Zoe and Aidan rallied today and are finally feeling better....much to my relief! Despite them being under the weather this week, I've managed to get a lot done. I am halfway finished with my retaining wall, I have nearly finished painting the boy's bedroom and...I got the garage and my van cleaned up! To top it off, I also managed to get 30 bags of mulch into the garden and have planted several bushes and plants. I've been scouring local shops for good deals on Perennials and bushes and have really gone crazy buying them and getting them planted. I love a good deal...right now the plants are 60% off!

Amanda has called every night to say "I love you", but I hadn't heard from either of the boys until tonight. Andrew finally called to tell us what a great time he is having. It was such a relief to hear from him, but I feel so sad that the boys haven't really kept in touch. Is this what it will be like when they leave the house someday? After all of the conflict with Amanda, she and I can still talk about anything and the idea of going a day without talking to her is just not palatable...but the boys....they seem to be able to adjust and move on. This might just put a damper on my plans to have them live here while they go to college...and then have them move into the neighborhood with their spouses. Someday, I have the feeling that their wives will be saying to them "when did you talk to your mom last" like I do with Thomas. Well, either that or they'll be saying "Your mom is psycho. She calls here three times a day. It's either her or me!" :> Oh...and you know that they had better choose ME!

Thomas and I have used the time together to both reconnect and have alone time.

We went out on a date night last night and saw "Sicko" which...is a great movie. I think it really highlights a lot of the real problems going on in America right now. It's amazing that as a country we can get side-tracked by issues like "should we keep the word 'God' in the Pledge of Allegiance" when every day we have people without insurance benefits who are being denied services in order to boost the stock portfolios of a handful of CEO's and investors. America has become a very selfish nation. We're not the home of the free and the brave....we're the home of "as long as I'm ok, who cares about you?". It's amazing to me that we can invest hundreds of billions of dollars to go to war with a country that didn't attack us under the guise of "freeing" their people, but we aren't willing to invest even a percentage of that money to improve the lives of hardworking americans. I loved that the focus of the movie was on those with health insurance.

I am lucky and I know it. Because I'm a dawkter's wife, I have had access to immediate appointments, CT scans MRI's and PET scans. I had doctors offer to come to my home in the middle of the night when I was starting chemo and was having some concerning side-effects. My doctors have come to my home and brought meals or gift baskets, have called me to see if I was ok....I am very fortunate. I know that this is not the experience of most people. My chemo buddy lost his healthcare insurance while he was in the hospital in the middle of a bone marrow transplant because he had "missed too many days of work". One of our neighbors was forced to change jobs and relocate because the healthcare insurance provided by his employer wouldn't cover his son's treatments for Leukemia. Healthcare can not be for-profit. It is not like selling a television or a car. Health is not a luxury. It is a requirement for people who want to work and contribute to society. What have we become?

When I lived in Germany and Thomas was a resident, I worked the drive-thru at McDonalds. It wasn't glamorous, but it was the only job that my American bachelors' degree would buy me. I made over $10/hour back then (13 1/2 years ago) and I paid my govt. sponsored health insurance premiums every two weeks from my check. My healthcare wasn't free. I contributed with every paycheck....as did my employer. We paid a little more in taxes, but....I didn't have to pay for any medications, there were no co-pays, and my children could have gone to college for essentially no money. Ultimately, if I consider what I got for my tax dollars...it was a lot more than I get now!

Af far as alone time is concerned....every night when Thomas gets home I have been able to go out into the garden to enjoy planting and working or have had the chance to catch up on my emails or blogs while he watches Simon and Simon or Miami Vice on DVD. We have both had the chance to just relax and enjoy ourselves alone...and together. It's been nice.

I have been contemplating a job that had become available at our local university. Basically, it is the job that I was doing before I got sick...but now it is Full-time and with benefits. Thomas only worked a 1/2 day today and when he got home, I went to Barnes and Nobles to re-work my CV and write a "Philosophy of Teaching" statement. I spent 4 hours working on all of this only to arrive at the conclusion that I just don't know what I want. The position is full-time/12 months. Am I really willing to send my children to KidStop or put them in the hands of a sitter for that amount of time? I want a challenge...I want to creat a life for myself that extends beyond the boundaries of my home....but am I willing to commit to something that time consuming right now? I don't know. The job would be a lot of responsibility and it would be a serious time commitment. On the one hand, that is really exciting to me...but my children...is this the right time? We live in an area where opportunities are few and far between. Thomas told me that if I don't apply for this that I can't complain anymore about not having a career...I will have thrown away my opportunity...but he doesn't know what he is committing to if I do get the job....the daycare drop offs, the prep time....things would change drastically.

I dont' know how much of my hesitation is realistic and how much of it is fear on my part that I'm not good enough. As I wrote my "Philosophy of Teaching" essay, I felt overwhelmed by the fact that I haven't taught for 2 years...that I have some weaknesses in chemistry, and that in general I feel I really would have to do a lot of working and reading to get myself where I feel that I need to be in order to teach again. Even when I was teaching a couple of years ago I felt inadequate because I realized that the more I learned...the less I knew....if that makes sense. Teaching was really the first time that all of those facts and details that I had memorized began to make sense in my mind.

I'm not sure what I should do. Applying for the position isn't a guarantee that I would get the job...which I'm a bit annoyed with considering I created the position when I was at the University. At the end of my time there, I had some conflict with the professor that I was working with...we just had some different ideas. I still have a lot of respect for him and I think that we could work together again...but I don't know.....

Ahhh....these are the kinds of problems that are good to have. I am healthy. My children are healthy. Everything else is just icing on the cake.[/quote]