Well, he could AT LEAST moo - Nov 2010

Scene: Chick-Fil-A, Kids' Night

The giant cow comes walking around, mobbed by young kids. As the cow has his tail pulled, his hands shaken and high-fived, and is generally tortured by small children, I'm reminded again how very thankful I am to not have that job.

Lea:  Why doesn't the cow talk?

Me:    I'm not sure. [Unclear how much to share - I mean, I THINK she knows there's a person in there, right?]
Lea:  But there's a person in there. [Well, that solves THAT issue.]
Me:   Maybe they don't want the person in there to talk.

Lea:  Why not?

Me:  Because maybe they want other kids to think that it's a real cow. [Why CAN'T the cow talk? How the heck do I know? Why do they make the people at Chick-fil-A say "my pleasure" instead of "thank you?" Maybe it's company policy??]  

Lea:  [Pause.] Well...he could AT LEAST moo.

I wud not like ene uthr mom and dad - Nov 2010

It's been a long time since I've posted, apparently. How time flies.
My baby is now 5 1/2 (actually, 5 and 2/3, but who's counting)?

Every day that I look at her, I wonder and marvel at the person she is and the person she is still becoming. In a word, she's a cool little dude.
Yesterday her kindergarden class made Thanksgiving cards for their families. This was Lea's (spelling and all):

To Mom and Dad
I love you. You are the best. You play with me. We can play bas boll. Thak you for taking car ov me. Form Lea.
I wud not like ene uthr mom and dad.

(To Mom and Dad: I love you. You are the best. You play with me. We can play baseball. Thank you for taking care of me. From Lea. I would not like any other mom and dad.)I love that kid.

Philly - Pt. 4 - Sept 2009

Day 3: Finally.

Day 3. Redemption for Philly. Ever since I came into town, I’ve been waiting to get my hands on Reading Terminal. I passed by it in the cab on my way to the hotel, and thought, “Hey, I think I’d like to go there.” Unfortunately, it closes at 6:00 each day, and conference obligations have made it impossible to get over there. But today, we were on our own for lunch, and I marched on over.

Glory. Finally something that I can really, really like.

Reading Terminal is a bustling hub of activity. Food vendors of all sorts – bakeries, delis, cheese steaks, tons of butchers and seafood vendors with amazing looking goods, and fabulous looking produce at amazing prices. And tons and tons of people and energy. It was crowded, it was hard to move around, and it was great. I wandered for a while, taking it all in. I wished that I lived here so that I could pick up some spinach (so deeply green it was almost glowing), fresh apples, corn, tomatoes, fresh bread, and go back home to cook up something amazing. It also made me wish I ate meat. The deli sandwiches, piled high with thin slices of corned beef, turkey, ham, roast beef. The cheese steaks slapped down on the grill and chopped with metal spatulas before being piled into a hoagie roll. And it also made me wish, deeply, that I wasn’t recently diagnosed as being lactose intolerant. The cheeses made my mouth water. Sharp cheddars, creamy provolones, soft bries, and romanos and parmesans in shavings so thin that they melt in your mouth. If I could have grabbed a hunk of cheese and a piece of bread, I would have been a happy, happy woman.

The other great part was the incredible variety of people. Young, old, Black, White, Asian, Muslim, Amish, tourists, business types, looky-loos, serious shoppers – everyone was there, mingling together. They also had live music – two guitar players singing Cuban songs (one was, incongruously, a very white, non-Hispanic, older man while the other was appropriately authentic) and a piano player tucked into a little nook in a remote corner of the building.

I wish I could say that my meal lived up to the rest of my experience, but the fact of the matter is that I was overwhelmed by choices and trying to figure out what I could eat that would be vegetarian and non-dairy, or seafood that wasn’t fried. I settled on a Mediterranean deli where I ordered a falafel salad and discovered that these people wouldn’t know a falafel if it bit them on the ass. I can’t really describe what it was, but it seemed like they had taken hummus, thickened it up with flour, formed it into a ball, and baked it somehow until it became very dense…almost like a hummus dumpling, but not as soft. Very strange, and not particularly tasty. Also, they put yogurt dressing on it, unbeknownst to me until I saw it. At that point, I just decided to eat it, and can safely say that it was the final piece of evidence I needed that I am indeed lactose intolerant. However, I did attempt to redeem my experience by grabbing a gorgeous looking cinnamon raisin walnut cookie on the way out – haven’t tasted it yet, but it smells heavenly.

From there, I walked only a little bit, since Philly is still in the midst of a heat wave. However, I did manage to see the Court House, which was majestic. It stands proud, more than holding its own in the midst of the modern buildings that surround it. Beautiful carvings and architecture – just an impressive presence.

On my way back to the hotel, I passed by an unremarkable Macy’s, and then noticed the sign that it used to be the John Wanamaker’s. I remember Wanamaker’s from growing up – it was THE department store, even though we didn’t have one in our area. As I recall, my Uncle John worked there for a while as well – security maybe? For some reason, selling suits also pops into my head, but I could be making that up completely. At any rate, I consider Wanamaker’s a true Philly landmark.

Now I’m sitting in a quiet corner of the hotel, writing. A few more sessions and I’ll be on my way back to NC. I’m tired, but it’s been a good trip. I feel like I’ve learned a lot and I’ve been stimulated to think in new ways, make new connections, and challenge my existing perspective. Not bad. Plus, on this final day, Philly was able to redeem itself. 

Philly - Pt. 3 - Sep 2009

Day 2: It’s Not Always Sunny in Philadelphia – at least, I don’t think it is.

I didn’t actually step foot out of the hotel today. Up early for breakfast and the plenary session, lunch provided for us in the Exhibit Hall, more sessions, and then an invitation to join the conference sponsors for dinner in their suite.

The conference I’m at is being sponsored by the Institute for Family-Centered Care (IFCC). They’re a great group of folks who advocate for care that is safe, effective, responsive, and patient- and family-centered. Seems basic, but in our US medical system, it often doesn’t happen. Most of the individuals who work there have, at one point, experienced an adverse or sentinel medical event in their family – and for the majority of these individuals, it was with their children. I have talked to countless people in the past two days who watched their children die, and I can’t imagine what that would be like. For some, it was the result of a chronic or congenital condition. For others, it was the result of a medical error. The unifying theme is that they were able to turn loss into power. They used their grief as a motivating factor and have now dedicated their lives to helping patients, families, health care providers, hospital systems, medical groups, and health care leadership understand the role that patients and families deserve to play in their own care.

We (AIR, the company I work for) are partnering with IFCC on a new project that will attempt to provide guidance to health care institutions (hospitals, at this point) in linking patient safety and quality of care with patient- and family-centered care. Because our health care system in this country is so varied, fragmented, and complex, most of the efforts to improve outcomes in these domains are enacted and evaluated on an institution-by-institution basis. Not always a bad thing, but how do we gather lessons learned and formulate best practices in that environment? Hopefully, that’s what we’ll be learning and addressing. Another part of the project is helping patients and family members understand the roles they can and should play – and giving them the confidence and knowledge they need to perform those roles. It’s all well and good to say to parents whose child is in the NICU that they need to be informed, engaged, partners in their child’s care, but what does that mean to parents who aren’t even sure if they’re allowed to hold their baby?

At any rate, the folks from IFCC were gracious enough to invite me to their suite last night for a brought-in dinner. I went because part of my charge here is networking. And it’s not that I wasn’t looking forward to it – it’s just that, at the end of a long day, it’s difficult to put my game face on for these types of things. But, as with most things like this, once I got there, I really started to enjoy myself. I love talking to people, finding out where they’re coming from, what things have motivated them, and what circumstances have brought them to where they are. I also discovered that I have a lot more to say on this topic than I thought. My maternal and child health training and public health perspective prepare me well to enter in to these concentrations – and I’m starting to be able to make the linkages between the work I’ve done at AIR in the past, the academic training I’ve had, and the work I’m doing now. This kind of “making sense of my life” is immensely satisfying, as is the ability to contribute, rather than just listen to these types of conversations.

My day ended around 9:45, when the party started to break up. We had spent the past ½ hour looking out the expansive suite windows at an incredible electrical storm. Enormous flashes lit up the skyline, causing breaks in our conversation as people stopped to “oooh” and “aaahhhh.”

I tumbled into bed around 10:30 where my exhausted brain wouldn’t turn off. I think sleep came around 12:45, and I slept fitfully, which made my 6:45 wake-up a bit unpleasant. I used to be able to get by on very little sleep, but now need a good 7 or 8 hours to feel appropriately refreshed. Needless to say, I’m a little bleary eyed today (Wednesday) as I write this. But it was worth it.

Philly - Pt. 2 - Sep 2009

Day 1 in Philly: Where the f- is the Liberty Bell and why is Independence Hall so small?

·         I call Lea and Tad as I head out down Market Street. I really have forgotten how to be a city girl, because I’ve forgotten how difficult it is to have a conversation with buses, trolley cars, jackhammers, and people shouting as background noise. My conversation consists of a lot of, “What??” and “Mommy can’t hear you!”

·         I stop in the world’s most depressing Kmart to buy a pair of knee highs to hopefully make my torture device shoes more bearable tomorrow. I have to search for about 10 minutes before I find the only pair that’s not Queen sized – do only plus-size people wear knee highs in Philadelphia?

·         I continue down Market Street, which, I’m sad to say, is something of a dump. I mean, it’s not horrible, but it’s not great either. And where are all the restaurants? I’m hungry, and all I want is a nice little café. Or sandwich shop. Or even any place that will sell me food.

·         I walk and walk and walk, hoping to find something redeeming. At the same time, I’m becoming ever more aware of the change in my attitude since I was younger. When I went out to San Francisco after I graduated from Oberlin (to attend a conference), I walked all over the place by myself, regardless of whether it was day or night. I stayed in a hostel, talked to people at all hours of the night, and attended a dance party in the Union Square on the first night I was there. I walked to Chinatown and had several wonderful meals there by myself. I roamed and wandered without a care in the world (and got my wallet stolen in Haight-Ashbury, but that was due to my own negligence and, quite possibly, too much sangria). Now, here in Philly 13 years later, I want to finish my walk before it gets dark. I look cautiously at people from behind my sunglasses and don’t want to veer too far off the beaten path. Is it because I’m now older and wiser? Or just old?

·          Despite my wariness, I keep walking because there HAS to be something that’s going to make this walk worthwhile, right? Also, I can’t bear the thought of traveling all the way to Philly and not really experiencing it. If I never leave the hotel, I might as well have traveled to Chicago. Or Boston. Or, god forbid, Detroit.

·         I continue to walk, searching for something to grab my interest. Like maybe the Liberty Bell? Independence Hall? A Ben Franklin impersonator? Or even, do I dare hope, a restaurant??

·         I see some green space and big buildings. Looks promising – except that it’s just a Visitor’s Center, and I don’t want to read about the things I should be seeing, I just want to see them. Plus, it’s closed.

·         As I’m walking away from the Visitor’s Center, a clearly deluded (and potentially vision-impaired) man passes by, turns back, and says, “Hey there, beautiful.” I spend the next few minutes pondering how I feel about this. Do I feel objectified and degraded? (My Oberlin self wants to say “yes.”) Or do I just feel grateful that at 34, someone still notices? I decide I don’t want to think too hard about the answer to that question.

·         Look – up ahead! It’s a bird! It’s a plane! It’s an honest-to-goodness historical landmark!!!

·         Except when did Independence Hall get so small? I remember coming to Philadelphia when I was younger, and somehow it was nothing like the Philadelphia I’m experiencing now. I remember waterfronts, historic buildings, quaint buildings, a large, impressive Independence Hall. And the Liberty Bell. Now, Independence Hall looks dwarfed by the buildings around it. And it’s roped off – I can’t get in, because the only visible break in the ropes is clearly marked “EXIT” and is guarded by two security guards who look disinclined to break the rules for me. I suppose I could ask how to get in, but it’s getting late, and Independence Hall is so far not making me feel like it’s worth the effort. I do, however, walk around the other side (still no entrance) and look at the statue of Commodore Barry, the “father of the Navy.” He’s pointing at something. Commandingly. Could it be a restaurant?

·         It appears to be an office building.

·         Off to find the Liberty Bell. Or something historic. Or something edible.

·         I keep seeing signs for the Liberty Bell. But where is it?

·         Seriously, where the f*&^ is the Liberty Bell?

·         I give up. Who wants to see a cracked bell anyway? (Note: In speaking with Tad later in the evening, he informs me that the Liberty Bell is in a separate building near Independence Hall. Apparently it’s liberty and justice for all as long as you can figure out how to get inside.)

·         I wander back towards the hotel and happen upon Washington Square. Kind of nice – really the first thing that’s been pleasantly surprising. Lots of people, a guy doing yoga, babies playing, tourists, locals, yada, yada, yada. If I had more time, it would be a nice place to stop and sit for a while – but I’m really freaking hungry.

·         I see Jeweler’s Row, which apparently is an example of early row houses. Neat, but I guess I’d be more interested if I was into jewelry. Plus, all the stores are closed, which means that the area loses some of its flavor.

·         I wander back along Chestnut Street, which, all in all, is MUCH more appealing than Market Street. More quaint, calmer. Also, it appears to have restaurants.

·         Except that all the cafes are closed – the only places that are open look like fancier, sit down types (like Morimoto’s, the Iron Chef’s restaurant). I just don’t feel like eating by myself in a fancy sit-down restaurant tonight. Plus I think they frown on flip-flops.

·         I can’t take it. After walking up to my third closed deli, I stop at a Quiznos, where the guy preparing my vegetarian sub (no cheese, due to recently discovered lactose intolerance) looks at me like I have three heads. How do you have a sub without meat or cheese? I’m wondering the same thing myself as he prepares a sad piece of bread with lettuce, tomato, and a few wilted olives.

·         On the way back, I pass by St. John’s Cathedral. I wish I could go in, because I actually really like churches. I’m not religious, but I love the symbolism, the iconography, the tradition. However, St. John’s is closed. It’s also dwarfed by office buildings all around, and right across the street is a large parking garage. It’s kind of smushed in among all these heinous buildings, and somehow its beauty is a bit shadowed by it.

·         Back to the hotel, where I sit on my bed and eat my now cold Quiznos sub (not that it really matters) while watching M*A*S*H.

·         I also check my in-room Visitor’s Guides, where it looks like there’s lots of cool stuff to do and places to see. I think Philly has a lot to offer – I just don’t think that I was able to find it by wandering. If I had more time and/or a plan, it might be different. Ah well, there’s always tomorrow.

Philly - Pt. 1 - Sep 2009

Day 1 in Philly: This Little Piggy Went Home to Get Comfortable Shoes

My stay in Philly thus far:

• My trip starts by waking Lea early so that I can spend a little time with her. She wakes up in a great mood and I love being able to spend those moments with her. Plus, I get to leave knowing that Tad will be the one to deal with tonight’s after-effects of the early morning wake-up. Lea gives me lots of hugs and kisses when I leave, but is not upset. This makes me incredibly happy, because it lessens the guilt. It also makes me feel like (a) she’s secure in the knowledge that I’ll always be there for her, even if I’m not physically present, and (b) she’s secure in Tad’s ability to be a great dad to her, regardless of whether I’m there or not.
• I get to the airport and navigate security without incident, despite not having flown since January of 2007 and wondering if I’m going to be the idiot who forgets to do something critical while going through security, thus holding up the whole line or causing a major security breach.
• Within two minutes of going through security, I realize that my feet are not accustomed to anything other than flip flops and sneakers. Exhibits A and B to support this are my aching, swollen feet that have big bloody blisters on the back. EasySpirit comfortable shoes, my ass. Thus begins my quest for BandAids. Three stores later, and it becomes clear that there’s not a BandAid to be had in RDU today. I suck it up and hobble on to the flight.
• The airplane is a small commuter jet, with only two seats on each side. I have carefully selected a window seat for myself so that I can snooze a bit. I just can’t sleep in an aisle seat – I feel too exposed. Unfortunately, there’s a very nice looking man sitting in my window seat with his eyes closed, leaving me with the aisle. I’m now left with the predicament of whether to: (a) attempt to wake up the man, make him unbuckle his seat belt, move his bag from under the seat, and hold everyone up while I do this, or (b) suck it up and take the aisle, relinquishing my cozy nap spot. Looks like my flight will be nap-less.
• I arrive in Philly, where circumstances force me to immediately turn my attention to my feet, which, in addition to being blistered are now swollen into little sausages due to the trauma and the flight. I adopt a strange sort of walk where I curl my toes under and try to talk on the balls of my feet without walking on tiptoes. I’m confident that I will develop hammer toes as a result of this technique, but I don’t care – it’s enabling me to move, albeit not without pain. Thankfully, Philly is not suffering from the same BandAid shortage as Raleigh-Durham.  I patch up my wounded feet as best I can in a cramped bathroom stall and limp to the baggage claim, where all the signs tell me my bag will be arriving at Carousel F.
• I wait. And wait. And wait. And wait. Finally, there’s an announcement that my bag will be coming out on Carousel E. I head on over and proceed to wait some more. Finally, I spot a sign over Carousel J saying that my flight’s bags were, in fact, delivered there. Somehow, I’m the only one who didn’t notice the change, because there’s my poor little bag, circling all by itself.
• Off to find a taxi, I step outside and realize it’s about 90 degrees here. What’s the point of traveling north if it’s still going to be hotter than hell? My taxi cab has a huge plastic divider between me and the driver, which also means that there’s a huge plastic divider between me and the air conditioning. Fortunately, they’ve provided me with a very lovely little fan that blows hot air directly on my face. It’s the little touches like this that are making me love Philadelphia already.
• I arrive at the hotel where they let me check in early. As I enter my room, I’m hit with a blast of frigid air. Someone has set the thermostat to 57 degrees (seriously). In the course of 5 minutes, I’ve experienced complete weather extremes.
• I attend a couple of sessions, and the conference is great. At the end of the day, I go down to the cocktail hour schmooze-fest that I feel obligated to attend. Because I’m horrible at just going up to random people, I spend the whole time talking to a nice guy from Children’s Hospital of Philadelphia. Sustaining a conversation with one person is much easier than trying to initiate conversations with many different people, even though I can’t particularly relate anything he’s saying. He’s nice enough, but he’s an economist, business type – and to be fair, I’m not sure he got where I was coming from either.
•  After an appropriate amount of time, I bail and head up to the room, where the shoes that I’m coming to view as torture devices are the first things to go. Out come the flip flops and jeans, and I head out to walk around Philadelphia.

The Heisman - July 2009

So, according to various web sources, it's the pose that "nobody ever does right." And yet I'm sure we all know it - the football pose made famous by the Heisman Trophy. The trophy itself is apparently modeled on a former New York Jets football player, and depicts him running (almost lunging) forward, right hand out, palm up (as if to block), with the football neatly cradled in the crook of his left arm.

Over the years, many have modeled the pose, from athletes to fans who have had a few too many "adult beverages." But none have re-enacted the moment captured by the trophy quite so elegantly as Lea.

Present day: Dardess Family Room

In the foyer stands a "sock-em bop-em" -  one of those giant inflatable things that you can push down and it pops back up again. This one is bright yellow with Lightning McQueen on it (and, might I add, makes a lovely addition to our family room).

In the corner of the family room stands a little girl, focusing on Lightning McQueen with a particularly intensity. She sizes him up, stares him down, and begins the play. She gives a giant yell and runs toward Lightning McQueen at full speed. Modeling the Heisman pose...right hand out, head down.....she charges toward Lightning McQueen. Slams into him and emerges victorious (of course, so does Lightning since he pops up moments later). Again and again she charges, always with the same teeth-gritting yell at the beginning and a "Look, Mommy, I'm a football player!" at the end. She's the very model of ferocity. Tempered, of course, by the fact that instead of a football, she is holding a naked baby doll tucked neatly into the crook of her arm.

Eat your heart out, John Heisman.