest point to 12.0 mm. So that will be nice for her.

We got an uber back to the room and I had thought we might go to the Botanical Gardens this evening but she just wanted to order food and rest. So we got fettuccine and had it delivered. I’ve never done that before and the cost was horrible. Too cold to walk tonight though, and getting an uber would have been more expensive.

Tomorrow we are supposed to meet a senator in the morning. Then the art museum or library of congress or natural history. I’m letting her lead.

Catch-up

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Well I got very behind on my December journaling. But now Belinda has had her procedure, we are up on the ninth floor of the Washington Plaza Hotel, and I thought I could at least attempt to do this thing again. My last day to do the journaling calendar was Dec. 10 and now it’s Dec. 16, which honestly isn’t as bad as I thought it was. So.

Day 11: List as many places you went as you can think of, no matter how close or far.

I actually went quite a few places this year. Thinking, however is generally more difficult. I remember going to Branson with Krislyn, Karlene, and Belinda because Krislyn was invited to come dance there. That was very cool. Most of the family went to Milburn to have a remembrance service for Sarah’s stepmom. And Karlene and I went to several away football games to support Sarah in the band. Then to Alva several times, and now Belinda and I are in Washington DC. I’m going to go back and look at my facebook and see what I forgot.

A fire truck is going through traffic circle that our room overlooks and it was so loud that I got up and looked!

Anyway, back to the travels. In January, it wasn’t really a trip but I did go to Yukon several times as Bennett got married to Mia. It wasn’t a trip but it was so very important!

In March we went to Roman Nose State Park in Watonga and hiked and geocached. It was just one day during spring break but was horrible and also fun.

Alva in April. Krislyn and I also walked 10.4 miles in one day on the OKC trails. That definitely counts as somewhere I went.

We went to Lindsay quite a bit, which felt like traveling because it was a long way. Belinda’s co-op met there and I might have opted out if it hadn’t been senior year. I’m glad we did it! I love all those people. Also, I got to visit that non-grocery-store-Walmart and that was nice and nostalgic.

June was when we went to Branson! We also went to see David at Sight and Sound Theatre and played dinosaur mini golf. It was an extremely good time.

Ben and Belinda and I went to Gatlinburg, Tenn. in June for Belinda’s last dance nationals. It was difficult and we used credit cards to make it happen, but I couldn’t bear to not let Belinda do her last year of competition. We did make a lot of good memories. We walked a lot, went to Ripley’s Believe it or Not and the Ripley Aquarium, played mini golf, visited the Great Smoky Mountains State Park, went to the Gatlinburg library, and did other fun stuff along with dancing. That was a really good time. I never posted on facebook about it because I was waiting for the professional pics and when they came I still didn’t get around to doing it. Maybe I’ll make a post soon about it. I really should.

We were back in Alva a few times in August, to get Belinda’s adjustable bed moved in properly and also to drop her off at the dorms.

Karlene and I started going to away games for football in September. We went to Noble and ate at Kendall’s for the first time. We also went to Deer Creek and Yukon to watch band competitions and we went to Alva again, for Family Day.

October was Milburn, and we also went to band competitions in Edmond and Elgin. Karlene and I went to football games in Tecumseh and also Madill (we stayed the night there at a weird motel). Homecoming at Alva was also in October. We came in second in the medallion hunt!

And now it’s December and Belinda and I are in DC. We are here for two more nights and we are happy to be here but also really want to be at home.

So that was very very long to be part one of FIVE in a catch-up post. And I also wanted to write about how the procedure went today. Maybe I’ll just do one more.

Day Twelve: Milestones, traditions, and events you celebrated.

Bennett and Mia got married.
Belinda graduated from high school.
Belinda started college.
Lenora and Ben had their one-year anniversary.
Sarah came to live with us!
We celebrated Easter and Thanksgiving and Christmas, and I’m sure a few others, as we always tend to do.
And the Tuttle Tigers won state and Karlene and I were there screaming in the stands and freezing our hind ends off! That was cool.

Day Thirteen: People you had dinner with.

Well, that’s odd. Ben. Lenora. Ben R. Bennett. Mia. Belinda. Sarah. Mom. Karlene. Krislyn. Kevin. Gary. Will. I know I ate lunch with Rachel once. We hosted the wedding rehearsal dinner with pizza and big salads, so we did eat with everyone who was in the wedding party. We had Adam over for lunch once. I think the church lunch thing fizzled out sometime in the spring, but before that we had many of the kids’ friends. Those were fun times.

Day Fourteen: Recount the first three memories that come into your head from the year.

Hmm. Branson. Bennett and Mia’s wedding. Belinda going to college.

Day Fifteen: Describe an ordinary day from the year and what about it you enjoyed.

I’m not sure what days I remember that were ordinary. I tend to remember the things that are memorable. And what makes a day extraordinary? One day the kids came over and worked in the yard and I wasn’t there and when I came back the sidewalk was really edged and when the sidewalk is edged it makes me feel super happy. I think about that every time I walk up the sidewalk and I feel very loved.

Day Sixteen: Identify five of your favorite photos from the year on your phone.

That is a lot of photos. I take a lot of photos. I guess I will look at the ones I tagged favorites.

That didn’t take as long as I thought it would.

One week to go

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A week from today will be Monday, Dec. 15, and Belinda and I will be traveling to Washington DC again for another follow up procedure. Her pediatric surgeons will be doing an endoscopy and will probably also do some dilation or other tweaks to the surgery, based on what they see in there. That will be on Dec. 16.

I am looking forward to seeing Dr. Kane and Dr. Petrosyan again. They are both so kind and they care so much about their patients. It is amazing to see how committed they are to helping kids with pediatric achalasia! I am glad that even though she is 18 now, she can continue to be their patient for the time being. This is the very best course of action to prevent end-stage achalasia and esophagectomy.

The spellchecker on wordpress has alerted me that esophagectomy may not be a word, but unfortunately it is. Anyway, that is the surgical removal of the esophagus. If things go as we’re hoping and praying, she will never get to that point. Please keep this in your prayers!

The surgery was originally planned for Dec. 17, but they needed to change it because of some kind of work being done on their surgical suites. So instead of us leaving on the 16th, we’ll leave on the 15th. The worst part about that is that we will be missing Sarah’s first band concert, and I really wanted to be there to support her. I’m going to try to facetime, but of course that isn’t the same. I’ve asked the rest of the family to do their best to go, which I think will make up somewhat for me not being there, but she does really want me to be at her activities first and foremost and I want to do that for her! I know she will understand that this couldn’t be fixed, but I hope that she doesn’t have a part of her mind telling her that I chose Belinda over her. It’s difficult because she has had so much loss and disappointments in her life. I just literally got an idea while typing this – maybe the band director would let me sit in class the day before, so I could listen to it live that way! I think he might. I’ll ask him about that (if Sarah wants me to – she also gets embarrassed at being singled out).

So now we have seven days to pack and plan for our absence. I’m always frightened of flying but I know that it’s in God’s hands and I don’t really have control over anything anyway. If it is His will, we will be back home on the 18th, ready for one for weekend of Tuttle Christmas Carol performances and then Christmas!

The specific places you frequented this year and memories

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I guess I forgot to do “December Journaling If You Feel Like You Haven’t Achieved Much This Year” again yesterday, so I’ll post date this one too. I don’t know what happened – yesterday was busy but not any more than usual, as far as I can remember. Anyway.

The specific places you frequented this year and memories.

Well, I know we went to Alva quite a bit this year. I guess some of those, like the Miss Cinderella pageant for Belinda and the Ranger Preview she went to were actually last year. This year I know we went there several times, but I don’t remember all the details. We went to the administration building to sign some papers at the financial aid office. That might have been during the Spring Showcase, but I didn’t remember that Belinda went to that, since she went to Ranger Preview and it’s basically the same thing twice. We also went to Northwestern when she got her bed installed in her room and then a couple of times to move things. Then we were there for Family Day and for Homecoming, and all of those had nice memories. Family Day had a scavenger hunt that was not like the homecoming one, alas, but we did it anyway and also had Taco Village and went to the little luncheon they had (even though we’d already had TV so we didn’t have room for chicken alfredo). It was still nice visiting. And then for homecoming we got to see the homecoming sign that Belinda did the lettering for, and we also did the big scavenger hunt and came in second by just minutes – but we had a fantastic time doing it! Sarah also got to tour the campus while we were there for Homecoming, and she thinks she might like to go there for college.

We also went to Gatlinburg over the summer, for Belinda’s last dance competition, and that was a really good time. The only thing I didn’t get done was posting photos because I was waiting for the nationals dance photos to post, and so I didn’t get those on fb because time got away from me. And now I’m trying to remember if I ever downloaded the nationals photos! I’ll add that to my to-do list to check on. I thought I would post those for the one year anniversary of the trip.

Same thing with Bennett and Mia’s wedding pics. I was waiting because I wanted to let them post the ones they wanted to post first, so I’d know which ones Mia liked best and could just follow her lead, but again, time got away from me. I am definitely posting those on their one-year anniversary (which again, I need to start planning asap because that is a lot of pics to look at)!

I spent more time than I would have thought at Mia’s family’s church, where the wedding was held. Her family has begun a theatre right at the church, and I’ve gone and seen Bennett and Mia and the rest of the family in several productions. And of course we’ve frequented our church a lot. And Fourth St. Theater.

I have also frequented Walmart but I don’t think I’m going to put any memories of that here, ha ha.

Slight change in plans

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I just got a call from Children’s National and something is changing in their operating rooms and they’d like to change Belinda’s procedure to the 16th. So I just sent emails to the flight charity and to NORD seeing if we change our flights and hotel reservation. I actually asked if we could just change things from Dec. 16-18 to Dec. 15-18. I figure the flight will not be an issue but I don’t know if NORD will just let us add a day like that. But it would be very nice to give Belinda an additional recuperation day before we fly back. So we’ll see what happens.