A picture my son colored in second grade. Wait until you read the story he wrote about it below!
Funny how it takes guests staying with us for me to get motivated to clean closets. I successfully emptied the casita closet. It had turned into storage space for all sorts of stuff including blankets, air mattresses, slippers, Sorel snow boots, hiking boots and even a box full of canvases and paints. Now it holds an appropriate number of sheets and towels.
That felt so good. I continued my cleaning spree in my own closet.
My efforts filled a car with blankets, books, comforters, and more that made it to Kiwanis Thrift Store. It’s amazing how things can accumulate after three short years of being in our new home. To be honest, a lot of stuff that I stored in closets moved with us.
Next, I went through my bathroom drawers and threw out ancient makeup, cough drops, unnecessary ointments and mini lotions and shampoos from years of hotel stays.
I have a guest bedroom closet left to tackle and I’ll be done! But it has all the personal things like photo albums, boxes of photos from my mom including her notebooks and diaries. I have generations of things to go through. Like the photo above, I saved things my kids created, report cards, school awards and swim medals. I have my daughter’s set of Madame Alexander dolls from the Wizard of Oz. I think it was easier to clear out the big stuff — especially because there’s no emotional attachment.
Here’s the story that goes with the photo:
What are your thoughts about the story? FYI, “derend” is a unique spelling of turned.
I wrote this nine years ago. It’s my most read post to this day. I remember writing it while visiting a high school friend in my home town Snohomish.
I understand how she feels. After all, I was once 19 years old. I remember it very clearly.
Everything my mom did, I found unbelievably annoying.
I’ll never forget sitting with her in the car, getting ready to shop at Bellevue Square. She had parked the car. She was fumbling through her purse, making sure she had what she needed. She reapplied her lipstick. Dug through her purse for her wallet to look through credit cards. Searched several times to check where she placed the keys.
Mom and me in the early 90s. I lost her to COVID in January 2023.
Would we never leave the car? Would I be stuck all day? I must have said something to her quite snippy, or flat out mean. A few tears rolled down her cheeks. Which made me more upset with her.
Isn’t it a sad feeling, transitioning from a mom who could do no wrong—from changing diapers, to cooking their favorite spaghetti, to taping treasured colorings on the fridge that were made just for you—to being the person of their abject disdain?
It’s a tough new role. Let me tell you.
But, having gone through these feelings myself, I understand. I’m visiting my mom this week in her assisted living center. I talked about it with her, what I’m going through now, and what I felt like when I was 19. Fortunately, she doesn’t remember me ever being a snarky 19-year-old.
For some reason, I’ve gained more patience throughout my life and that has been a blessing. I’ve also learned forgiveness.
My baby girl years ago.
Something else, I’ve learned through the years of parenting: this too shall pass.
It’s called independence and freedom. We want our children to grow and become separate human beings that can stand on their own. Sometimes they need to separate from us. A good time to do that is during their senior year of high school, or their freshman year of college. It’s a good thing. I keep telling myself that.
However, we also want to be treated with respect, and once again—someday—to be cherished.
A beach day with my daughter.
I wrote more about separating from our kids and the experiences we go through when they leave for college HERE.
I miss my mom. So much.
Why do you think some posts are discovered and read throughout the years, while others are not?
Do you think when people close to us are going through rough times, it’s easy for them to take it out on those closest to them?
A few years ago we were visiting our kids in the Berkeley area. The weather was perfect and we went on a quest to see redwoods.
We walked through the woods in the Redwood Regional Park in Oakland with our kids and future daughter-in-law. We sat down on a bench and enjoyed a treat our son prepared for us. Brillat Savarin cheese, blackberries and crusty bread. It’s the first time I had tasted that cheese. If you have not tried it, it’s mild but the creamiest. I found this description online:
It is a triple cream soft-ripened cheese that is luscious, creamy and faintly sour.
We did find a few redwoods and it was such a peaceful place to be outdoors in a forest with the people I love.
After our hike, we went to Rockridge in Oakland to a cafe and window shopped. What a beautiful day with family.
Once at home, I searched for the cheese. I went to five different grocery stores and none had Brillat, including the expensive, fancy schmancy one. Years later, I was picking up vitamins I normally order on Amazon at Whole Foods. (For some reason, Amazon directed me to pick up my vitamins myself.) Wouldn’t you know it? I spotted Brillat Savarin!
What are a few of my favorite things? Spending time outdoors. Spending time with family. My favorite cheese that brings back those memories. Olive. And yes, “The Sound of Music.”
This was the entrance to our Palm Springs home of 28 years. It was an incredibly beautiful, unique home built in 1937. I loved living there and it was hard to move. It may sound like I am bragging, but it was beautiful. Not that livable. That was was one of the downsides.
WARNING: This may turn into a rant.
You can imagine my shock when a friend sent me a video from an Instagram account for our former home. The buyers, who we thought loved our home and lived in an old Spanish Hacienda themselves, are turning our home into a short-term vacation rental. They told us they liked our house better than theirs because we had a spectacular view of Mt. San Jacinto.
They’ve totally gutted the house inside and it’s lost it’s rustic charm and is filled with white marble with gray streaks, dark glossy floors with a bizarre tile shape. They removed wood-beamed ceilings, the columns and the original Sausalito tiles and everything else I loved about our home. It no longer has any character.
My daughter and I were ranting to each other by phone. Absolutely horrified by what we saw. We felt violated.
I made a comment on their Instagram account, “That’s my old home.” My daughter added a comment, “Why did you remove the original tile floors?” We were blocked. I guess the good news is we don’t have to look at more videos and photos of how they turned an authentic 1930s Spanish Colonial into a Mid-Century Modern Hollywood Nightmare. Tacky without taste.
Our living room, the way it was.This was our master bedroom.
In our Master bedroom, they removed the columns, floors, wood beams, granite wall paper, tub (at the far end) and built a wall with three archways to cut off a large portion of the room. Now the master looks much smaller. The shower and bathroom were behind mirrored doors on either side of the tub. Now they are behind archways and they put in a modern circular white stand-alone tub.
When I ranted to my husband, he was shocked when I showed him the pictures. He didn’t recognize our home. Then, being level-headed he said, “We don’t own the home anymore. We sold it.”
I know he’s right. But I have so many memories of living in that home. When we moved in, I was pregnant with my first child. It’s the only home our kids lived in before they went off to college.
FYI, we moved out December 12, 2020. We asked the new owners if we could have a little extra time to move. Escrow was 30 days and we lived there for close to 30 years. They were gracious and agreed. Then, we asked if we could stay for one last Christmas with our kids and DIL’s family. They said, “Sure. For $7,000.” We moved and spent Christmas alone getting settled in our new home.
We are better off for moving out of California to Arizona, I will admit. I liked the downtown Palm Springs location, but it had a downside with a homeless guy living on the steps to our entrance. Also, my husband said he’d have to work until he died to support the expenses.
At least I have these photos to remember what once was.
I guess it’s true. You can never go home again.
Outside view of our former home at night.
Have you ever been surprised at what has become of a place you lived in before?
What changes have you seen to your old home or home town?
Photo from my son and daughter-in-law’s wedding day.
It’s been a long six months, but Monday was the final treatment day for my daughter-in-law. Every two weeks, my son has driven her over the bridge to UCSF for chemo.
I’ll never forget the worry I felt during her surgery. We were on vacation at the time. They were supposed to spend a week with us in Santa Barbara at the beach when they found out she had cancer was was having surgery immediately. I wrote about surgery day HERE. The linked post includes a beautiful poem by my DIL after she met my son at UCSB.
Every day I pray for my DIL and my son. Over the weekend, they were moving into an apartment and my son hit his head. He hit it badly. I was in shock when my daughter called me from the ER.
He’s now down with a really bad concussion. Seriously? Do they need this now?
Have you noticed how life interrupts life just when you think it’s getting better?
What are your thoughts about how quickly this last six months went by?
This was the second post ever on my blog. I was looking through old posts and I thought this tale was worth retelling.
Robert’s asthma and allergy appointment — on his first day home from college for his four-week Christmas break — didn’t go well. The doctor said we could get rid of the cat or put Robert up in a hotel for four weeks.
We’ve only had baby Olive for a year. We’re not too attached, but still. She’s a member of our family. We rescued her from a local pet shelter and committed to be her loving family. And she’s Robert’s little sister’s cat. Not mine. I felt before we agreed to give Olive away, we needed to discuss this with little sis. Or, let Olive be an outdoor cat.
I heard that Robert had posted on FB for a new home for Olive. Of course, as his loving mother, I’m filtered from seeing his posts. Grandpa, on the other hand, has full access to Robert’s FB account. He told me about the long and lengthy post about how I love the cat more than my own son. Short and shorter: we needed to get rid of the cat. Several people had said yes to adopt the furry feline. Some even called me!
Am I a terrible mother for not wanting to give away our pretty little kitty, Olive Bear?
Robert said I’m infected with Toxoplasma gondii and I’m in danger of turning into a crazy cat lady. I “googled” the toxo thing. It’s different than cat scratch fever, which can cause chills and a fever. T. gondii is a protein that invades your bloodstream and makes women crazy about cats. Or, it makes men crazy in a wild way. And there’s a link to schizophrenia. It’s why my OB GYN told me not to change the litter box while I was pregnant. However, he said that if I’d been around cats my entire life, most likely I was already infected. Great.
I know about crazy cat ladies. We had one in my home town. She lived in a house filled with felines and feces. Hundreds of cats. My parents drove me to her house out in the country a few miles from town. The home badly needed paint and had broken floorboards with cats leaping in and out of the foundation. We picked an adorable calico kitten named Pansy to bring home. Pansy died a few weeks later from feline pneumonitis.
I never had good luck with cats. I can name the ones we owned when I was young: Ting, Tack, Tenni-runner, No Name, Thomasina I, Thomasina II, Little Leticia, Bianco (white in Italian), Striscia (stripe in Italian), and my favorite, OJ Simpson. (I was a huge OJ fan. Remember, this was decades before I quit being one.)
We lost these cats (in addition to the aforementioned Pansy) by the time I reached first grade, due to an overzealous cat-hater neighbor. He caught them in a wooden trap, dropped them in a gunnysack, then tossed them in the river.
When we moved out into the country I had Soute´ (a French word from ballet that means jump) from second grade through high school. Coyotes and bears were kinder animals to our kitty than our former neighbor in town.
We adopted Sherman years before we had kids. That allergy doctor told me for years to get rid of Sherman. Robert was allergic to lots more things than cats. Things I couldn’t control, like rye grass and trees. Sherman lived from 1992 for 17 years — until a neighbor’s dog jumped a wall and killed him.
I know it’s terrible not to want to get rid of the cat. I never believed that our cat could be harmful to my child. Now, my son is living in beautiful Santa Barbara, going to college. He’s only home for visits. Or maybe it is the toxoplasmosis that let’s me rationalize all this.
Olive letting her temper show. Once my daughter left for college, Olive became mine. We found a solution to the allergy problem called an air purifier for our son’s room.
Looking back, was I bad mom for wanting to keep the Olive the cat?
What is the topic of your second post on your blog?
On Monday, I was celebrating fun memories of my daughter on her birthday. Then I saw a post by a mother whose daughter shared the same birthday with my daughter. Our daughters knew each other as student-athletes at the University of Utah. I didn’t know they had the same birthday until Monday. I texted my daughter if she knew. She said she did. I remember how devastated my daughter was on the day she learned of Lauren’s death.
As I was rejoicing the life of my daughter, this mother was grieving her loss. I burst into tears realizing how fortunate I am.
The other mom heard her daughter’s death happen, on the phone, while she was talking to her daughter when she was shot to death by a stalker.
“‘There but for the grace of God, go I.”
Lauren’s story is a harrowing event that made national news. The mother has worked to keep Lauren’s memory alive, plus began a foundation with the following mission:
Our Mission
Dating violence and stalking are some of the most pressing issues facing universities and colleges today. One third of all women report dating violence by a current or previous partner. University and college campuses are not trained to respond effectively to these problems. The Lauren McCluskey Foundation was founded to honor the life and spirit of Lauren Jennifer McCluskey by bringing awareness to, funding research for, and providing resources to change the culture that responds poorly to dating violence and stalking on campuses.
Our mission is to let Lauren’s light shine by supporting her passions, including animal welfare, amateur athletics, and by making campuses across the country a place where students are safe, supported, and have the ability to thrive.
