Do You Have What It Takes?

We just got done talking about MOUNTAIN MEN and GOVERNMENT EXPLORERS at school.  You think you're tough?  Well, have you ever had a bear rip your ear and part of your scalp off and then let your dirty friend with no medical experience sort of sew it back on out in the wilderness?  Probably not, because you're not Jedediah Smith.  Wimp.

What can I say?  Kids love learning about tough people.  And I love teaching them about it.  

Me: "What?  You don't want to do your fractions test?  Jedediah had his ear ripped off and still probably didn't even complain.  Cowboy up."  


(Just kidding, I've never said that--except the "Cowboy Up" part, which they hear almost once a day, but I would sure love to say it.  No worries.  There's always tomorrow.)

After learning about the government explorers the U.S. sent out to map the "wild West," the kids wrote a wanted ad for a newspaper advertising the job.  Here are some of their "Help Wanted" ads:

MAY NOT HAVE THE BEST HOURS.....

Wanted: Explorer.  Tell us how to survive.  Notice: You have to work 24 hours a day 7 days a week.  What?!  

(The kid actually put "What?!" at the end.  Love it.)

Wanted: Government explorer.  Must know how to speak other languages.  Must work full-time, holidays, weekends, and nights.  You need to have a pen and paper.  Must have experience with a job for at least 12 years and need to know how to live alone.  If allergic to anything, not a good job.

Should I know who he is?  Because I don't....

MAY INVOLVE ANIMALS.....

Wanted: Government Explorers.  If you are allergic to bees, horses, or other animals, this may not be the job for you.  Must be willing to work very often.  This includes holidays, late nights, weekends, and more. Must know other languages and agree with Indians.  You will need mapping supplies.

Wanted: Government explorers.  Must be able to tell directions, survive in nature, and map out things.  Must be able to sleep outside and travel and find your way home.  You must be able to defend against bears and other dangerous animals. 

Wanted: Government explorers.  Need: bravery.  Be good with traveling and nature.  Bring supplies for survival.  Be ready for maybe bears, wolves, foxes, or poisonous snakes.  You may go through deserts.

Wanted: Government explorer.  To be a government explorer, you need to be brave, like skin animals without throwing up and kill big animals and shoot big guns. 

MAY REQUIRE KNOWLEDGE OF PLANTS.....

Looking for a job?  Stop by Tough Crowd Corners.  You need an application.  Be able to ride a horse.  Good experience with outdoors.  Your job will be at least four years long.  We will have all the equipment for you.  Be able to make trails.  Big boys who can tell the difference between poison plants and non-poison plants.   

Wanted: Good explorers.  Need to know how to ride a horse, have knowledge about plants, how to make trails, and how to survive in the wild.  Be willing to work for five years straight.  Be tough.  (Picture: “Is that poison ivy?”  “You can do better!!!”)

Yes, Mr. Hammond.  I did find out the hard way what poison ivy is.

I think the funniest part was the differences between the boys and girls.  

WHAT BOYS HAD TO SAY:

Wanted: Government explorers.  Have to be good with directions, know how to make camp fires, or go to the training camp.  If you can crush the odds, defy what your wife has to say and rise to the challenge.  Your name will forever be followed by the words: Mountain Man.

Wanted: Explorers.  Wanted for new government plan.  Two years of training.  Have to do well in wildlife.  Have to have a sense of directions.  Have to know what plants to eat.  Ten year contract.  Men with clingy wives…do not apply. 

Wanted: Someone that has five years of experience.  And please don’t take your wife.  Your job is to be an explorer for 20 years.  You also have to get your own gun.

Boys' Version of Family Exploration

WHAT THE GIRLS HAD TO SAY:

 Wanted: Explorer with three years wildlife experience.  Long 2-3 years, so bring family if needed.  Must know way around.  Know what food to eat that’s not poison.  Have wildlife skills and hunting skills.  Must have your own gun and knife.  Must have fist-aid techniques.  Must know how to build a fire. 

Wanted: Government Explorers.  Someone who is good with the outdoors and with guns, to be able to use a compass, and make trails.  It will take awhile so if you have a family, you will have to miss them or take them with you. 

Girls' version of Family Exploration.
Almost the same...

You got all that?  Your ear could get ripped right off.  Suck it up and sew it back on.  You might get into poison ivy or eat something poisonous, but come on.  You can do better!  You better skin animals without throwing up and be tough enough to leave that clingy wife behind.  If you think you have what it takes, there could be a job for you.

Please apply at Mrs. Montoya's 4th grade class.  A panel of ten-year-old toughness experts will determine if you really have what it takes.  

This is Jedediah Smith.  He thinks you're a wimp.

Cancer, Herpes, and a Root Canal

I love being married.  It's like I have all the same things to do that I always have had, but sometimes, they magically turn up done...without me doing them.  Like my breakfast being made when I go to leave for work, or the laundry being done or the dishes being washed when I get home from work.

Nevertheless, balancing my 32 kids at school, the 3 year old Sunbeams I teach at church, and just the everyday things like, you know, getting dinner made, seems to have thrown me over the edge.  I have been sick more times since meeting Paul than probably all the years I've been away from home...combined.  What is it about change that does that to a person?

Anyway, a few weeks ago my being sick reached an all-time high.  My mouth started hurting, my throat started swelling up, and I got a horrible fever somewhere between 100-103 degrees.  When Paul asked me what was wrong I said, "Honey, I think I have cancer."

Something like that, minus the smiling or course.

"Why would you say that?!"

"Paul, I have never been sick this much.  I never get sick.  I have been sick FIVE TIMES this year.  That probably means that something went horribly wrong in my body and I have cancer, and I'm going to die."

"You don't have cancer and you are not going to die."

"How do you know?!"

Because after lying in bed all day with a fever, what else am I to conclude?  A totally healthy person with Viking blood gets sick five times in a row?  There's nothing it could be but cancer or something equally horrible.

And thanks to all the Lurlene McDaniel "Cancer Death Books" I read as a sixth and seventh grader (Six Months to Live, Don't Die My Love! and other equally riveting treasures) I knew exactly how this would play out.  I would be one of those tragic stories--a young woman, only 27, with everything a person could want in life, suddenly diagnosed with some type of lymphoma--when it had just seemed like a cold or flu.  Of course, the biggest tragedy was how horrible I was going to look bald with this big, round face of mine.

I know, you want to run to the library and get it, don't you?

While Paul was able to convince me that I probably didn't have cancer and didn't need to say goodbye to anyone just yet, I was still certain that all the sickness wasn't normal.  So, on Saturday, I dragged myself to a QuickCare...that didn't take my insurance.  I was so exhausted, I went home and took a two hour nap before calling the next place first to make sure they took my insurance before I tried again.  Finding they would take it, I drove myself over, pretty certain now that it was some type of infection that had started in my gums that was causing the fever.

I tried to explain that to the InstaCare folks, but would they even look in my mouth?  No.  They swabbed me for strep, tested me for mono, and told me that I probably needed to "rest and drink more water."  By the time I got to the car, I was hysterical.  "They just charged me $200 to tell me to drink more water!!!"

It is no secret that I hate doctors.  I typically think they are morons (Sorry Brett and Paul).  I feel like I have never had a good experience with a doctor to this point in my life.

It started in elementary school when I was getting horrible earaches.  My mom finally convinced me we should go see a doctor.  After waiting for what seemed like forever in the waiting room, they called me back.  The doctor asked a few questions, looked in my ears, said nothing was wrong, and told me I was probably just cold and should buy some earmuffs.

"What an idiot!"  I thought.  "We paid all this money so he could tell me to wear earmuffs?!"

And that was when I decided that doctors knew nothing.


I have been to the doctor as little as possible from then on, but the times I have had to go have not been any more reassuring.

My greatest fear in going to the doctor is not that there will be something wrong with me.  It's that there won't be anything wrong, and suddenly, I 'll be that same little kid being told to go buy earmuffs.  Which is exactly what happened.  Except this time I was supposed to drink more water.  Which would have made me less mad if they would have at least tried to listen and look at what I told them hurt.

And so, I went home and drank more water and slept some more.  But things didn't get better--they simply got worse.  Monday I stayed home from school and didn't even make sub plans or show up to my important presentation I was supposed to be giving.  I slept until 11:00 am, ate some food, and then went back to bed.  (If you know me, this is all clearly atypical behavior--probably a sign of imminent death.)

By Tuesday, I was able to get into an emergency appointment with a dentist.  After all, the pain was coming from my mouth.  Perhaps they would be more informative and less expensive than another doctor.

Dentist: "It was the top right that you said was hurting you, correct?"
Me: "No, the bottom left."
Dentist: "The bottom left?"
Me: "Yes."
Dentist: "Well then, I have bad news for you.  Because you have problems on the top right."

And so, there in my dental chair, I discovered that I did not have cancer.  I needed a root canal (top right) and I had herpes (bottom left).

"Herpes?!"

"Above the belt herpes!" he said reassuringly when he saw that look on my face that screamed, "But I can't have herpes!  I'm not that kind of person."

Apparently, 70-90% of adults have it and are carriers.  It's the same thing that causes cold sores.  If a person gets too stressed, it can manifest itself.  In my case, the symptoms were high fever, canker sores all over the inside of my mouth and tongue, sore throat, and swollen, bleeding gums.

Delightful.

"So, how do we fix it?" I asked, secretly pleading, "Please give me drugs, please give me drugs."
"Well," he said, pointing to the virus section he was showing me in his dental textbook, "It says here take Ibuprofen.  It'll clear up in 7-14 days."
"I don't have that long," I said.
"Well, the worst part is over," he reassured me.  "But, that bad news is, that top right part of your mouth?  You had a filling fall out and it looks like you now need a root canal."

True Story.

So, I didn't have cancer.  But I did have herpes (and now have the terror of a repeat performance if I ever get stressed again), and I certainly needed root canal--which frankly was nowhere near as horrible as the herpes.  At least they numbed me for the root canal.

Talk about some March Madness.

Now if I can never, ever get stressed again, we should be good to go.
"You were stressed?!" a mom at school asked me.  "What do you have to be stressed about?"
I know.  There is nothing to be stressed about ever again.

Except maybe doctors.

But let's look on the bright side.
After not being able to eat for so long, at least my pants fit again.