"Kid, this is it."

One morning last week I was hustling about -- running late as usual -- pawing through shoes in my closet, upending the house in search of my cell phone. Martin was handling "cram" mode with the kids: cramming breakfast down their throats, shoving socks and shoes on their feet, and pushing them out the door.

As I bolted up and down the stairs, I caught snippets of conversation -- about the baby and whether it would be a boy or a girl. And that's when I heard Martin sternly say, "No Cayden, this is the last baby. There's isn't going to be another one. This is it."

When I came down the stairs, I couldn't help but ask the Boy, "Do you want a brother or a sister?"

He grinned and triumphantly displayed his best Nixon-victory pose. "I want two more brothers and two more sisters," he announced.

As if such an order were normal. Like selecting donuts from the bakery.

Yea, 4 more kids. I'll get right on that.

Clearly, Cayden has not tapped his jealousy gene.

And he thinks we're Catholic.

I tried to set him straight, as Martin did. Boy or girl, Hoffa's it!

Headless horses

Headless, legless horses. That's what fills the window panes looking out on our back pasture.

Three pot-bellied horses clustered in knee-high, hock-high stalks of green. Every so often a nose rises to whisk away the seedy tops of tall fescue but most of the time, their faces are hidden as they crop tuft after tuft of succulent clover.
It's astonishing how quickly they've shed their winter coats and fattened up on spring growth -- they've easily gained 50 pounds each. A few dapples have sprung on Chance's ample rump and in the sunshine, the two chestnuts gleam like pennies. (*for the Huck update, see below).

Instead of bringing the horses in for feed, we lock them in at night to give their bellies a rest. Stall bound, they shun their hay and stand about, glassy eyed in grass comas. And wait for morning, and a new feeding frenzy to begin.




*Huck -- who gets fat on air, and never met a meal he didn't like -- was shipped out before spring unleashed its green. He's now residing at another farm where pasture isn't so bountiful. There, he's being ridden and has bonded with two goats named Vanilla and Butterscotch.

Poor Spook

Our 5-year-old barn cats, Mel and Frog, are utterly phobic of cars. They scatter at the faintest hint of gravel crunching on the drive and they'd never deign to venture down to the road.

Unfortunately Spook, our once-wild cat, was not so wary.

On Saturday night he was hit by a car. The neighbors discovered him and brought him up to the house. But he was gone.

Spook had already been fed for the night and we'd seen him just a couple hours before. I never imagined that he'd head to the road since he didn't venture far from the house. Maybe nocturnal hunting got the best of him.

We placed him underneath a pine tree, not far from where Drippy and Old Kitty are laid to rest.

Felix, who generally keeps his distance, sat nearby and watched us bury Spook. Afterward, he camped out on the fresh earth.

Poor Spook. That once feral beast had become our friendliest cat.

The pre-name game

We're galloping into the home stretch on the baby front -- an eviction notice will be served in 2 weeks -- yet Martin and I are still hashing out names.

Chalk it up to the fact that we're pretty blase this time around. I haven't even bothered to dig out the infant car seat. And as Martin pointed out, "We can buy some diapers on the way home from the hospital."

But snagging a few bottles and diapers is one thing; choosing a name for life is another.

In a manner of speaking, the kid has had a name for months. A title that he/she will shed instantly in the hospital.

Most expectant parents wind up naming "the bump" something, because it's weird to have a nameless stranger occupying your midsection for months on end. But Martin and I have never been keen on the "sweet pea" or "peanut" monikers. We've shunned "jellybean."

We've gone to the dark side.

With my first pregnancy, we knew we'd be having a boy. And we decided that any nickname would have to be something we'd never use as a real name; we didn't want friends and family to latch onto something that we might later discard.

And that's how our first unborn kid earned the nickname Baby Hitler. (Mussolini was too clunky). Not everyone appreciated the joke, so Martin and I shortened the name to "BH." And it worked. During my pregnancy, friends would ask: "How's BH doing?"

Baby #2, the future Barbarian, was to be a girl. I don't remember who offered it up, but 5 months in, we called her Shaniqua. It wasn't on the same level as a murderous, antisemitic dictator but still, not a name in the running.

This time around -- the FINAL time -- we don't know the gender, and that stumped us in the nickname department. Simply calling it the "the accident" or "the surprise" or even "lymie" seemed too cliche.

But months ago, while dipping our feet in the name pool, I tossed out "Harper." It didn't stick but that evening, Martin was over at my mom's house, and she offhandedly inquired about names. Martin said that there was one that he liked, but he couldn't remember it.

He told my mother it was "something like Hoffa."

"Hoffa?" Mom asked incredulously. "Like Jimmy.... the missing union boss?"

Well Hoffa stuck and since then, has been regularly referenced. As in, "Hoffa's kicking," or "Hoffa's squashing my ribs." It's been a suitable unisex name, guaranteed to get tossed curbside in a couple of weeks.

Wow, just a couple of weeks to go.

BH and Shaniqua can't wait.

Spring presents for everyone

In light of Mother's Day, Martin carried on his tradition of plunking new plant life in the ground. This year he surprised me with a new row of blueberries, raspberries and a couple grapevines.


But I wasn't the only one showered with gifts. No longer must the kids entertain themselves by clambering all over the tractor or slithering out Chitty's windows and tumbling to the ground.

Well, they still have those options but we hope to lure them toward kid-friendly gear which was installed today.



Martin even bought himself a springtime gift. I think that some guys would consider this bib a form of punishment, but Martin was proud to flaunt it while whipping up dinner.


Heck, even Maisie wasn't forgotten on this spending spree. After running away yet again, before a dinner party on Sunday, Martin shopped for her as well. I only hope that an underground fence will deter her from bolting down to the river, and hiding in the thicket and poison ivy....

Priceless Pixs

A long-time family friend read yesterday's blog entry about Dad's picture, and was kind enough to dig through his own photo collection. In doing so he unearthed some classics, including several of me, around 1973, with his kids (my earliest childhood playmates)....

...and of our muppet-looking sheepdog, Kormos (pronounced "Corn-mush")...

and of course, my Dad....

The photos sparked a round of tears but they were worth it. Thank you, Lee....

A glimpse back

My father has just a few personal possessions at the nursing home and last night I nearly took one of them.

Dad's room is sparsely decorated on purpose. Dementia sufferers like to collect things, carry them off and stash them --- it's one of many compulsive, repetitive behaviors -- and Mom and I didn't want lose anything of sentimental value. So when we moved Dad in, we packed a scant supply of personal items.

Last night it was clear that one of these things had gone missing. At dinner Dad kept standing up, claiming that he needed his "armand."

Lately he's been using nonsensical words and I don't always know what he's talking about. But in this case, he cupped his hands together -- like he was holding a small animal -- and I knew what he wanted.

"Oh, your elephant?" I asked. "Yes," he remarked, as if that's what he'd said. "My elephant."

Dad has this funky elephant figurine that he once carried around my parents' house. The elephant later journeyed with Dad from assisted living facilities to hospitals and back to this place again, and it remains a favored treasure. Before dinner, I noticed it was missing. In its place on the dresser was a moccasin.

At the time, I picked up a nearby photo -- a Christmas snapshot of my mom seated beside the tree, in our old house with our old Hungarian sheepdog. I'm there too, elementary school aged, with a cheesy grin, brandishing a wooden nutcracker.

As I set the plastic frame back down, I noticed a second picture tucked in back. A close-up shot of my father that I don't remember seeing before.

In it, he takes up the entire frame. There's no identifying setting, but judging from his clothes and expression, he's at work. His sideburns, mustache and the fat striped tie tucked into a checkered vest are standard 1970s garb.

Dad's looking away from camera as if he doesn't know it's there. He stands with his arms crossed over his chest, one hand poised against the stump of his pipe, which leaks a thin tendril of smoke. He wears an expression I remember well -- when he knew exactly what to say but was mulling over how to tailor his statement.

The photo is mesmerizing, not only because it captures a younger, healthy dad, but because I see myself back then. I would have been about 7 or 8 -- at an age when you know your father is smarter than anyone else. That he can fix broken toys, cook dinner and catch a snake in the yard....complete your homework and name constellations in the sky. It was a time still unspoiled by my truculent pre-teen years. When dads are flawless.

Which is why I retrieved the photo. I slid it out of the frame and pocketed it. Just a week before a nurse mentioned that Dad had shredded a family photo, then carried the pieces in his pocket. I figured I'd save this one from dementia-addled destruction.

But then I realized that the photo was a form of identification. If another resident walked off with the Christmas picture, there was no guarantee that a nurse would recognize the woman and the kid and the mop-topped dog by the tree. But they'd see the photo of Dad -- no longer lawyerly and wise -- but Dad nonetheless.

So I slid the photo back into the frame and returned it to the dresser. Hopefully it'll be there the next time. Along with the elephant.