Category Archives: travel

Huckleberry Mountain Adventures

Posted on by Stacy Swiger

It was August of 1991 and I had just moved to Morgantown for Round 3 of my college experience.  I promised myself (and my parents… because they forced me) that this time would be different and I was going to focus on classes and learning and actually graduating from college.  Not just the fun stuff like partying and boys (which, for the record, was pretty fun).

In an attempt to follow through on that promise, I walked into my Intro to Biology class and took a seat right up front.  Normally, I would sit somewhere in the back so the professor would not necessarily know that I was too hungover to show up for a lecture.  This time, though, I planned to show up every day.  It was a pretty large class – almost a hundred students – and people began filling in every other seat, all the way to the back of the lab.  Then, just as class was about to begin, an old man came in and sat down in the seat right next to me.

Now, when I say “old man,” you should realize that I had the perspective of a self-centered twenty-year-old, so anybody who looked like they could legally buy me beer was automatically “old.”  It turns out that this particular old man was only about thirty.  He kept whispering ornery and sarcastic comments to me throughout the class, and even though he used the word y’uns way too often, I decided that we should be friends.

So friends we became.  We would talk before class and we got to know each other pretty well.  He had been happily married for a few years and his wife, now a pharmacist, worked as a paralegal at a local law firm.  I naturally looked to him for advice and approval when Sheepdog and I started dating a few months into the semester.  It was not hard to see the Marine in him when he met my fiancé for the very first time.  Protective and annoying, he was like the big brother I had always wished for.  We all became very good friends during our time at WVU.  And it was no surprise when he was the one who stood next to Sheepdog as his Best Man at our wedding.  It was also no surprise (especially to the girl who originally befriended him for his ornery ways) that his speech included the wish for our marriage that “all of [our] ups and downs be between the sheets.”

Afterwards, Sheepdog and I moved to Alabama for work and then back to New Jersey to be closer to my family.  The Marine hadn’t yet graduated, so he and his wife (and their awesome kid/ golden retriever, Gracie) stayed in Morgantown.  When we traveled to West Virginia to visit Sheepdog’s family, we would often work in visits to see the Marine and the Paralegal/ Pharmacist as well.  But once we started having our own kids it got harder and more inconvenient to make that extra stop.  And since we kept having kids, our get-togethers became less and less frequent.  They moved away.  We moved again.  And again.  Ironically, we all ended up in Georgia at one point and they came to visit us, but it was not the same.

Then last spring, we caught up with them at a couple of art shows where the Marine was selling bowls that he carves from reclaimed wood.  They invited us up to their home in North Carolina and we all went up the mountain to visit them last May.  We went on long walks and made jam and s’mores and told stories around the campfire.  It was awesome.

We had so much fun that we invited ourselves back this past weekend.  We rode on the 4-wheeler and hiked some new trails and watched the playoff games in front of a roaring fire with an awesome spread of layered nachos, buffalo wings and pizza.  The Marine took me out to his range and let me shoot his .40 pistol, as always emphasizing safety and reinforcing proper technique.  We compared abilities to assemble and disassemble things while blindfolded under pressure in the dark (things like heavy fire or conditions involving vomit or poop) – him an M-16, me a crib.  Still protective and annoying.  Still just like the big brother I had always wished for.

There are many times in my life that I live in the moment.  Then there are times when I am a little more contemplative.  This weekend had both.  I continue to be amazed by the seemingly random circumstances which have brought certain people into my life.  And I will continue to be grateful evermore.

Wish me luck for tomorrow…

The Holiday Wrench

Posted on by Stacy Swiger

I did all of the laundry so everybody would have clean clothes to pack.  I charged the pump so we could blow up the air mattress for somebody to sleep on when we got there.  I filled the gas tank in the truck so we could get up this morning at 3 A.M. and just drive.  I did a little early Christmas shopping for some bigger items so we could drive them up instead of shipping them.  I’m not even gonna start on the preparations that Grandma and Grandpa made in anticipation of our Thanksgiving visit… the shopping, the cleaning, the cooking, the “little” projects around the house.

Turns out they were all for naught, though, because we have kids.  And kids come with a cornucopia of wrenches that they will throw into the gears of our lives at any given moment.  And because of a sick wrench, the seven of us are all milling around our house in Georgia instead of driving somewhere along I-77 watching (or just listening to, if you sit in the front seat and can’t view the screen) a Disney-Pixar movie right now.

Exactly what we were trying to avoid
*photo courtesy of Google Images*

On Monday, Kid A came home from school in tears.  She was extremely nauseous and on top of that another girl in her lit class had written an essay about her (a very flattering one, not a mean one) that made her extremely emotional.  Since naps are my go-to cure-all, I immediately sent her to bed.  She felt a little better after that, but ended up not going to school on Tuesday because she got worse through the night.  She had a fever and didn’t have the energy to get off of the couch.  She was shaky and dizzy and icky, but I figured whatever it was would run its course and be gone after 24 hours.  So I kept on packing.

But by Tuesday at 5 P.M., while standing amidst 6 fully packed duffel bags (Sheepdog, of course, waits until the very last minute to pack.  He also feels the need to run every article of clothing past me as he does it, despite my insistence that I DO NOT CARE which damn shirt he wears to drive home), 7 winter coats, 7 sets of hats and gloves, 7 pairs of sneakers, 7 backpacks filled with charged electronics and books, a soccer ball, a football, a few baseball gloves and balls, the travel pillows and blankets, the sleeve of DVDs, the camera bag, the snack bag and the drink cooler, Sheepdog and I made the decision to cancel our trip.

The kids’ reactions were similar… all of them were very sad that they wouldn’t be seeing their Grandma and Grandpa, or their aunt and uncle and cousins.  Kid D started to cry inconsolably and he continued through bedtime.  Kid E was mad at me.  But I saw an ever so slight look of relief pass over Kid A’s face when she realized that she wouldn’t have to fake tough for ten hours riding through the ups and downs of the mountain roads while trying not to even think about throwing up even though she would have the Tupperware vomit bowl within her arms’ reach the whole time.  We would also be sitting right next to her the whole time, breathing her sick air and coming into contact with her cooties, pretty much guaranteeing that somebody else would have what she has for the trip home.  It was definitely the right call.

The next call I had to make was to my in-laws, who were vibrating with so much excitement in anticipation of our arrival that I could feel it through the phone lines.  Ironically, our trip to visit them earlier last summer was canceled on their end, as they were all dealing with some sort of plague that we couldn’t take a chance contracting, especially since Kid A’s boyfriend had just had a bone marrow transplant and was extremely immunocompromised.  I was scared that my mother-in-law would be furious or cry or have some sort of extreme reaction that would cause me even more guilt than I was already experiencing, but she was understanding and gracious and so sweet about everything.

So now we are all home.  We have the gift of an unexpected day with nothing much on the schedule.  Kid A is recuperating and we are all keeping our distance.  Kid B went to the movies to see Breaking Dawn Part II (which was AWESOME by the way… best of the series) for the sixteenth time.  Kid C and Kid D are running around in shorts outside playing some sort of bucket, snoochie boochie game.  Kid E is shadowing Sheepdog while he changes the air filters and applies wood putty to a broken door and generally performs a bunch of Sheepdog chores around the house.  I am going to take a much-needed nap.  And tomorrow, as long as everybody has been fever-free for at least 24 hours and nobody shows any signs of being sick, we will join two of my sisters and their families, as well as my mom and dad for Thanksgiving dinner down the street.

I sure hope nobody throws a wrench into that plan.

Wish me luck for tomorrow…

Over the (Hawk) Hill

Posted on by Stacy Swiger
Last Thursday I had some kind of unholy, unprecedented strain of PMS.  All five of the kids were ganging up on me by playing a rousing game of Who Can Get On Mommy’s Very Last Nerve?  So when Sheepdog came home from work and (uncharacteristically) asked, “What’s for dinner and when’ll it be ready?” before even saying hello, I felt totally justified in telling him that I wanted “to hit (him) very hard in the face with a(n effing) shovel.”  Obviously, I needed a break.  The very next morning I hopped on a plane to Philadelphia.  We were all very pleased that I got away for a bit.
 

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When I was a senior in high school I did what almost everyone else was doing and I applied to get into college.  Three colleges, to be exact.  I was smart, involved and had yet to experience any hard slaps-in-the-face from life.  I was Miss Absecon 1987 and Holy Spirit’s homecoming queen, for goodness’ sake.  So I was in utter disbelief and completely devastated when I received thin envelopes from all three schools telling me no, no and wait.  It was April of my senior year and all I could say when asked where I was going in the fall was, “I honestly don’t know.”

I remember going in to see my school guidance counselor in a daze and asking what I was supposed to do at that point.  He mentioned a small school on City Line Avenue in Philadelphia called St. Joseph’s University.  I had not heard of it before, but my grades and SAT scores were on track to allow me admittance there.  I do not recall the administrative details that followed, but I do know that my parents moved me into a college dorm up on Hawk Hill as that summer drew to an end.

But even with my very own spot in the SJU Class of 1992, it turns out that I still was not sure of where I was going.  I spent the next two years floundering.  I went to parties and bars, but not many classes.  I changed my major and therefore my schedule countless times.  I made stupid and sometimes dangerous choices.  I got my heart broken more than once.  Looking back on my freshman and sophomore years at St. Joe’s, I recall a general sense of sadness and isolation, which was made even worse by my belief that I was surrounded by so many people who all seemed to be having the time of their lives.

My parents saw that I was not happy and they finally convinced me to come back home (a fate worse than death at the time!).  I would work and take classes at a local college in order to bring up my GPA.  Then I could reapply to another school or schools, and eventually earn a degree.  That is how I ended up at West Virginia University as a transfer student in the Fall of 1990.  I met Sheepdog there after just a few weeks.

Short Aside… Yes, WVU was a giant party school back then (and still officially is, according to Princeton Review), but I had thankfully gotten most of it out of my system by the time I moved to Morgantown.  Note that I said most, not all.  Now that’s a true story.

After years of ruminating (and some good, old-fashioned therapy), I look back on my first years of higher education with a smile.  It was the time when I walked on to the varsity cheerleading squad for the basketball team and I got to cheer on national television and travel all over the East Coast to other schools in the Atlantic 10.  It was when I learned that accounting was definitely not my thing, but english and eventually journalism were.  It was when I learned how I didn’t want to be treated by boys, and therefore what I did eventually want from a partner in life.  Most importantly, it was the time when I learned what I did and did not like about myself.  It was where I learned that having a rhinestone crown placed on your head doesn’t mean jack, so I needed to buckle down and start working for what I wanted.  It was where I made friends for life, because college years can be so intense that bonds are forged deeper and stronger than during any other experience.

This past weekend I traveled back to City Line Avenue for Hawktoberfest 2012 and to celebrate the passage of 20 years since the Class of 1992 had been handed their sheepskins.  Originally I booked my plane ticket and hotel room because it was an excuse to spend time with friends who now live scattered all over and I rarely get to see (save for the occasional wedding or funeral or milestone birthday celebration in the Dominican Republic), but it turned out to be so much more than that for me.

I saw people who I hadn’t seen in decades.  I listened to the stories of how their lives had played out, as well as their plans for the future.  I heard the classic tales again, but I also listened to new ones that I never knew about.  One girlfriend teased, saying that I was quite the social butterfly… talking to absolutely everyone, but that was the best part of the experience for me.  We went out to dinner and shared so many memories and bottles of wine.  We played softball on the incredible new field.  We posed for pictures in front of our old dorms.  We tailgated (I know, I know… how do you tailgate without a football team?) and gossiped and laughed.  I laughed until I was hoarse.  It was very, very good.

The more things change, the more they stay the same. This was taken just before 2AM on 54th Street.

On Sunday, we roused our sad, over the hill selves out of bed with lots and lots of coffee.  After we checked out of the hotel, a few of us who had later flights walked around the campus.  It is so much bigger now, with all of the new buildings and dorms and fields, but it is still the same in so many ways.  It was awkward but comfortable at the same time.  I had to catch my breath several times as I walked through the old Fieldhouse (now Hagan Arena) and down past Finnesy Field.  I actually had tears in my eyes as I went from Lafarge to the Chapel and the old Newmann Hall and then crossed the foot bridge to McShane.  They fell silently down my cheeks as I walked down the tree-lined Lapsley Lane to the most magnificent view of Barbelin Tower.

What’s magis? It’s a Jesuit principle that underlies everything we do at Saint Joseph’s University. It inspires us to think a little broader, dig a little deeper, and work a little harder. More simply put, magis calls us to live greater.

The tears were few but they were powerful and cathartic.  I felt such peace and comfort in knowing that St. Joe’s was the first of many steps in bringing me to where I am in my life today.  It defined me, both good and bad.  And it feels so awesome to own that.

I left Hawk Hill feeling light and happy, albeit a little old.  I left with renewed friendships and some new Facebook friends.  I left with a memory card full of photographs.  But mostly I left with a palpable gratitude for the life I have now and the people who are in it.  It never ceases to amaze me how life twists and turns, takes us up and down the hills and sometimes even mountains, and lands us where we are right at this moment.

Sometimes we just need to be reminded.

Wish me luck for tomorrow…

What Did One Math Book Say To The Other Math Book?

Posted on by Stacy Swiger

“Dude, I’ve got a lot of problems.”

I love that joke.  Probably because I am a math book.  And one of my biggest problems keeps popping up lately… I am very ornery and I tend to bring out the ornery in those around me.  And that can get us into some hot water at times.

For example, I see Kid C and D’s elementary school bus driver every weekday morning.  He is a really nice, reliable man in his late forties or early fifties.   He drives safely and he keeps the kids in line and they all say he is a great bus driver.  Everybody likes him.  I even know his wife (she was the previous elementary school bus driver for Kids A and B when we first moved here).  We always exchange pleasantries and what’s-going-on’s, but we are usually limited to yelling just a few words back and forth to each other over the very loud diesel engine.

Prior to Spring Break he told me that he was going to Las Vegas for vacation.  For the last few days before school was out I would yell, “Vegas, Baby!” while raising my arms and laughing uncontrollably whenever he opened the bus doors.  The other kids on the bus looked at my kids and were like, “Is your mom drunk again?”  Whatever.  It made me giggle.  And, no, there is nothing else in my coffee.

So when we returned from Spring Break and all of the groggy kids were climbing onto the school bus on Monday morning I asked the bus driver how his trip went.  He smiled a wistful smile and said it was really fun, as if he had either lost a lot of money at the craps tables or he really wished he was still on vacation.  Or both.  I didn’t want him to be sad, so my ornery busted out with some bright-side support and I yelled, “At least you still have your pants on!”

He laughed out loud and then succumbed to my bad influence.  The engine was very loud but I think I heard him yell back, “Yeah, but I’m not wearing any underpants!”  …in front of a school bus full of little kids.  The poor man realized what he said as soon as it came out of his mouth and was mortified.  Imagine the face that a minister would make if he dropped the F-bomb in the middle of a church picnic.  The bus driver made that exact face.  Thank goodness all of the kids already think I am crazy and don’t pay attention to anything I say, so nobody was really listening to us anyway.  I don’t want anybody getting in trouble, so I will say again that the engine was really loud and I probably did not hear him correctly.  But if he did say it, then chalk up one more for my very bad influence.

What happens in Vegas, stays in Vegas. Thank goodness.

Speaking of Vegas, Sheepdog gave a speech on food traceability and its impact on recalls in litigation at a food-borne illness conference in Las Vegas last week (I know, I know… how sexy is that?).  Now, I have shared a lot about Sheepdog over the past year, so I feel like you all should know him pretty well.  Even so, I can not stress enough how much of a square peg Sheepdog is in the holes of Sin City.  He does not drink, he is the married father of five children, and if he is not working like a madman to pay for all of those children to be housed, clothed, fed and educated, he is either running or riding his bicycle somewhere.  Not exactly the things that come to mind when you think of Vegas, right?

Sheepdog is more than a fish out of water on the Vegas Strip.  The place genuinely scares the crap out of him.  He went there only one time years ago for our brother-in-law’s bachelor party weekend.  He went out there with something like $200 “fun money” in his pocket (the most money he ever had in his possession at one time up until that point, and it was a big deal financially for us to send him there with that much) and then called me from a strip club or somewhere because he had already used up all of the money.  After only being there for an hour.  I won’t even say how much cash he ended up dropping that weekend, but it was not an itty-bitty number.  Apparently there was just so much of everything available twenty-four hours a day.  And apparently Sheepdog’s intensity does not translate into anything good in a place like that.

So Sheepdog and I were both joking how ever since that trip Vegas scares the bejesus out of him.  And it turns out that at least somebody was paying attention when we were talking.

On the drive home from preschool on Wednesday, we were talking about Sheepdog and I reminded Kid E that his Daddy was in Las Vegas.  From the backseat I hear him say to nobody in particular, “Daddy is a-scared of Vegas.”  For whatever reason, I found this to be particularly funny.  And I found it to be even more hysterical when Kid E asked what, specifically, it was that Sheepdog was a-scared of.  Cue the ornery me.

Now, I’m not proud of this (although I do keep laughing about it), but I told Kid E that Daddy was scared of “too much boobies and drinking and spending money.”  And being a four-year-old boy, he thought that me saying those things was absolutely fantastic, and he proceeded to repeat them over and over and over again.  And I, of course, kept encouraging him because he follows up saying “boobies” with that priceless little kid giggle that just melts my heart.  At least I did remind him that he wasn’t allowed to mention any of this when he was at his Lutheran Church-based preschool.  Fingers crossed that I don’t get a note from his teacher anytime soon.

“Dude, I’ve got a lot of problems.”  Trust me, I know.

Wish me luck for tomorrow…

Vacation Shoes

Posted on by Stacy Swiger

From April 10 – 17, 1999, with Nanny and Pop Pop happily in charge of a three-year-old Kid A and a five-month-old Kid B, Sheepdog and I set off for a week of some fun, sun and “Bow Chicka Wow Wow” time in the Guanacaste province of Costa Rica.  It was a fantastic vacation filled with good food and drink, exploration of fabulous beaches and restaurants and jungles in a rented jeep, hanging out with cool people and a bunch of wild monkeys watching the sun set over the Pacific Ocean, and – best of all – time alone with my husband at a 5-star beach resort.  I loved every single minute of that trip (except maybe for the lizards in the shower).

It’s a good thing too because it turns out Sheepdog and I would not have another no work/ no kids week away together for twelve more years.  Seriously.  That is a very long time to wait to go on a real vacation, but there was always something more important to spend money on, or a sick and needy kid, or I was pregnant (it happened A LOT) or there was a work conflict.  Plus it turns out that not many people are capable or up for the challenge of watching five kids for an entire week.  Fortunately for us this time around, Sheepdog’s parents agreed (I presume they were not really sure what they were saying yes to when we begged them almost a full year ago to commit – NO TAKE BACKS!) to come down and wrangle the entropy in our absence.

Knowing that it was such a long time since our most awesome Costa Rican vacation together and presuming that our next trip could potentially be that far off in the future, I set out to make this the best trip ever.  I organized, scheduled, planned, prepared and set up the kids and the house to the absolute best of my ability, so it would not be such a burden on their caretakers and so I would not worry so much about them.  With Grandma and Grandpa in charge I knew they would be cuddled, loved, protected and they would play tons of card and board games with them (which is torture for me).  As far as my own preparation, I did P90X and got my hair colored and a mani/ pedi and I waxed and shaved and did all of the things that you need to do to lay around for a week half-clothed/ half-naked by the pool in front of other people.  I picked out and packed some cute dresses and several cute bathing suits.  And then I packed my vacation shoes.

"Are we going to a strip club when we get to Mexico?" - My brother-in-law, Brandon, when he got on the plane and noticed my choice of footwear for the flight to Cabo

It really is true that Sheepdog is a very simple man.  He requires only regular doses of food, sex and biking, and not necessarily in that order.  Anything else is bonus material.  I figured the least I could do to set the tone for our awesome week in Mexico was to wear some sexy shoes on the airplane.  I wanted the week to be special, and that meant the opposite of Sheepdog coming home every day to find me frazzled, tired, unkempt and, more often than not, barefoot and in sweatpants.

In addition to wearing the leopard shoes, I downloaded and read a very dirty book during our vacation week.  And when I say “very dirty” I actually mean there’s not enough Orbitz gum in the world to wash that dirt out.  I am sure I was blushing the whole time I was reading it.  It is very poorly written with a bunch of really cheesy euphemisms and clichés.  The stuff I read was disturbing on so many levels that I could not even wrap my head around most of it.  Yet, if I am being honest I have to admit that I read the whole damn thing.  Not that I got into all of the pervy stuff in the book, but it most definitely set a mood for our trip.

So the preparation and planning and even the twelve-year wait were all definitely worth it.  We didn’t worry too much about the kids and we enjoyed each other and Sheepdog got to golf three times and take a four-hour mountain bike ride and I lounged in the sunshine by the swim-up bar (we have very different ideas of what to do while on vacation).  By the end of the week I felt refreshed and recharged and ready to get back to the kids and our regular non-vacation lives.  I felt like I could deal with the temper tantrums and wash the dishes with a smile, at least for a little while.

It’s a good thing, too.  We came back to little kids who were mad, mad, mad that we had gone away and teenagers who needed this and needed that and everything was URGENT and it is a very good thing that I refilled my patience bowl on that trip because I sure have needed it lately.  Having all of these kids and trying to raise them without causing irreparable damage and running a family and a home can be incredibly rewarding but it can also be hard on your body and soul.

So every once in a while I’m going to think back to our fabulous week in Cabo and I am going to take out my leopard print platforms and I am going to put them on while I make the beds or fold the laundry or do some other menial chore.  I’m hoping that will get me through until the next time Sheepdog and I go away together.  That, and the dirty book is actually the first in a series of three.

Wish me luck for tomorrow…

Over the River and Through the Woods

Posted on by Stacy Swiger

The holidays can mean different things to different people.

To the young child it may mean that their parents will dress them up and drag them all around town, and if they have been a good little boy or girl this year they might have a Hot Wheels wall track or a pink LeapPad Explorer waiting for them under the tree on Christmas morning, Santa willing.

Hey Santa! This is number one on my wish list... an inflatable remote control flying shark. Awesome, right?

To the young couple it means spending lots of time with each other’s relatives, usually with excess stress and excess food and excess alcohol, all the while making whispered promises to each other that their lives will never, ever resemble those with whom they share those inextricable genetic links.

To the parents of teenagers it may mean being able to enjoy the Christmas Eve church service without (as much) fear that it might be their child who drops the taper candle during the congregation’s rendition of “Silent Night,” thus setting a pew or a hymnal or an old lady’s wig on fire.

To the grandparents it may mean a renewed spirit, and seemingly new eyes through which they get to watch the next generation experience the innocence and unguarded joy of believing in flying animals and toy workshops and true, untainted Christmas magic.

I have been running around for the past month like a crazed (yes, even more than usual) lunatic, slowly but surely crossing things off my To-Do lists, which were constantly being extended and amended and created anew.  I have been planning and shopping and wrapping and baking and decorating.  Sheepdog has been traveling for work all month, right up until he flew home from California on the 22nd.  The kids have all participated in their classroom parties and team celebrations and gift exchanges.  Then yesterday the seven of us piled into the car and drove well over five hundred miles to be with Grandma and Grandpa in West Virginia.  We are all still swirling around, caught up in the glorious enchantment that reaches its pinnacle tomorrow morning.

This afternoon we will finally slow down as we come together to spend time with even more family.  Tonight we will watch a reenactment of the birth of Jesus at a family friendly church service in town.  Finally, when the kids are just about to burst with anticipation, Sheepdog will read ‘Twas the Night Before Christmas and everyone will eventually fall into bed.

In theory, Christmas is supposed to be about simplicity.  It is about Jesus being born in a stable.  You don’t get much more unelaborate than that.

In reality, Christmas is complicated and stressful and expensive and anxiety-ridden, especially in the weeks and days leading up to it.  But, if you are really lucky, you will also get to experience those moments of calm and peace and love and true magic that make Christmas such a wonderful time of the year.

Here’s to you and yours.  May your weekend be filled with the people and things that make you happy, even amidst the crazy.  Make sure that you take the time to stop and smell the Christmas cookies.  Joy to the World!

More of an Indoor Girl

Posted on by Stacy Swiger

Our family is composed of both extremes when it comes to the inside vs. outside debate.  I would live in a penthouse in the city if I could make it work with five kids; Sheepdog would live outside in a treehouse were it not called “homeless.”  Kid A loves taking pictures of things in nature; Kid B enjoys watching moving pictures on television.  Kid C leaps into the pile of leaves before she looks; Kid D wants to learn all of the facts about the tree on the internet first.  But both of them are up for almost anything in the out-of-doors, while Kid E complains about every last aspect of it.  Yet every once in a while the planets align and we nay-sayers cry uncle and we head out as a family to some remote place where the county flower is poison ivy but the views are spectacular and the air is piney (and DEET-scented) and we are all humbled by the awesomeness of nature.

This weekend we traveled to Tallulah Falls State Park for a picnic and some hiking and to watch the kayakers navigate the gorge.  It was perfect fall weather (sunny in the high 50s) and the leaves in northeast Georgia are experiencing extreme chlorophyll-deficiency, so the residual colors left us breathless.  An added bonus was that Georgia Power floods the dam every weekend in November so the crazies can ride the rush in their little boats of death (insane to do but extremely cool to watch).  The drive took over an hour and most of the kids watched “The Princess Bride” while Sheepdog and I talked uninterrupted like civilized people.  Almost before we knew it, we had arrived at a little cliff-side viewing spot/ antique store/ BBQ restaurant.

After a quick stop in the restroom, I was immediately approached by a bearded man holding a deep pot on the end of a five-foot pole.

“Bald penis?” he asked of me and the girls.  Sheepdog was still in the bathroom.

I protectively put my arms around the kids and moved them all behind me.  Simultaneously, my brain was calculating possible situational outcomes and I quickly realized upon looking into the pot that he was not some local pervert trying to harass the tourists.  He was offering us a soggy, cooked, traditional Georgia snack.

I honestly believe I might never figure out the whole deep-southern accent thing.  It throws me for a loop every time.  P.S.  Boiled peanuts are kind of gross.

The view from 1,000 feet

We checked out the view and decided to get back into the car so we could find the place where we could hike down the trails closer to the raging water.  It was conveniently just down the road as bellies were starting to grumble all around us.  We paid a minimal five dollars to park and soon set up our picnic lunch in a field next to some rocks.  They were perfect for sitting against or upon and also for having Kid E jump off and climb, thus guaranteeing that I would have indigestion for the remainder of the day.  Fortunately, no one got hurt during the meal and soon we were off, with nothing but a trail map, five kids, two adults, a backpack/kid carrier, a full water bottle, three pairs of extra sunglasses, sunscreen, bug spray, some light jackets, a packet of wipes, a couple of iPhones and a 35mm SLR camera.  Ah, the simplicity of nature!

First, we walked up from the information center to a place called Inspiration Point.  I was hopeful that this was more of a spiritual moniker as opposed to a carnal one.  I mean, hadn’t the peanut guy contributed enough depravity for one day?  Fortunately there were just a bunch of other people with cameras and dogs and walking sticks up there.  While at the point we got to see the remains of one of the towers that Karl (“The Great/ Flying”) Wallenda used to tightrope walk across the quarter-mile-wide gorge in 1970.  Crazy.  But the views were phenomenal, especially with my family safely behind the protective viewing fence.

After that we hiked down the mountain back past the main parking area and then continued on our downward trek toward the suspension bridge that sits just 80 feet above the rocky bottom, providing spectacular views of the river and waterfalls below.  To get there you have to climb down a little more than 300 grated metal stairs.  And unless you want to live out the remainder of your days like a troll under the bridge, you also have to climb back up.  Easier said than done.

By this point in the day we had hiked quite a way and some of the kids were getting tired.  But we didn’t drive all the way out here to hike just the easy part!   Kid E had toughed it out with minimal complaining and walked most of the trails so far, but he was definitely ready to ride in the backpack carrier for the remainder of our excursion.   Being no dummy, I offered to wear/ carry him down the steps.  It was no big deal except that after the first few sections I had to ask him to please stop chanting, “We are going DOWN the steps.  WE are going down the steps.  We ARE going down the steps.  We are going down the STEPS.”  He did not.

I then felt zero guilt when I asked Sheepdog to take his turn carrying Kid E on the way back up.  Even without a person on my back those steps were hard.  I refused to stop on the little resting benches.  I was panting like a dog.  To add insult to injury, Kid D ran the whole way back up.  Show off.  At least I beat most of the old people.  I considered it a great day all around.

If you pick 'em up, O Lord, I'll put 'em down. - Author Unknown, "Prayer of the Tired Walker"

The whole family had a fantastic time.  I even look forward to the next time we get back to the woods.  Maybe Sheepdog can make a nature lover out of this indoor girl yet!

Wish me luck for tomorrow…

What’s Scarier Than One Teenage Girl?

Posted on by Stacy Swiger

Why two teenage girls, of course.  And that’s just what we got a few weekends ago when Kid B turned 13, joining her older sister in the official years of life-affecting decisions, crazy, unpredictable hormones, and angst.  Lots of angst.  Oh, and the texting while they are doing just about everything else.  Don’t forget that.  Maybe some eye rolling, door slamming and foot stomping too.  But it does not all have to be bad.  I think that teenagers have gotten some bad press because some of them can be really cool.

In fact, most of Kid A’s teenage years to date have not been horrible.  I would even go so far as to say that they have been quite pleasant.  She is still talking to me and we rarely fight.  She is sometimes sullen and moody, but I always ask her what is going on and we usually talk about what is bothering her.  Some things get resolved and others go on festering, but I don’t do better than that now with my own mother and I’m forty.  My teenager teaches me all kinds of teenage things so I can continue to stay in touch with the youth of America.  We talk openly and often about relationships and sex.  She’s already smarter than me in math, but she doesn’t make fun of me for it.  She teaches me how to navigate Prezi and Spotify, and I teach her what dirty slang words mean when she asks about them.  So I can only hope that Kid B’s teen years are half as good as her sister’s have been so far.

A few weeks prior to Kid B turning 13, she presented Sheepdog and me with a packet of sorts.  It was an “All I Want for My Birthday” kind of thing.  So I laughed out loud, but she said it was serious so I read through it with an open mind.  She asked for a new purse from zappos.com, some posters for her bedroom, a neon soccer ball, an Angry Birds iTouch cover, and a week off from making school lunches.  But in lieu of all of these presents what she really wanted was a weekend trip to Atlantic City.

Seriously… Kid B wished to go to Atlantic City for her 13th birthday.

You have got to be kidding me.

Now you have to understand that her favorite person in the world (her Pop Pop, who is my dad) lives there, so her big draw to Atlantic City is (hopefully) not lucky craps tables at the Borgatta or even my cousin’s 70% manager’s discount at Lacoste.  She wanted to spend time with her Pop Pop and her Nanny and just chill with no sisters or brothers and no scheduled activities.  She wanted to sleep in every day, walk down to the docks to get some breakfast, then wander over to the boardwalks to maybe play a round of mini golf (in Ocean City) and get her tarot cards read by a gypsy (in Atlantic City).  As a bonus she got my undivided attention, a visit with 3 Pops at the VA Home, Primo pizza for lunch one day, and both a t-shirt and a sweatshirt as souvenirs.  It was a fantastic weekend.

Most importantly, we got to spend time together.  We were adding to an already strong foundation just by having this shared experience.  Then we watched “Bridesmaids” together, and we laughed until we almost peed our pants.  I reminded her that I am her mother first and her friend second.  Teenagers can get caught up in their own heads pretty easily.  It is my job to make sure that mine don’t get lost inside there.

For now I’m just going to continue winging it with my teenagers.  With communication and a lot of luck I hope we can make it through these years with more laughter than tears.  I’ll continue to remind them that they are not perfect and neither am I.  And even when they do stupid teenage things I will love them unconditionally, for ever and ever.

Wish me luck for tomorrow…