Its June

Alright. It's June. My birthday month. Let the celebration (and presents) begin!! I don't actually remember how old I am. I've lied about it for some years now. My closest guess is 43. Hmmm. When did that happen? My mother was a GRANDMOTHER when she was my age! No thanks. Not ready for that just yet! Lets see. Since my last post there have been a few developments. My youngest sister and her husband(whose name is also Chris...isn't that fun?) lost the entire downstairs of their home in the Nashville flood. This includes, but is not limited to: both cars, Melissa's art studio (which is her job), Chris' musical instruments and equipment (of which he had A LOT), their computer, which housed all their photographs, including wedding pictures,vacation pictures, pictures of me...(haha)and on and on and on. It was a terrifying experience for Melissa. Chris was out of town,(because as Im sure you've noticed, the Simms girls just HAVE to wait until their husbands are out of town to have an emergency) Apparently, it had begun raining...a lot and the flood water came about 50 feet from her house on Friday, but receeded overnight when it stopped raining so hard. The following day it came that close again, but Melissa thought, It CANT rain more than it did yesterday and it didn't come all the way up here, so it'll be ok. She went upstairs and took a nap (because what else is there to do on a rainy Saturday!!) When she awoke, the water was 20 feet from the house, and it was still rising. She hurried to try and get the "important stuff" to higher ground...the computer, some paperwork, Chris' drum set..but she only took most of it to the landing on the stairs(which is about 8' up) because she was by herself and in a hurry and thought that surely 8 feet would be safe!! When she ran out of time, she put the cat in the carrier and leashed her two doggys just as the water was buckling the garage door. She fled to the neighbor's house, whom she had never met, but lived on a hill behind her. She said trying to climb that hill with a cat carrier and two dogs in the pouring rain and practically a river running down the hill as she climbed up was terrifying. When she was almost there, her neighbors heard the dogs barking and came to her rescue, helping her the rest of the way up the hill and taking care of her for 2-3 days and being enormous help to them when they were able to return and clean up what they could and demolish the rest. Of course, as is the case in most of the flood victims here, they didn't have flood insurance because they don't live in a flood plain...not even a 100 year flood plain. Their car insurance covered the cars and they qualified for a FEMA grant, but that doesn't come near covering the expense of rebuilding. Your prayers are welcomed, as this isn't on the news anymore, but the people here are most definately going to be dealing with this for some time to come. Its the little things that seem to put my sister over the edge. (The three of us are a lot alike. We can handle the big stuff, but the little stuff drives us nuts!!) Melissa called me a couple of weeks ago and was frantic. "Thank God you answered! I am about to have a nervous breakdown" Calm down. What's wrong? "I am sick of this. I just want my life back! I just reached in the washer to pull out a rolled up sock and it was a dead MOUSE!!! I PICKED IT UP!!!! WE HAVE TO GET WALLS SOON!!!!" I tried to be supportive. I remembered pulling a dehydrated froggy from my dryer once when Warner had left him in his jeans pocket, and this was surely worse, because at least the froggy wasn't mushy. I remembered having seen a mouse earlier in the day and going to bed that night, walking down the hall in the dark I stepped on one of the boys rolled up socks and KNEW it was the mouse and made to the bed in one giant jump (from the hall)..but this was surely worse, because it really was just a rolled up sock. I recalled going into my grandfather's shed to get my grandmother's old Singer pedal sewing machine for my mother, reaching to pick it up and wondering how my grandfather had gotten the cord to lay that way, all coiled neatly inside, and the cord moved and in less than a second realizing that pedal machines don't have cords and it was a snake. I remembered how HORRIFIED I was after all those incidents. I really wanted to be supportive...but all I could do was laugh and say, "Oh honey, I'm so sorry" Compassion...not my Spiritual gift I guess. On a lighter note, Tanner graduated High School in May and plans to attend Motlow College in the fall, then will transfer to MTSU. He wants to be a high school teacher...you know, if the whole pro skateboarder gig doesn't pan out. AnnaLyn's spinal tap has FINALLY been rescheduled..third times the charm, right? It's set for July 19. Praying for answers Everyone else is doing well. No big plans for the summer. Hunter is planning to come home in September for a visit, though it was originally August, and he keeps moving it back. In July he will have been in the USAF for a year already. good grief. Not too much else to report from around here. Soooo...until next time...HAPPY BIRTHDAY TO ME....