What's a Karen?

 I am not sure when on where the title "KAREN" 

started from....

but now, whenever someone oversteps what the normal

person would do, they are called Karen.

While looking for a definition of this, I am struck

with the fact that there is actually a group of people:

"a member of a group of people of eastern and southern Myanmar"

However, in our world of today this is not what

"being a KAREN" means.

I don't have a definition but we all know what

being a Karen looks like.

Valentine's Day, boo and I sitting down where we spend

most of our Valentine's at, (don't want to mention name of

restaurant and be labeled a Karen)

We are looking forward to a quiet little corner to talk and 

enjoy the food, and I, for bottomless Mimosa's

We did a brunch so as to be home before the freeze

begins that is so unusual for our South Louisiana area.

Soon, we get our appetizers, we love them

but we also begin to hear loud speaking from the kitchen area.

We are close to the kitchen but not on top of it.

The noise get louder and as I make eye contact with

another customer at the table 6 feet away,

we realize their is an argument going on in the kitchen.

It is not just a one word argument, it is a full, loud

argument between more than two people.

I call over one of the waitresses as by now, it has

gone on for a few minutes and no let up is noted.

"Can you please close the door to the kitchen or

ask the arguers to take the business to another place

we don't want to hear that on Valentine's day"

She has not yet heard the argument but she says

will take care of it.

As she makes her way to her other customer she

hears what we hear, excuses herself from her

patrons and goes to the kitchen. 

Almost immediately, the fussing is stopped.

I look at Randy and I ask.

"Does that make me a Karen?"

No he answers.

Then we have a conversation over what makes someone

a Karen. We decide that had I gotten up, went in to the

kitchen and asked them to take it somewhere else,

that would have made me a Karen. 

I perhaps would have done that.....

but I am proud to say, I did it the right way...

In Boo and I's eyes anyway.

This brings on other conversations,

"What is a Karen really?"

"What is the male version of a karen?

(I looked it up, internet says Ken)

All this story to say, I have seen

a few Karen's since then. 

I am still trying my best to thank the people who help me,

letting them know I appreciate them.

We were without electricity for 30 something hours.

Because I have a home generator and a gas fireplace

I was okay. I was worried about my neighbors, 

offered my home to some. When the electical workers

came to my yard, right outside my studio, to change

wires that had to be replaced, I opened a window

and thanked them, offered them coffee.

My neighbor, Rhonda had already served them hot chocolate

so they turned down my coffee.

I think they thought I may fuss them,

I told them how appreciative I was as its cold out 

and I know they wished they could be home and warm.

They thank me saying not everyone is as understanding.

I laugh and say having a generator makes it a little easier for

me to be grateful. Uncomfortableness brings out the worst in some.

Our electricity is restored but my internet and TV is not.

I am not a big TV person but my internet is crucial.

I cannot get it rebooted so I call ATT and speak to a person.

It seems a technician has to come out and the first available

day is Saturday.... Saturday? I have the grandgirls from

Thursday to Saturday am, I don't let them watch tv or get on

iPads except for at night but won't be none of that here.

I could have complained, 

instead I thanked her even though my insides were

screaming "Karen"

We shall wait and in due time all will be well...

patience it's what I am trying to practice.

BE patient.

AMBER ALERT

 Sunday night at approximately 1:15 am 

my emergency sound went off on my phone.

Boo was here for the night and we were both asleep.

When that warning sound went off we both 

immediately rolled to opposite sides of the bed

to check the message.

There we had both just received the Amber Alert

with the description of the car, etc.

We both said aloud,

" Amber Alert" as we read the text.

We then both settled down and I could not sleep.

My thoughts wondered to the poor child

that was not safely in her bed on this early Sunday am.

I worried about the parents, family who must be so afraid.

I decided prayers were in order and so I said a prayer

for the child, the parents, I even said one for the 

perpetrator to return the child close to home unharmed.

Too many times these do not end up in the way

they should. Prayers went out for the very best outcome,

a rescue. Two trash pickup drivers had also got

the Amber Alert and when they saw a car parked in the

field, they remembered that alert and possibly 

have saved that child's life.

Happy ending, prayers answered, hero's in the making.

Yet my story is not finished.

I was shocked to find and also hear boo speak of all

the facebook complainers saying things like

"Darn Amber Alet"

"I had just got to sleep when that Amber Alert woke me up"

"Why do they wait until 1:00am to send those amber alerts"

So many complaints.

Yes, there were probably just as many that felt like me,

but just the fact that someone would be disturbed by being

notified of a missing child, no matter what time, unnerves me.

My thoughts were, "hmmm if it were your child..."

Come on "Karen's"

this is a life, this is a child, have we become so used to 

things that we can't see an emergency from a political text.

I will end with this.

The next time you are hit with an Amber alert,

remember how serious this is. Remember that very few 

children abducted make it home safe.

When they do make it safe, rarely are they the same child

that they were before the abduction.

Remember the reason for the Amber Alert,

the poor child and her family that the project was named after.

Say a prayer, if you don't pray, take a minute to send good thoughts

to all involved. Pay attention to the details as this man who

found the child was aware that the car that had been explained

in the alert was similar to the one he saw.

Let us not become a society that is so filled with mundane things

that we don't take these alerts seriously.

This child now safely sleeps in her own bed, with 

her loving family surrounding her. 

She is safe once again.

Not all are so lucky.

in memory of:

AMBER HAGERMAN

11/25/86-1/17/96

RIP

being patriotic in today's world.

A few days ago I went to visit two very good 

and close friends, You may have read something I have written

in the past about them,

I call them Hubster and Sister Wife, Linda and Lionelle.

They are two of my very best friends here in Plaquemine

and they got their names when I became single and Hubster

helped me so much with things I needed help with at

the Cottage. When I got sick, they loaned me their pulse Ox

machine (they both had Covid before me, thankfully didn't need

hospitalization) Linda picked up prescriptions I needed while

I was sick, made me a chicken soup

 and when I got back from the hospital with very little 

appetite, it was Hubster and sister wife I called to 

pick me up the only thing I was craving, Ritz Cracker and Rouse's chicken salad.

Delivered almost before I could hang up the phone.

When you have friends like this, consider yourself blessed

I am blessed to have many.

Long introduction to where I am going with this.

As I was leaving their home after finally visiting and returning

things they loaned me they followed me outside as they normally

do. Linda reminded me that my brake tag was expired

(for the third year in a row, lol)

and Hubster began to show me his new telescopic flag pole.

Oh my!!! I immediately had to have one!

Sister wife went me the link and it has been ordered

Once it comes in, it will be hubster to help me cement it in.

I had been looking for a pole such as this for a long time.

I didn't want a flag pole on my cottage and

I wanted a pole that I could raise and lower by myself.

This one does just that. To say I was excited was beyond belief.

Now to get to the meat of the blog.

My Daddy fought in WWII. It was many years before I was born

but he did have little children at home. My Mom ran their 

bar room and raised the children in that said bar.

I do not know exactly how many years he was in war,

but he was shot in his leg and which went through one thigh

and into the other lodging somewhere in the second thigh.

He told us many times, it was the best day of his life.

He knew he was either coming home or was going to die.

He had already lost his younger brother to the war and

many cousins and friends. 

As I came into this family when my parents were 43 and 45

I was a spoiled treasure to them and to my 6 siblings.

We always had a flag up. Sometimes it was on a pole,

when my second brother returned for Vietnam, it was 

a large flag place right one the front of our home,

spread out for all to see our brother was coming home.

We were a very patriotic family.

As I grew up, having had my Dad, two brothers who served

and then my exhubby who served, and knowing many others

who also served I wanted a flag that long ago.

WE always talked about wanting one, but we just never did it.

Then came the day that my sisters and my Mother decided

to take a trip to visit my oldest brothers burial site.

Although he died of lung cancer a few month before the visit,

he had also served during the Vietnam crisis.

His children live in Texas and they decided they wanted him buried

in a military graveyard.

My mom by this time, was 89 and dementia was beginning to

reek havoc on her brain. 

Myself and my sisters, My Mom and my brothers children and their Mother

were joyful before we got to the cemetery.

Yet the minute you began to walk the cemetery there was a peace

of the place. I got the sense, that no talking was needed here,

all these thousands of gravesites was someone who had

 fought for our Country, for our freedom and either died in that battle,

or like my brother died many years later but served his country.

We did not know how Momma was going to take seeing the 

grave site of her second oldest child, her first son.

AS we all walked up to his place, we took a step back and my Mother,

all 120 pounds of her found his name and we were witness to 

one of the most saddest and proudest times of my life.

She placed her hand on his cold piece of marble and cried.

Tears running down her face she traced his name with

her finger. IT was not what we expected but we let this 

Mother and Child have their time before we too, went to comfort her.

This day will forever be etched in my mind.

No words had to be spoken as the silence said it all:

No parent should ever have to bury their child.

On that day, still too long ago, I knew

I wanted a flag, talked about it, looked for the perfect one,

but still years passed. I rarely watch the news, it scares me and

I never know what is real and what is not, but while I was in the

hospital, days before the inauguration, with nothing

else to to I put the TV on CNN.

It was the very first time I was the breaking in to our

Nation's Capitol, in to the Senate area.

I believe in freedom to march and stand for what you 

believe in, but breaking in, going up to the podium 

covered in animal fur, wanting "selfies"

using our American flag to drape their bodies

in it for more photos, I was sickened.

I was for the first time, embarrassed to be an American.

That flag, that symbolized all the Peace and Freedom my 

Father and Brothers and many others faught for,

being Mocked by people who broke in to a place

they had no business being at that time.

Again, my blog, my opinion.

I cried, right there in my hospital bed, maybe having a

lot to do with the fact that both myself and KD's

dad, Frank were getting better. 

That day I KNEW this flag business was going to happen.

I didn't care how it was going to hang but It was

going to be in my yard for all to see to see

I am a a Proud American.

The fact that days later I find the pole I need

Tells me many above me including the Big Man agree.

2021 Be....

 Remember that blog of the New Year?

When I picked my word for the year 2021?

Crazy how it seems so long ago.

I left on Jan 1, 2021 to go to my sister and BIL camp

Came home on the 3rd feeling very sick 

and was diagnosed with Covid pneumonia on the 4th.

Longes month of my life....

I have said it aloud and said it to myself, 

I have written about it and thought a lot about it...

Covid has changed me. I thought,  maybe at first

it was a temporary thing just being grateful for Frank and I's

health but my thoughts remain different from how I

felt prior to becoming a statistic.

BE......

it is still my word for the year....

BE who you are, don't let others change how you feel about anything but,

 BE a good listener, if another has a good point that you have

not contemplated be open to change.

BE someone you would be proud to know.

BE kind to everyone, let others know you appreciate them.

BE quiet when you feel a disagreement coming on,

let another become peaceful before bringing up a problem.

I am still a little unsure of just how much I want to share

about the changes in me. I know some will not agree

and others will think my Covid Brain is still not clear.

I will say this,

Before getting Covid, I wore a mask most times but 

now I am a mask wearer all the time. I do not want to 

ever have to go through Covid again, I also

don't want to take the chance of ever giving this to anyone else.

Before Covid, BC as the boo calls it,

I was not going to receive the immunization.

Now, I have my name on a list to receive it when I can.

My doctor said I have to wait 90 days after having Covid

before I can get it but said she recommends me getting it

because I may not be as lucky with another bout of this virus.

I have my name on a list at my pharmacy for when my time comes.

I will end with one more be

BE proud of your beliefs and your choices so as to stand behind

them.

COVID BRAIN

In the last few years, I have heard and read a lot

about Chemo. brain. It interested me at the time because

when i returned to school after surviving cancer,

although my Daddy had done a great job making sure I 

could read and do simple math, I struggled in some subjects.

My siblings always had good report cards and I 

struggled in Math, History, Geography and still do.

I loved Reading, writing, spelling and was an overachiever there

but was always embarrassed about my grades

in those other subjects. Boo would say I still struggle with

directional issues. I never know where I am at.

Although this is funny, its really true, that he and I can go

somewhere ten times and I still can't tell you how to get there

and the only time I feel comfortable going anywhere is with

my trusty GPS. I now understand why before GPS I

rarely drove off the bayou and if I went to NOLA I was so proud

of myself if I made it home safely. 

All that explanation to say, Covid Brain seems to be something

like chemo. brain.

Every day is so much better than the day before but my mind

is not right. Some would say my brain has never been right lol.

Yesterday, was one of those Covid brain moments.

Two days ago I went to the bank, made a deposit and at

my bank you have to give your account card and your 

drivers license which I did.

Yesterday, I went to the pharmacy and when I open my wallet

I realize my drivers license is not there.

I begin to wonder where in the heck it could be.

I am very conscientious about returning things where they go

right when I am done with them so not having my

drivers license there shakes me up a bit.

I realize I must have left it at the bank, so I drive up to

the window and I explain my dilemma.

The teller begins searching all the places they put things

people forget to no avail. She was the teller who had helped me

and she says she is almost sure she returned it to me.

"I don't even have my deposit slip..."

She feels bad, I feel frantic, she leaves to go look in

another spot. I finally think, well let me look in my car,

and low and behold, there is my bank envelope in the

pocket of my car door along with my drivers license and 

my bank account paper AND my deposit slip.

Embarassing to say the least......

I have to wait for my poor teller to come back to the window

from wherever she is searching to tell her I found it in my car....

Soooo unlike me.

"I found it, I am so sorry...."

She seems as relieved as I am.

What else can I say? My bad? Covid Brain? 

No, she knows I have been sick,

" I appreciate you"

my mantra....

Covid Brain, a real thing.

Happy Day friends. 

TWO WRITINGS TO SHARE

I think we all have times that we read something

and it makes a lasting impression on us.

I do this often yet sometimes it hits me hard

and then I forget about them so I now started

saving them in a folder of my computer.

When I tell people this illness and the whole Covid World

has changed me, I mean for the better I think.

Sometimes you get stuck in a negative way and you

don't even realize it. Then something happens in your life,

you are left with a lot of time to think of life

while alone and you realize you were becoming that 

negative person who you didn't like in others.

The above one is like a prayer for me.

I pray that negative people or people who only speak

of the bad instead of bringing out good things as well

can find in their hearts to feel all 

that writing explains. 

... and then there is the one above, 

a little different note because we are human.

We cannot always feel the good vibes.

I think if we never had bad days we

could not appreciate the good/great days.

So yeah, we can be disappointed, angry, scared, cry

but we can't give up.

It's a balance of thoughts on life, living a life

that is fulfilling and that each day brings you to

a better clarification of your place in this World.

Try and see and bring out the positive in the things

around you. It can only make you a better friend, mom,

Mumsie, etc. and the difference in your life

can make a huge difference in others.

Happy Monday to you all.