I Believe I Can Fly | Or Free Fall

By now many of you know Michael is my son. He is, simply stated a blooming genius. Did you notice the subtle plant tie-in with the addition of blooming? I like to remind Michael of a valuable piece of archival reference material that I have savored for years. It’s an article from the Wall Street Journal dated June 28, 1996 titled “Heredity Theory Says Intelligence In Males Is ‘Like Mother, Like Son’ that basically says boys. inherit their intelligence from their mothers, according to Gillian Turner, an Austrian geneticist. Perhaps there are many counter theories by now but it will make for lively debate. I am sure many of you will put that information to good use.

At any rate my brilliant son Michael has chastised me for not providing my readers with an explanation for what has befallen me over the past week. And when I protested about the shape that I am in due to, shall we say, the pumpkin accident, he said, and I quote ” Mom, have you considered the physical challenges that Stephen Hawking works with every day?”

I think Pumpkin accident horror week-end started like this; and it was innocent enough. It was the Friday before Halloween when I wore my pumpkin sweater vest and Jaimee Goehring took a picture and posted it on her wall on Facebook. Jaimee has teased me and her Mom, Candy for years for wearing holiday festive wear. She thinks that, shall we say only, “mature” ladies wear holiday sweaters. Along with the lovely picture of me in my pumpkin sweater vest on her Facebook wall she posted a comment that she wanted a sweater like that when she “grows up.” I commented that if I had known pumpkins were so slenderizing and flattering I would have made pumpkins part of my basic wardrobe for life and I will be looking to add more pumpkin attire in the future and I will be be wearing turkeys, snowmen and Santas very soon. Perhaps I will even be wearing pumpkins as some sort of head gear. Then on Sunday, Halloween, I decided I needed more pumpkins as decorations to add to the goose girls that are dressed up in the yard to delight little Trick or Treaters as they marched up the stone path to ring the bell and get their treats. One of the geese is dressed as a witch and the other is dressed as merlin the magician. My husband doesn’t like for me to go in the attic but I told him the LED lit pumpkin I wanted was right by the pull down stairs, I thought. My husband had the Cowboys game on which was going to be torture enough I suspected and I was going out in the garage to get more pumpkins. I climbed up the pull down stairs and started milling around up there and I promise you I was thinking these stupid arrogant thoughts,”I wonder how accidents happen?” “I’m being so careful, I’m holding on to the joists, I’m watching where I’m stepping, how can you actually have an accident when you plan each move, that’s plywood, I’m sure that’s plywood by that box over there.” “Pride goes before destruction, a haughty spirit before a fall.” NIV Proverbs 16:18 *

I stepped through sheet-rock and fell 8 feet to the concrete garage floor. I was aware during those split seconds during the Free Fallin how bad it was going to be. Then when I did land and the pain was so extreme I tried to scream as loud as I could so my husband could hear me, he didn’t hear me yell but he heard a tumbling sound like a box being tossed down the stairs so he rant to the garage door and found me on the floor by the back door. He called 911 and I could hear the sirens before he hung up the phone. The rescue team that came to get me were the most wonderful people you can imagine. The took me to Medical Center of Plano and the team in the ER on Halloween were just outstanding. They x-rayed me from head-to toe. I had a broken foot and a dislocated finger and the rest of me is black and blue, pretty much from head to toe. Mostly doctors and family members can’t believe I survived the fall with as few injuries as I sustained and that I only have a broken foot and dislocated finger and am very bruised, sore and banged up. The lesson learned here for everyone is when they took me in to the ER I was the second person that had fallen through the attic ceiling looking for decorations and while I was still there a third person was admitted in worse condition than I was in.
Now due to my injuries “OUI” had a dilimna. I mentioned in earlier posts that the Texas almanac states the average date for a freeze in our area is November 16th. Last night the temperatures dipped to 34 degrees and “OUI” had to haul the remaining potted plants into the greenhouse and water them.

Remember watering protects plants from the cold. Freeze warnings don’t take a holiday because Gaga knocked herself goofy and almost forgot it was really getting cold. Just because I moved to Texas, I almost forgot I was born a Yankee. How soft I have become. Growing up in Northern Illinois my Dad used to put chains in the trunk along with survival gear, sand if we got stuck in the ice and snow and shovels and a pick ax. Now I fall on my head out of the attic and lull myself into forgetting it’s winter at all. Last night watching the weather while nestled in my down blanket nursing all my wounds I sit up straight as an arrow when the reality finally reaches my addled brain when between the weather man and my husband I get it, it’s going to be 34 degrees! I sit up straight in bed and say “oh don’t worry that’s two degrees above freezing,” and my husband says “so you trust the weather to stay two degrees warm enough to keep your precious Jasmin from Persia alive?” You know where we are headed, don’t you? At 10:30 PM, “OUI”, and you know who “OUI” is now because part of the “OUI” team fell out of the attic crashing onto the concrete floor below in search of pumpkins, nearly killing herself. So now 1/2 of the “OUI” Team had to get the hand truck and move the remaining plants into the $142.00 Do-It-Yourself-Greenhouse, by himself. Now that is dedication. 🙂

I leave you with this thought. I Believe I Can Fly by R. Kelly, so I am Learning To Fly by Tom Petty.

*I want to extend gratitude to my cousin Linda Foshee of Brownfield, Texas and posthumously to her mother, my Great Aunt Mary Louise Chisholm Harrell for catching and correcting the scripture I had misquoted, Proverbs 16:18 that was so exactly apropos for my attitude in the attic just prior to the fall.