Hope can come from the weirdest places. A Facebook memory popped up today from exactly three years ago. That day I was dealing with the winter blues. The grayness and gloom and the whole no sun thing was really getting to me. COVID was still very much in our lives. 2020 saw Gary in the hospital for prostate removal followed by hip replacement surgery. Money was tight with him not working and I was worried and tired. You get the picture. And 2021 didn't look like it was shaping up to be a good year. That morning I walked out of the YMCA after a much needed session in the pool and I saw a man walking by and I told him hi. We were both masked. The conversation went like this. Him: How you doing? Me: I'm fine! Him: You sure are fine. You got some pep in your [...]

The only time I ever heard my first and middle named together was when I did something wrong. My mother would never see me walking into the room the first thing in the morning and say, "Good morning Carmen Theresa." Nope, when I was in trouble I'd hear her call, "Get in here right now, Carmen Theresa!" But my mom always called her best friend Betty Mae. And Betty Mae always called my mom Barbara Jean. I don't remember anyone else calling my mom by her first and middle name. Maybe my dad did. Betty Mae Glenn and Barbara Jean Leal were best friends for probably as long as I have been alive. Between them they had 14 kids and we were all in and out of both houses. Betty Mae was tall and glamorous and Barbara Jean was short. I have so many adjectives to describe my mom. Both [...]

I dream in color and my dreams are detailed and I remember many of them. I love going to sleep because I enjoy my dreams so often. After the wreck I didn't dream. It was weird and unsettling. The neurologist said it was because of the trauma and that maybe I would have those kind of dreams again. Maybe not. About a year or so after the wreck I started dreaming but only in black and white. In some ways that was even worse. And the dreams were all scary. I woke up with terrible headaches and felt angry for mos of the morning. Maybe three years into the healing process I started dreaming in color again. It was a long, long road back to reclaiming some of who I used to be. Today a memory from 2021 popped into my feed. I remember how I felt when I woke [...]