Great news!

This will be short, but I knew you all wanted to know.  I just got off the phone with Bill.  He is being released from the hospital tonight and is expected to make a full recovery.  He has promised to come by my dock shack when he can so that I can give him a big hug!  I am so relieved and happy!  This has been a life changing experience for me.

Life is a precious gift!

Life is a precious gift.  It can be taken from us at any moment with no notice whatsoever.  Never was this point brought home any clearer to me than it was early this afternoon on the docks.  Here’s what happened.

 

I had just finished my lunch and was heading back to my dock shack when I saw my favorite dentist at the sailboat hoist preparing to launch his boat.  He is in a partnership on a racing sailboat and takes part in all the local regattas.  My assistant had already finished his lunch and was helping someone launch a powerboat at the main hoist.

 

I went over to lend a hand at the sailboat hoist and to catch up on what’s going on with my dentist.  We talked for a bit and I learned that he and his partner were putting the sailboat in the water so that they could take the trailer to have it worked on.

 

We got the sailboat in the water with no trouble at all and decided on a slip to move it to for the time period it will take to get the trailer worked on.  I headed over to the slip to catch their lines as my dentist, Kevin, and his partner made ready to cast off and motor over. 

 

I was almost to the slip when I heard Kevin yell at the top of his lungs, “SAM!”  I started moving quickly back towards the ramp to get me off the dock.  I looked over and saw our maintenance supervisor running full speed towards Kevin at the sailboat hoist docking area.  Kevin was bent over the side of the dock and holding on to his partner who was in the water.  The maintenance supervisor got there fast and helped Kevin get his partner out of the water and stretched out on

the dock.

 

 I yelled to my assistant to grab our heart defibrillator while I ran for the golf cart. Arriving as quickly as we could, I ran down the sailboat hoist dock and saw Kevin performing mouth to mouth resuscitation on his partner.  When I bent down on the ground to set up the defibrillator, I looked at Kevin’s partner and his face had turned blue and his eyes were wide open with a blank expression.  He was not breathing and he had no heart beat.  I tore the protective backing off the paddles and stuck them in the proper positions as the partner coughed some water up.  I turned on the defibrillator and the machine ran a quick analysis and said a shock was called for.   I cleared Kevin from the body and pushed the shock button.  The partner’s color almost immediately changed from blue to beet red and the machine said another shock was not called for.

 

Kevin threw himself into the mouth to mouth resuscitation.  We now had a pulse and needed the partner to start breathing on his own.  More and more water came up from the partner.  Kevin kept clearing the breathing passage and kept on working on him.  The eyes closed and opened again and the partner started breathing on his own, coughing up volumes of water each time.

 

I had brought a towel down that I always keep on my golf cart and shoved it under the partner’s head.  Kevin told me to look at the coloration around the partner’s fingers and told me that the man was going into shock.  Kevin asked for my sweatshirt and I took it off and wrapped it around the partner. More and more it seemed the man was able to breath on his own and Kevin could devote his energy to keeping the breathing passage clear as water and mucus kept coming up.

 

During all this activity, the maintenance supervisor used his cell phone to call 911 and request an ambulance.  I was told the ambulance arrived in just a mater of minutes, but it seemed an eternity to me.

 

The partner was drifting in and out of shock and was barely conscious.  He could not recognize us and did not know where he was.  As the EMT technicians tried to strap him onto the flat board and secure his neck in a brace, the partner fought us.  I had to hold his legs so he would not kick one of the EMT’s into the water. 

 

A second ambulance arrived as well as two policed cruisers.  With the help of the second team of technicians, the partner was finally strapped down on the board and transferred to a gurney for the trip up the dock ramp and into the back of one of the ambulances.  Just before the doors to the ambulance were closed, the partner finally looked at Kevin and asked, “Kevin, what the hell’s going on here?”  Kevin reassured the partner and sent the ambulance off towards the hospital.

 

The second set of EMT’s wanted a full account of what happened from Kevin as one of the police officers, a friend of mine, cornered me for a full report for his bosses.  My policeman friend called the County Marine Patrol Unit who at first said to hold us there until they could arrive on scene.  A second call to the marine patrol resulted in them saying that because the boat was not moving at the time of the accident, they did not need to respond and the police could release us after they finished their report.

 

It seems that after I had walked away from their boat earlier, the partner was getting ready to cast off and jumped over the boom on the sail boat’s mast to cross the boat.  His foot caught on something and he sprawled face first out onto the concrete dock and lost consciousness.  Kevin secured his line to the cleat on the dock in order to go and help the partner.  He took his eyes off the partner only for a second, but in that short amount of time the partner had slipped off the dock into the water.  He disappeared below the surface instantly and was well on his way to the bottom before Kevin was able to grab him to pull him back up.  Kevin had screamed “SAM!” When the partner had first hit the dock and the maintenance supervisor reached Kevin very quickly to help pull the partner back up onto the dock.

 

After the event was over and all the emergency vehicles had left, Kevin and I sat down on the chairs I keep in front of my dock shack.  We were both still shaking and passed light conversation between us as we tried to calm back down before we had to do anything else today.  Kevin thinks the prognosis is good for the partner, but promised to call me as soon as he hears what the doctors have to say.

 

Kevin called me from the hospital before I left work.  His partner is listed in critical condition.  He will on a respirator for several days.  He ingested a huge amount of salt water and when his condition stabilizes they will have to try and cleanse the salt from his lungs.  At some point after he comes off the respirator, they will do a CAT scan to determine the extent of his head injury sustained when his head hit the concrete dock.  His name is Bill and he could use your prayers right about now.

 

All in all, it was quite a Friday the thirteenth for me today.  I don’t ever want to have to go through something like that again.  I am glad, though, that I signed up for the CPR course I took this last August to freshen up my skills.  If any of you have a chance to in the future, take the course.  You never know whose life you might save, or when.

 

 

An update for the New Year!

First let me wish everyone a very Happy New Year.  The year 2006 hold so much promise, may we use our time this year wisely

 

I want to thank one and all for the outpouring of support I received after my last post.  Your kind words brought me comfort and gave me strength to get through a bit of rough water.

 

Trenton is still living with us and will be for some time to come.  We have no idea how long his stay will last, but take it one week at a time and make sure he has a regular routine and maintains his good habits.  He is a good student and we make sure he completes his studies each day before we allow him to play.  He’s used to it and doesn’t mind, there is plenty of play time left after the homework is done.

 

Trenton had a great Christmas.  He received a letter from Santa two weeks before the big day and was thrilled.  I’m just glad he didn’t recognize my handwriting, LOL! 

 

Christmas day dawned with the little guy getting up at One AM and waking us to let us know Santa had already come to our house.  We coaxed him back to bed and he slept ‘til we woke him at seven to open his presents.  He thought it was cool that Santa had eaten the cookies he had left out and drank most of the milk.

 

Santa was good to Trenton and he received some gifts that he had been wanting for up to two years now.  There were presents under the tree that we placed there from his absentee parents, and one from each of us in the household, as well.

 

We devoted a lot of time to Trenton every day and he had a ball getting so much attention.  Then it was back to school Monday and he was excited to be able to tell his school buddies what he got for Christmas.

 

I was very sick during his first week off from school.  I had flu-like symptoms.  It was a virus that went through this community like wildfire.  Mine changed from virus to bacterial and I had to get antibiotics from the doctor before I could shake it off.  I didn’t start feeling human again until Christmas Eve Day. 

 

Calls from the parents, both in different places, were regular at first, and now sporadic.  His Dad calls at least every other day, but it’s been a few days now since his mother has called. 

 

 The last we heard of Danielle, she had still not reached her Father’s house in California.  It became apparent she was lying to us about her whereabouts early on.  I mean, how many times does one have to pass through Tennessee to reach California?  She would forget where she told us she was on her previous calls and at one point was in Nebraska and two days later driving through Tennessee again.  What a pity her education did not extend to include the geography of the United States.  We can only pray that she eventually reaches her father and that he gets her into the drug rehabilitation program she so desperately needs. 

 

I knew I would be away from this keyboard for a bit of time but I have surprised myself by finding I’ve not posted in a full month.  I have had very little time for visiting other journals in J-Land and the web, as well.  I find that there is not any single aspect of my daily routine that has not been changed by the presence of Trenton living in our home now.  As the weeks go by, I will be able to make the slight adjustments and recoup some of my journaling time again.  Thanks to all of you who understand.

 

No, today’s post is not another story of daring rescues at sea or exciting adventures on the water.  I realized after my last post just how many of you care and I just wanted to update you on the situation.  I also wanted you all to know why I seemed to just drop off the face of the Earth for a whole month. 

 

I made it half-way through the comments on my last post, sending thank you notes to each commenter.  Then, I got sick and had to give up on it.  Please know how much each and every comment meant to me.  You are all so very nice and a wonderful community to be a part of.  I’m going to try and get around and visit all of you as I can over the next few days.

 

Yes, Christmas 2005 was a warm and wonderful day at our house.  I can only hope that each of you had a wonderful Christmas Time as well.

 

My special thanks to Donna over at D's Design for the graphic at the top of this post.  Donna does some wonderful work and is kind enough to share it with those who would like to use it.  She does ask for some sort of credit, and with talent like hers, it's very easy to give her a mention when I snag some of her artwork.  Thanks Donna!

 

A Family In Crisis

There is a little cloud over our family this Holiday Season, but there is light on the horizon. I took this picture a week ago and it seems very fitting for this entry.

I’ve alluded to some family trouble cropping up in a previous post but did not elaborate. Since one of the main reasons I started this journal is for my 6 year-old Grandson Trenton to read it when he grows up, I thought I’d give a little insight into what is going on. Perhaps in a few years, if he reads this as I hope, he will have a better understanding of the events leading up to Christmas 2005, the first Christmas he will spend without the company of his mother or father.

I don’t like to air my family’s dirty laundry; However, this story may have benefit for some that may be going through similar circumstances. It may also serve to fill in some blanks for Trenton a few years from now when he will be older and more capable of coming to terms with family events.

The story really started two years ago, during the Christmas season on 2003. So, sit back and get comfy and I’ll try and fill you in.

It was in December 2003 when we got a collect long distance call from Paulette’s son Trace. He was calling from the Reno, Nevada County Jail facilities. Trace was 31 years old at that time and was married to Danielle. They had a son, Trenton who was going to turn Five in February.

Trace left home a few weeks shy of graduating from high school. Paulette and I had been dating and were getting pretty serious about each other. He eventually got his GED and was off roaming the country with some friends of his, selling meat off the back of a truck. It turns out that Trace was a natural born salesman and did quite well.

We heard from Trace very sporadically through the years, but he seemed to be doing well, although he had a problem with drugs that would rear its ugly head from time to time. We did get to see him once and meet his wife and our Grandchild on a visit to Upstate New York near Watertown when we went to visit Paulette’s father.

The story is that Trace was in jail that December, 2003 for spousal abuse. The side we heard was that Danielle’s sister had gotten mad at Trace during an argument and called the police in Reno, where they were all living at the time, and told them Trace had hit Danielle. Danielle told the arresting policemen that Trace had not hit her, but, upon further questioning, let it slip that Trace had pushed her during an argument and so off Trace went to jail.

Trace got out of jail right around Christmas day or a couple of days afterwards and we made arrangements for the three of them to come here to Georgia to get a new start on life. At first things went well.

Both Trace and Danielle got jobs and moved into their own rental house. They made attempts to pay off some of the money they had to borrow to get moved in and other necessities. But things were not as smooth as they could have been. Danielle was having problems at her work place and so was Trace. Trace changed jobs several times, Danielle changed jobs once, then gave up. She hasn’t worked a day in over six months now.

The drug problems crept back into Trace and Danielle’s life and plunged the lives of Paulette, Aunt Sandy, who lives with us, and me into a vortex of lies, broken promises and heartbreak. Paulette would not give up on them, bless her heart, but it has taken its toll on our finances and put a strain on the entire family. The stress that Paulette has been under is criminal, considering her heart condition that her son is very much aware of. It has all come to a head recently as Paulette and I refused to enable their lifestyle any longer and cut off all financial assistance.

Trace claims he is clean of the drugs, though no strong case can be made there, but Danielle is still out of control. They both need professional help. Trace refuses to acknowledge the need to enter a program.

They are about to be evicted and have no income whatsoever. Trace has been in touch with a friend in the meat business who is going to send him a ticket to fly to California so that Trace can work for his company. Danielle’s father, also in California, is sending her money to fly home and has enrolled her in a thirty-day program for the drug problem. Trace is separating from Danielle, although not legally. They will divorce if she does not complete the drug program, he claims.

We have gotten papers notarized giving us temporary custody of Trenton. We will keep him clothed, fed, and safe until his parents can get their act together, no matter how long it may take. We have the difficult job of making this little boy’s Christmas a happy one in spite of the fact that his parents will be across the nation and not beside the tree with him on Christmas morning.

This has all come to a head this week and may explain to some of my journal buddies why they don’t see my comments in their journals right now. I have my hands full here and my time online is a tenth of what it was before all this came to a boil.

We have some terrific gifts for the little guy to find under the tree. Some items he has wanted for two years now. We will make sure that a few of his presents have tags saying they came from his parents, too. We want him to know they love him and miss him. I will be spending a lot of time with Trenton this holiday season trying to keep him doing little boy things and not dwelling on adult problems.

This dialogue today is not meant as a rant, and I don’t want to be carping about our family problems. I did want to let my extended family know some of what we are facing here. I also want Trenton, years from now, to read this story as I wrote it during the actual time frame that it happened and not from the faulty memory of an aging or biased Grandfather.

Our Christmas will be as happy as we can possibly make it for Trenton. I seek not your sympathy here, but your understanding that we are a family in crisis and we cope, one day at a time.

I wish you all a very happy holiday season, and a very merry Christmas!

A Close Call

"Mayday! Mayday! Mayday!" It was Wednesday, a week before Thanksgiving, and I had just arrived at work after having Monday and Tuesday off. I had checked the gas pumps and retrieved the daily printout from our fuel tank monitoring station. The voice on the radio was shrill and high pitched. I first thought the voice sounded like a child playing on the radio.

I hurried into my dock shack to hear this on the big radio. I was sure the Coast Guard would come on and tell the kid to quit playing on the radio.

"Vessel hailing Mayday, this is the United States Coast Guard, Section Tybee, do you copy?" I thought, "Gee! Are they are taking this child seriously, or giving him enough rope to hang himself?"

"Mayday! Mayday! Mayday! This is the "Dauphina!" We are taking on water, possibly sinking! The bridge just closed right on top of us. U. S. Guard, Mayday!"

A chill went up my spine almost causing my hair to stand on end! This was no child, but an obviously hysterical lady shouting into the microphone.

This is every boater's nightmare who operates a boat tall enough to need draw bridges to open for safe passage. There is a drawbridge just south of our area and also one just to the north of us. This boat had tried to go through the drawbridge to the north of us as it headed south, coming towards us.

I settled onto my stool and turned up the volume. I was compelled to listen as this played out.

"Coast Guard! This is the 'Dauphina,' we were heading south under the bridge and it closed right on top of our mast! Our cockpit was pushed completely under water and we are taking on water! We need help!"

Coast Guard Tybee: "Yes ma'am! I understand the bridge came down on top of you and you are taking on water. What is your current position, ma'am and how many people are on board?"

Dauphina: "We are at the Causton Bluff bridge and are taking on water! The engine quit and we are trying to get our bilge pumps on and to get clear of the bridge. There are two adults on board. The bridge tender closed the bridge on us!"

Coast Guard Tybee: "Delphina, I understand you are taking on water and there are two adults on board. Ma'am at this time, I'd like you toput on your PFD's (life preservers) if you haven't put them on yet."

Dauphina: "Coast Guard I understand. Yes, we are putting our life vests on now. Our situation is stabilizing, the water is being pumped out and my husband just threw out an anchor. There seems to be a lot of damage, our engine quit."

Coast Guard Tybee: "Dauphina, this is Coast Guard Tybee. Ma'am, I understand you have thrown out your anchor. Please give me your current position."

Dauphina: "Coast Guard Tybee, we are right at the bridge and, hold on, here comes my husband. He can update you on our situation." (Voice of husband) "Coast Guard, our pumps seem to have cleared our cockpit of water, we seem to be stabilized now and I can't see any more water coming in. We need to be towed to a facility to assess our damage and get the boat out of the water. Please send a tow boat as fast as possible."

To make a long story short, (this dialogue went on for over forty-five minutes), The Dauphina was a sailboat heading south on the Intra Coastal Waterway. It had approached the bridge right behind another sailboat. The first sailboat hailed the bridge on the VHF radio and requested an opening for passage through the bridge. The Drawbridge operator complied and the Delphina followed the first boat through without contacting the bridge operator. The bridge tender, as they are called, must not have noticed the second boat, or grossly misjudged the timing of closing the bridge for a safe passage by both boats.

I did some follow up investigating a couple of days later, as I have friends working at the facility where the boat was eventually hauled out. There was very little damage that actually occurred. The boat is of a type that is built for offshore racing and was strong enough to survive this punishment. I was astounded.

According to my friend, the bridge came down on the top of the mast and literally pushed the boat down into the water. This caused the cockpit to go below the surface of the water and it filled up immediately spilling water down the companionway into the cabin and engine compartment of the boat.

Fast work by the captain of the boat got the pumps on and the water out before complete floatation was lost. No damage to the deck where the mast was stepped occurred and very little damage happened to the rigging.

If you were looking for a holiday miracle, well it's a miracle that no one was injured and that the boat was able to weather such a blow and survive.

I'm proud of the Coast Guard in the way that they handled this event. They had a launch on scene much faster than I had thought possible. They got a commercial towing outfit to respond to the situation and got the main channel to the Intra Coastal Waterway cleared for navigation in what seemed like record time.

I've said it here before, and I'll say it again. Thank God for our boys in blue! You can all be proud of the way the Coast Guard operates in my area, and I'm sure how they operate around the rest of the country as well. Well done, U. S. Coast Guard!

Just a note to explain the lighthouse that now appears in my "About Me" space. Recently, AOL began putting advertising at the top of our journals without any warning whatsoever. Many who have journals on AOL left AOL and set up their journals via different service providers as a way of protest to AOL's actions.

This lighthouse was created by Nightmaremom, (Donna), over at The journal "This That and Hockey." The lighthouse is to represent to our friends who left that we have left a home light burning so that they may find their way back to read and comment in our journals, or to come back and journal here at AOL again.

We will always cherish the friendships we have made in this community and respect the decisions of those who both left and those who stayed. We just wanted to let them know they are welcome back anytime!

The Fall of 1967

It's fall now, even in the Deep South. I lost a bet with a VIVI Award nominee and my payoff, if I lost, would be to write about the strangest or most unique fall I've ever had and to show a picture of me doing a fall activity.

I know, you all want to know what the bet was over. I bet this fine journalist and friend would win a VIVI Award after being nominated in four different categories. The award never came and I'm paying off on my bet. You can check out her excellent journal at this link.

http://ellipsissuddenlycarly.blogspot.com

The most interesting or unique fall I've experienced would have to be the fall of 1967. I had just started my junior year at Hampton High School in Hampton Virginia.

When my father, an officer and pilot in the U.S. Air Force got transferred to Langley Air Force Base in Hampton, Virginia, I had just graduated from the eighth grade in Smyrna, Tennessee. I was popular in school, played trombone in the school band, and loved the house we lived in that was set on one-and-a-half acres near Stuart's Creek. Life was pretty good and I did not want to move.

I knew that I would have to move whether I wanted to or not. My father was a career officer in the military and we moved every three years. It was just a fact of life as I grew up. There was nothing I could do to change it.

When we got the assignment to Langley, I got a map of Virginia and found Hampton on the map. All my doubts about the move vanished when I saw that Hampton was on the Atlantic Coast and surrounded by water. I loved the water and we had a boat. I could already slalom ski better than any adult I had met. This move might be fun after all.

During the school year, the first two years of living in Hampton were hell for me. They wore different clothes than the kids did where I had come from. No one told me about that before the school year started. I stood out like a sore thumb and the kidding and weird looks started immediately. One of the school bullies found me an excellent target and my life that first year could not get any worse.

By the time the fall of 1967 came to pass, I had found my way out of the situation with the bully adjusted my wardrobe, changed from the Junior High School to Hampton High School and was just starting to really fit in. I was in the High School Marching Band and was the first to letter on the Swim Team that year. I had even learned to play the guitar.

I usually dreaded the fall. A new school year with new teachers and weather that just got colder every day for months on end. I hated cold weather! The fall of 1967 was different! I looked forward to the school football games. I liked my classes. I was no longer bothered by bullies or teased by thoughtless kids. I wore my letter sweater with pride!

I had a mad and passionate crush on two of my teachers that year. Nancy Orcutt was my English teacher and I had never met anyone quite like her. She was an attractive blond with a brilliant mind and made her classes interesting to her students daily. My other crush was on my history teacher, a short and stunning brunette, who was fun loving and made her history lessons come alive.

We had just moved onto the base and I had to make new friends with the kids I met in base housing. When we transferred in, base housing was full. What made the difference was that dad got promoted to the rank of full colonel and there was a vacancy in base housing for that grade of rank.

The house we moved into was an older Victorian two story house of red brick with ivy growing up the sides and front. It was on the part of the base that was on the water and I was thrilled. My room was upstairs and I had a dormer style window that I could sit in facing the water while I played my guitar and day dreamed. This house really looked like a building straight off the campus of an ivy-league college. That's the feeling it gave me, anyway!

My sister had already gone off to college. Johns Hopkins University's nursing program is where she was that fall. She lived in Baltimore, Maryland and I felt kind of strange living in a house without her daily presence.

I had a strong crush on her best friend at college whom had come home with her on a previous visit at the old house. I used to sit in that upstairs window seat composing letters and songs to send to Pat Carpenter as I gazed over a beautiful vista of the Back River. Pat was a wonderful person whom I've always regretted losing contact with over the years.

Thanksgiving was the time everything came to a head that year. We knew something was in the wind, we could just feel it. The Air Force usually gave new assignments with promotions at my father's level. We were waiting and worrying.

My mother wanted to go to the Officer's Club for Thanksgiving dinner. There would only be three of us at the table and my father was about to give in to her wishes when he got his new assignment papers.

Dad was to report to Vietnam the following March. He would leave his present assignment in January and report to Washington DC for spy school and counter insurgency training. No, Dad would not be a spy or counterspy. He had to go through the training because men assigned to his command would be doing these jobs. The commander of these units would need to know what these jobs entailed. Notice I said units ... plural. Dad would be the commander of two helicopter outfits, a group of C-124 Caribou aircraft built for short takeoff and landings, and an outfit of C-130's that had Puff The Magic Dragon cannons installed on some and some with The August Moon equipment that could light up an entire battlefield as it flew overhead at night.

I can't tell you anymore about what my father did in Vietnam. Almost everything he did was classified and my father would never discuss classified information. Period. That was the kind of officer he was and one of the reasons, I guess, he rose to such a rank as he did.

Because of his impending departure, Mom decided that we would have a home cooked meal after all for Thanksgiving since Dad would not be with us for at least one full year. Mom was a first rate cook and she surpassed her previous achievements that Thanksgiving. There were some tears being shed as we bowed to give our thanks at the table that year. I didn't know how to act, so I played the brave one, ready to be the man of the house while dad was gone. But I saw the tears and never forgot them.

We started making plans that fall as to what mom and I would do and where we would live while dad was gone. We still owned the house in Tennessee where we used to live and I wanted to return to my old friends. So, we started to get our affairs in order and plan our move back to Tennessee.

The general who lived down the street from us offered to allow me to move in with them for the remainder of the school year so that I could finish my swimming season with the team. His son and I had become friends and it was a very generous offer. I turned it down, though. Losing my father for a year was going to be hard enough on Mom. Jan, my sister, would remain away at school in Baltimore and if I stayed behind Mom would be alone. I chose to move back to Tennessee with her.

As fall turned to winter and Christmas plans and decorations were being made; we all dealt with the impending future in each of our own way. Yes, it was a strange and unique fall that year of 1967 and one that I will never forget.

Dad made it back safely from Vietnam over a year later. The experience changed him and it changed us, as individuals and as a family. We seemed closer when we were all together again and we no longer took anything for granted. We were so very thankful to have him back and to have each other! Oh, and one other thing happened. After his return, Dad and I were never too embarrassed to hug anymore.

As an aside, those of you who read this journal regularly and like to read the comments can gauge my sister's reactions to what I write. She comments using the screen name Ltcjan. She does not have an AOL account so you can't email to that screen name. If anyone ever wants to contact her, send me an Email and I'll send you her Email address. Ltc Stands for Lieutenant Colonel. She may be changing that screen name soon because she is pinning on her Eagles this week. Jan is now a full Colonel in the Army Reserves. Congratulations, Sis!

As you sit down to the table this Thursday on Thanksgiving Day, think about the things you have to be thankful for. I will be giving some very special thanks for having become a part of this community and I will give thanks for all of my friends and family online and off. Happy Thanksgiving everyone!

A Short Break

I know that, once again, it's been too long since my last post. I've answered the inquiring Email saying everything is okay with me, I have just been busy. That is true to a point. I am fine, and everyone in my household is fine, but there has been some trouble with my Stepson. There are some problems he is having to deal with right now. My Grandson Trenton moved in with us yesterday and it may be for a day, a week, or a month. I just don't know right now.

Please know I have not abandoned this journal and bear with me. I have an entry three fourths of the way written that I have not had a chance to finish yet, but will soon, I hope.

As for my thoughts on AOL adding advertising to these journals without our prior knowledge, I have not had time to fully digest that bit of news. I knew the AIM accounts would have an advertising banner across them, AOL said so right up front. To add advertising to regular AOL journals is a surprise.

I really have come to love writing this journal and being a part of this community. I just can't afford the time to really weigh this out right now. So, for the time being, I am here and will stay.

This is my first post since the VIVI Awards presentations which I really enjoyed attending. My heartfelt congratulations to all the winners. The VIVI Awards Committee did a superb job and put in so much work. Thank you!

Now, I may be able to post again in a day or two, or it may be another week or two. I may lose a lot of my readers for being so inconsistent, however, my family is more important right now and they need me. I do promise, though, that I will be back and remain a part of this community for the foreseeable future.

Thanks for bearing with me and I hope to be writing again sooner rather than later.