Tommy's Team 2013

Last week was an exhausting whirlwind of a week. This week proves to be even more of a whirlwind. I'm steeling myself for it with the promise of June and SUMMER. I can do this. You will not beat me, May.

Saturday was the Epilepsy 5k, which we did last year. I feel guilty because I didn't throw myself into fundraising like I did last year. My attention was on campaigning for the referendum that our school was trying to pass (which we lost. by 4 votes. DO NOT GET ME STARTED) and I will admit that fundraising fell by the wayside. Life is just so busy now. Luke is playing t-ball. His science fair was Friday night and that was honestly our focus all week. Although we did the research well in advance, we left the poster board until this week (rookie mistake). Since it was his science fair project, I let him do most of the poster board, except that he obviously couldn't type. Friday was hectic. I left work, ran to the grocery store to get stuff for his science fair and sides for the picnic to have after the walk, then straight to Luke's school to set up for the science fair. We didn't get home until 7, then I had to get things together for the walk.

I didn't find us a sponsor for shirts this year, so I bought shirts out of my pocket for the newcomers to the team. In hindsight, I probably could've found us a sponsor. I just didn't try and that's my fault, but buying shirts is the least I can do for those who do so much for us. Who give to a cause where their only connection to it is my son.
Like I said, I was so focused on campaigning for the referendum that the walk became secondary. Still, we managed to raise $1305. This is a lot less than we raised last year, but last year, I was very much actively fundraising and Tommy's epilepsy was not as managed as it is now. We also had more team members, many of whom raised a couple hundred dollars each. I'm proud to have raised over $5000 for the epilepsy foundation in the course of these two years.
I am beyond proud that despite how busy our lives are these days, despite two members of our family being at a t-ball game, we still made time to walk.

Maybe next year the weather will be nice?

When I started training for this 5k, I really wanted to race it. Even though it's untimed, I wanted this to be my comeback with regard to my injury. However, my feet have flared up for the eleventy-billionth time and have been an absolute wreck for the last week and a half. It hurts to walk, let alone run, so I haven't been running at all. I wasn't even sure if I was going to run, but I decided to give it a try and walk if I needed. The course was at beautiful Cantigny Park and wound past trees and flowers. Once I settled into an easy pace, I was so happy. There weren't many runners, just hundreds and hundreds of walkers, so it was peaceful. My feet were sore, but seeing kids in wheelchairs who are unable to walk at all because their epilepsy is so bad puts it in to perspective. So what if my feet hurt? I can RUN. The course was hilly, with a really steep hill just after the halfway point. A few people dropped to the side to walk, but I pushed myself up it and kept going, only to find out that the course looped around and made you go back up the hill. The second time I was mixed into walkers and a woman hit me in the face while she was taking off her sweatshirts. This made the hill even more fun! Soon, I was out of walkers and rounding the corner toward the finish line. Since I was going at such an easy comfortable pace, I wondered if I even wanted to push it, but I did and gave a double fist pump at the end. It was, by far, my most enjoyable 5k. I didn't race it. I didn't push myself. I didn't care at all about the numbers on my watch. I just enjoyed it. I watched the scenery go by. I read the facts about epilepsy on the signs throughout the course. I learned what the money raised for the 5ks does. I thanked all of the volunteers, which I don't usually have the breath to do during a 5k. Maybe I need to do more 5ks like this.

Afterward, I walked back to the last turn in the course and waited for the rest of our team, where I was stalked by wild turkeys (did you know that I'm afraid of turkeys? Cuz I totally am). Shelli, Martina, Lily and Tommy were the first to arrive, so I finished the course (again) with them and we waited for everyone else with cheers, then had a very cold picnic, followed by the kids playing on playground for, oh, four hours due to my sister falling and requiring an ER trip and stitches (she's fine!).


With the walk yesterday and for awhile now, I kind of felt like, should we be there? Because we've been over a year seizure free and he's no longer on seizure medicine, but then I saw a team with a sign that said seizure free since 2010 and I smiled. Of course we should be there because even though we it may not be a part of our daily lives NOW, we will always be touched by epilepsy. Always. We will always be a part of this community, a part of the community of parents who know what it's like to be so powerless against a disease you cannot predict. I will always remember the moment that I first held my seizing child in my arms and my heart stopped and stopped and stopped, and even though you never know what each day will bring, I realize that my God, we are the lucky ones.

What I Read Wednesday

I read one book this week. Yikes!


Touch & Go
Lisa Garder is one of my favorite mystery authors. I like that her books keep you guessing until the end. This focuses on a family who is kidnapped and the how and why of it is slowly unravelled throughout the book, making you wonder just who is good and who is bad. I love detective novels and this was no exception. It would make a great beach/vacation read. Or in my case, standardized testing read.

What are you reading?

What I Read Wednesday

**on Thursday. I don't know. It's been a WEEK.


You
I'm not really a gamer, although back in the day before kids, I really enjoyed beating people up on Grand Theft Auto. I highly recommend that for stress relief. That said, even though I was lost of some of the gaming aspect of this book, I was still drawn into the story of the misfit band of kids who found each other in high school were games were rudimentary on Apple IIEs, one drifted apart, then he found them again and was thrust into a gaming mystery that threatened to bring down a huge company. I enjoyed the characters and the storyline.

Six Years
This mystery book was about a man who loves a woman, until she suddenly marries a man then tells him to leave them alone--no matter what. Until six years later, when he reads the man's obit, shows up to the funeral, only to find that the man apparently had a whole different family. What follows is an unraveling path of clues that leads every which way, most of them dangerous. I like books like this. They are fun and keep me guessing.

Life After Life: A Novel
I really wanted to love this book and the premise was fascinating. On the same night, two babies named Ursula Todd are born. Both have their cords wrapped around their necks. One lives by the snip of scissors, the other strangles. The surviving Ursula Todd lives constantly on the edge of almost death, somehow always surviving, always knowing what to do to change her fate. I loved the premise, but the actual writing was so tedious, so hard to follow. One moment she was in WWII Germany, best friends with Eva Braun (you know, Hitler's mistress), then she was a child again. It skipped around a lot and was difficult to follow. The last thirty pages of the novel were really beautifully written and I loved them, but most of the novel was a chore for me. It was an Amazon best book of the month for April, so I may be in the minority here.

Whirlwind (Dreamhouse Kings)
The second to last book in the Dreamhouse Kings series. It was good!

Frenzy (Dreamhouse Kings)
This was the last book in the Dreamhouse Kings series. It was good, but had an open ending to an extent. I don't normally mind this, but after six books, unless you're going to continue... tie it up!

What are you reading?

What I Read Wednesday

The Storyteller
Sometimes I like to read Jodi Picoult books because I can turn off my brain. The plot twist is easy to figure out, the story is at least engaging enough to keep me going and I don't have to think too much. Which is not to knock anyone who loves Jodi Picoult, I'm just not a huge fan. This one was a good story, although somewhat cliched for Holocaust based fiction. Still, it was overall an engaging read.

The Distant Hours
I really loved The Forgotten Garden and The House at Riverton by the same author, but I didn't get into this one as much. Overall, I enjoyed the story of Percy, Saffy, Juniper and their controlling, addled father, but I didn't connect with them as much as I have the characters in her other stories. The ending finally grabbed me, but the first two hundred pages were slow for me.

Paper Towns
Obviously I really like John Green--this one was no exception. I would say this is also somewhat a coming of age story, but again, with a twist. Quentin is on the fringes of high school, a few close friends, but mostly harassed by the popular kids. His neighbor and former childhood friend, Margo Roth Spiegelman is popular and unattainable, until the night she appears at his bedroom window and leads him on an adventure, giving him hope that they can be friends again. Except that she disappears the next day, leaving him to piece everything together as his high school years wind to a close.

What are you reading?

Over There.

Guest posting today on Simplicity in the Suburbs, in defense of public education. Thanks to Samara for letting me share my thoughts on education!

What I Read Wednesday

All That Is
I wanted to love this story. I really did. And in some aspects, I loved it. The story itself was incredibly engaging, but parts of it fell flat. It was one dimensional. I found myself getting confused and burdened down by certain things, like the author's habit of sometimes referring to a character by his last name, sometimes by the first name. I couldn't connect with the characters like I wanted to. It just didn't click for me on the huge level that I felt like a storyline of this caliber should, one that spans from WWII to the 1980s, and that was disappointing. I really just wanted this one to end.

An Abundance of Katherines
This is another one by John Green, who is arguably one of the best YA lit authors out there and definitely one who can transcend the genre. The protagonist is a boy prodigy who has been dumped 19 times by girls named Katherines and sets out to create a mathematical theorem to determine if romantic relationships can be graphed and predicted from beginning to end. Although it's a coming of age novel, it's definitely the most original coming of age novel I've ever read.

The Interestings: A Novel
This was the novel that resonated with me this week. Six teenagers meet at a creative arts summer camp and remain friends afterward, though those friendships aren't without strings and troubles. What I loved about this novel was that it followed the character, but it also followed the time periods, too: Nixon's resignation, the AIDs crisis, and so on. It was woven together so seamlessly that you almost didn't notice the way the author worked it in. This is my must-read suggestion for the week! I definitely fell in love with the characters (or with some of them, not so much).

Gatekeepers (Dreamhouse Kings)
This is the third book in the Dreamhouse Kings series. It's a YA series about a family who lives in a house where the third floor is made up of portals that transport back into the past--but not just randomly into the past, always into dangerous places in the past. Onto the sinking Titanic, into gladiator arenas, in the line of a tank during WWII and so on. Although not the most brilliantly written books, they are enjoyable and I like that the two main characters are boys and that it's magical while still teaching about history.

Timescape: Dreamhouse Kings, Book #4
Not much to say here; it's the next book in the Dreamhouse Kings series and since I just told you about it, I won't repeat myself, as I assume you listen better than my students. I bought this on Kindle because I was annoyed that the person who checked it out at the library before me was a week overdue and hadn't yet returned it. So if you have a Kindle and are reading this series, let me know and I can loan it to you!

The Drunken Botanist
I love science that is interesting and easily understandable to the common person, making this book right up my alley. I've always found it fascinating how many plants go into our traditional medicines, so plants that make alcohol? Sign me up. This is a book that I wish I'd bought because it's not really the type of book that you sit down and read straight through because while the various facts are interesting, it's also chock full of recipes for not only drinks but simple syrups and herb garnishes. I loved this book because it was full of all sorts of random facts that I've now filed away to pull out at times that I need to prove that I'm smarter than other people.

What are you reading?

What I Read Wednesday

What I learned is that I need to stop saying that I don't like non-fiction, because I'm reading more and more of it. Are my tastes evolving? Is non-fiction getting better, maybe? Let's go with the latter.

The Still Point of the Turning World
This book tore at my heart, as I knew it would. The author's son was diagnosed with Tay Sachs as a baby, even though she had the screening for it while pregnant. At this point, she was powerless as mother to do nothing but stand by and watch him deteriorate. This book isn't really a memoir of her son Ronan's last days, because it was published while he was still alive. It's more her thoughts on grief. The pain of watching his eyes dull, watching him slip away. Knowing that he won't hit any milestones beyond what he'd already hit at his diagnosis. While losing a child is unimaginable, so is the thought of simply having to watch him go.

Looking for Alaska
Becky recommended this one because we both loved The Fault in Our Stars (please recommend me books--or if you do book posts, I've seen a few people doing that lately, too, link me up!). I loved this. It was a little more raw than The Fault in our Stars, but it was also real. The characters were humorous and heartbreaking and I loved the storyline. I absolutely love this author and I definitely think he's one that transcends that Young Adult lit genre.

The Dinner
Okay, blog readers, I want you all to read this book and then we'll discuss it. Seriously. This book, wow. Two couples meet over dinner to discuss something that happened between their teenage sons. The story goes from appetizer through dessert and the ending was not at all what I expected. That's all I'll say, but please, someone read this and email me so we can talk about it. Or if you have read this, email me. I want so badly to discuss it, but I don't want to say anything here. This was definitely one that kept me up late reading. It was great.

Her: A Memoir
Look, more non-fiction. I was interested in this one because my older sisters are twins. The statistic that when one twin dies, the other usually follows within two years was interesting. This is one twin's story of how she beat that statistic. I realize that there were some serious co-dependency issues, among other things, with these twins, but their story was interesting. There is a lot of survival and strength in this book.

Gulp: Adventures on the Alimentary Canal
I love Mary Roach. All of her books answer those interesting, disgusting questions that you've wondered about but don't know who to ask. She asks them for you and answers them in a way that's scientific but understandable. Gulp is about food, stomach digestion and all other manner of disgusting but interesting things. As always, I loved it.