Another Day Older and Deeper in Debt

If you recognize the title of this blog and even more if you have heard of Tenneesse Ernie Ford, then you must be around my age.

I celebrated my 54th birthday yesterday. I was expecting a normal day with the occasional "Happy Birthday" my family. I work in an elementary school and teach 3 classes of third grade students. I was tired when I arrived at school yesterday morning because it is the end of a long first two weeks of school starting. I have had early morning bus duty for the entire two weeks and my body is still rebelling at having to get up so early.

From across the hallway, a longtime friend and colleague, gave me a card and cute little M&M magnets. She knows I collect M&M things. One of the new partners I teach with this year, is a woman I've actually known for a long time, but never worked with. She stapled a cute little banner outside of my door in the hallway that read, "Happy Birthday Mrs. Martin!" I thought it was very sweet and on my way to do my bus duty, I told her so. She then told me to go back to my classroom and relax that she would do my duty. Wow! I was so surprised, but I let her. How nice of her! In about 15 minutes the students were due in my classroom, but another teacher came to the door and told me I was needed in the Reading computer lab. It was strange, but I figured someone had a problem so I went. Upon arrival, the darkened room seemed odd. I opened the door and the lights came on and 69 third grade children hopped up from their places and yelled, "Surprise!"

I was certainly surprised and had to tell myself not to cry as they sang "Happy Birthday" with those kid voices. As they filed past me out the door to go to class, they proceeded to each give me a hug and say "happy birthday". What a treat!

The birthday greetings didn't stop there. All day long the banner announced my big day and teachers and staff were tapping on my hallway window and mouthing "happy birthday" to me. My teacher friend that began all of this fun, got each of our students to create a birthday card for me which they proudly presented to me as they came into my classroom. At my conference, my team all met in my friend's classroom where we had birthday cake. It was a good time.

At home my husband cooked a lovely dinner with wine. He brought home a sweet pot of miniature roses that hopfully I won't kill and can replant in the yard somewhere. Then my middle son came by with birthday greetings from he and his wife. I loved visiting with him so much, it would have been gift enough. To my surprise his wife and he gave me an iPod nano. I just love it and I'm already feeling younger for just having it. :-) A few days ago, my sweet in-laws brought over a hummingbird feeder which I hope to hang in my backyard and watch the little creatures in flight.

I also received cards both "snail" and "e" from friends. So many people just acknowledging my birth made me realize how blessed that I am. Sometimes I don't feel worth a whole lot. On my birthday, even at 54, I miss hearing Happy Birthday from my mother. But each greeting and act of kindness shown to me yesterday was God's message to me and perhaps my mom as well. Being in this world was no accident.

Thank you to everyone for reminding me that I'm someone of worth in this world. I am grateful to everyone that made this 54 year old feel loved.

The Duke City

Albuquerque has been nicknamed "Duke City" because one of the old Spanish governors named the city "Albuquerque" after a Spanish Duke.

Kim and I just returned from a trip to Duke City to visit our son, Ryan and his wife, Amy. They moved out there a couple of months ago to help some college theater friends renovate and open a theater. Not the movie type, but a live theater with all it takes to put on a play to entertain the people of Albuquerque. We thought it was quite a risky undertaking at first, but having seen their building and heard about all of their plans, I'm excited too. I can't wait to return to see the finished product. For the before pictures, click on my Flickr link from this page.

While Ryan and Amy went to work to earn a living, Kim and I took a look around the dry, hot land outside of the main city. The mountains are filled with ancient markings of people that inhabited Albuquerque long before any Duke ever lived. We walked around ancient petroglyphs in Boca Negra Canyon. That's where I am in the picture posted here. We took several pictures of the drawings as we thought about the people that once lived there and etched their bit of history on the boulders so we could find them today.

While driving back to Texas, we came to Malpais Valley where lava once spewed out of volcanic vents in the earth thousands of years ago. The black oozing stretched over 17 miles. It was most evident that the flowing of hot sticky lava onto a valley floor would forever showcase this bit of history for all to see and learn. I thought this was an extraordinary piece of earth to view.

New Mexico certainly has a lot to teach us about our country's history. Home one day to repack, we will journey to places that will teach us about a different time more closely related to our own. Friday we leave to see New York, Connecticut, and a bit of Massachusetts.

Check back next week when I hope to blog about the last excursion of our summer vacation.

Wireless Internet

This summer has afforded me the opportunity for much travel. I went to Michigan for two weeks and did not take my laptop. I tried to use my sons' dial up service on his computer, but had much better success when he and I took his laptop to a coffee shop with wireless internet service. Then, Kim came up during week two of my visit with his laptop, we could visit the local coffee shop and check email through "wireless internet".

For the past 3 days I have been visiting my cousin who lives in Ft. Worth. Her fairly new neighborhood does not have cable and they do not have wireless internet, so they only have the dial up internet service. While I had my laptop with me, I could not log onto their system because I did not have a phone number at my access. However, while trying to figure out the system, I noticed that I had an internet connection and it was not from my cousin's connection. I was picking up on someone's wireless internet in the neighborhood. Wow! Remarkable! I began to whisper, "I have a connection on your Neighbor A's wireless internet." I was afraid that the internet cops were listening in and I'd be caught. Actually, there were two wireless connections in the neighborhood. Neighbor B was a bit smarter and had a blocker with a password. So, no connection with him. Neighbor A became my secret friend with whom I "shared" his connection. I was most appreciative of his generosity.

At the present I am sitting in the Midland Community Theater backstage area where they have...you guessed it...wireless internet. I had resigned myself to just sitting in the lobby of this theater while Kim attended a board meeting of the Texas Non-profit Theater group of which we are members. I came in armed with my laptop and a book to read in case access to wireless was not available. Upon arriving in the building, I was summoned to the board meeting room by Kim where there were refreshments. After I settled in my chair preparing to either type a story using my laptop or read my book, Kim asked if this school had a wireless connection. A person said they did and kindly escorted me to this (very cold, brrr!!) room where I am happily typing this post and checking email.

I just love this connection to my world of internet friends and websites. It is a miracle that, with my technical ignorance, I am previledged to access this cyberworld almost anywhere.

So, who do I thank for this technilogical gift? Bill Gates? I don't know. But for now I want to thank my husband, Kim, for introducing me to computers and the WWW and also to my dear brother in law for passing this exceptional Apple laptop on to me. This is the best toy with which I have ever had to play and work.