All is right in the world

Mark, Jaden and I leave every morning at 7:15. Mark and Jaden head East towards the High School and I head West towards the freeway. When I get to the end of my street, before I turn right, I take a glance over the railroad tracks to make sure there isn't a car coming and off I go.

All winter as I looked over the tracks, I could see my friends' car warming up. I'm assuming she was warming her car to head to work. EVERY SINGLE TIME I saw her car, I smiled. The world just felt right. You know the feeling. Time is in sync and the stars are aligned correctly.

Rhonda has boys that grew up with my boys. Shelby and Matt Hinkley have been very good friends through the years. The Hinkleys have been a permanent staple in the growing up of the Deason clan. I consider them friends. 

Rhonda and I aren't the go-to-lunch-go-to-a-movie-go-shopping kind of friends. We're just friends. I think she is smart, beautiful, FUNNY, real, a great mom, and all around fantastically fabulous. And I'm guilt free when I see her.

I think we need those kinds of friends in our lives. At times there is so much pressure to "do". I think the "doing" is what I fail most at. I THINK about bringing cookies to new neighbors. I WANT to bring dinner to my Aunt that has cancer or my friend, Pat, that has cancer, or help my neighbor, Celeste, when she is out doing yard work with three little ones tugging and pulling at her trying to gain her attention. But I don't. I'm wrapped up in what I need to do. I juggle work and kids and hubby-ness and dogs and cleaning and gardening and personal time and sleep. Oh sure, I'll feel guilty and say that I feel like I should do more. I don't.

Therefore, I appreciate the smattering of people that are light and fun and free in our lives. The kind that share a smile, a kind word and unspoken support. The kind that when you see their cars warming up down the street, it brings a smile to your face and you know all is right in the world.

Sweaters For Chickens

As I stated in a previous post, I'm adopted. When I was little, I used to imagine what my birth parents were like. When I was super young, I had no doubt that they were in the circus. That was the coolest thing I could imagine.

When I met my family, I was super nervous. I worried and worried that they would find out the "real" me and run screaming for cover.

I met my dad. He hasn't screamed one time and he fills in the blanks of my biological make-up whenever I ask.

Many of my mom's side of the family live right in the same area as my dad, so it is up to them to fill me in on the how's and why's of the Vermeire's. I believe that I am VERY MUCH like them. And I really, really like that.

A few things have happened along our "getting to know each other" path and I have caught a glimpse of the true colors that flow through my blood. Every once in a while, I'll hear from my cousin, Brenda, in White Salmon. We are very close in age and EVERY SINGLE TIME she contacts me I think "If we had grown up together, we would have been great friends."

When something incredibly yucky crossed my path, another cousin, Sheila, was the first to contact me and let me know that I mattered. I still have that email and read it when my heart needs a boost.

I find myself drawn to my cousins, my uncle and my aunt. I keep abreast of happenings with my cousins on facebook and my aunt emails me regularly.

The other day I got an email from Aunt Alice. It was titled "sweaters".  I assumed it was another forwarded message that Alice likes to send. You know...warm, fuzzy, inspirational... The kind that if you don't forward in FIVE MINUTES, horribly rotten things will come your way.

Imagine my surprise when I opened the attachment and it was a photo of two chickens wearing knitted sweaters. Aunt Alice had made sweaters for her chickens.

I shook my head in wonderment. Who thinks about making sweaters for their chickens? Who in the world actually MAKES the sweaters? Aunt Alice.

That's my family. I come from a line of warm, caring people...the kind that make sweaters for chickens.