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So, we bought these rings in Germany. Lloyd’s is a guy’s ring – plain gold band, but the cool thing is that the edges are kind of squared off. It was unique, so that was the choice. My ring is just the same, only smaller.

It’s the middle part of my now-ring:

So, I was happy enough with it. I spent the months before looking at them side by side in the little box. They looked so cool together. When I tried mine on, though, I realized it was a little lacking in the ‘wow’ department when viewed solo.

No matter. I was fine.

We got married. Right before the wedding I drew a dotted line on my ring finger with pen so Lloyd would know which finger to put it on. We went through a year of college and I was fine. During my student teaching experience I had lots of observation time due to a scheduling error, so as I would sit for hours at the desk in the back of the room, I looked at my ring. I had a similar ring that I had bought years ago, and I tried wearing them together. I liked it. It bulked up that skinny band.

We moved to Maryland. We were young and stupid and the internet had not been invented yet, so I spent an inordinate amount of time obsessing about my ring. I had two cheap silver-ish earrings that were the same size as the ring, so I tried putting one on each side.

(re-enacted here with Lloyd’s ring)

I liked it. I liked it a lot. It really beefed up that puny little band. I strongly hinted that this would be a cool thing to do. I strongly hinted often. I strongly hinted more. (It was early in our relationship, and I had not learned how to properly strongly hint, i.e. – do it myself.) Nothing was happening.

Then came a moment that I am not proud of. We had walked through a local mall where there was a jewelry store, and I must have strongly hinted as we walked by, but Lloyd said nothing. As we left the mall, I remember stopping in the entry, bunching up my fists and bursting into tears. “What is wrong with you?” Lloyd asked in shock and fear. With shame, I remember that I sniveled like a little kid, “I just *sniff* really want *sniff* my ring to have *sniff* some other rings soldered onto *sniff* it.”

“Oh…..kay……” Lloyd said cautiously, fearing for his safety. Then he did nothing. Grrrrrr.

Now you should know that in our tiny little apartment, I would take off my wedding ring to wash the dishes. (I don’t know what I was worried about.) Several days after my hissy fit he came into the kitchen as I was cleaning up after lunch and said, “I’m really thirsty for some 7-Up. I’m going to go buy some.”

He was gone for hours, and when he came home he was holding a child-sized cup of 7-Up from McDonalds.

Oh, Lloyd from the Past. You thought you were so sneaky. I looked at the cup and said, “Where’s my ring?”

He feigned surprise, then showed astonishment at my powers of deduction. Long story short, ring was at the jewelers.

And the moral of the story, children? Throwing a fit totally works.

Happy Birthday, Mark!

As we were having breakfast this morning, one of the girls asked, “Mrs. Sommerer, why don’t you have a pretty ring?” (I assumed she was not insulting my actual ring, but was curious as to why I didn’t have a diamond.) “I just wanted a plain ring,” I answered. The children then proceeded to tell me bout their mom’s fancy rings. “My mom’s ring is pretty.”

Hmmmmm…. maybe they were insulting my ring.

When Lloyd and I got engaged it was kind of a secret. He proposed kind of spur-of-the-moment (whole other story), but it was November and we wanted to tell our families in person first, and that would have to wait until Christmas. I told him that I didn’t want a ring for two reasons:

First, I am very cheap and thought that it wouldn’t be a good use of money. (Not that he was hurting – detasseling had made him wealthy.)

Second, and most importantly, I am clumsy. A hard gemstone on my hand would have guaranteed repeated scratches on my face. No thanks.

After we told our families, our college choir went on tour for New Year’s break. We thought it would be funny to get a fake ring, so we went to WalMart and bought a HUGE fake diamond ring. As we announced the big news, I loved watching the reaction of people’s faces – a bewildered yet kind smile that said, “That poor, sweet, dippy girl – she thinks it’s real.”

It was especially funny when we went to the beach and after making a sand castle I said, “Hey! My ring is all scratched up!” You could feel the tension as friends wondered, “Should we tell her?”

Hee hee hee.

Oh! I almost forgot the rest of the story! We were on another choir tour in Germany and realized that since we were going to get married in three months we should probably buy rings. We went to a shop where the salesperson spoke English and picked ours out. My original ring is just the little band in the middle…. Y’know, I’m going to save this story for another time. It will need a drawing.

I am typing this as I sit on my sofa watching Neat Freaks on TLC. This show is nuts. It is all about people who obsessively clean their homes for hours and hours and still don’t think they are clean. I feel so sorry for them, because this is obviously a mental disorder. They love for their house to be clean, but it’s never clean enough. That must be a strange kind of personal hell.

I remember reading Orson Scott Card’s final book in the Ender’s Game series (science fiction) and there was a planet that regarded OCD people as ones who were actually communicating with the gods. It followed the story of one young girl who was ‘most favored’, but her OCD behavior was to trace every single line on a hardwood floor with her eyes,and if she lost the line, she had to start over. The description was so, so sad.

This has been an interesting hour. I feel so stressed for these people, but I have no desire to clean my kitchen sink with bleach and a toothpick. In that respect, it’s no Hoarders.

I’ve caught a ride to work with Lloyd the past couple of days, and I like it because I’m walking home again in the evenings. Monday night I stopped by Beth’s to visit the kittens and borrow her ukulele. Tuesday night I walked through downtown and enjoyed the lights all over the square. Peggy, I even took a few shaky shots for you.

This is the little house on the courthouse lawn where children can visit with Santa. (Santa keeps banker’s hours here, so you better check the schedule if you want to place an order.) The children are always telling me about it, but I’ve never done more than drive by. Tonight, though, I stopped for some pictures.

And then I looked inside.

Oh!

This is a tiny house! A tiny house! The chairs are nothing special, but that tiny fireplace threw me into a full-on Rich Inner World experience. I could live in this house! Or at least sit in my jammies, drink cocoa and pretend to roast marshmallows.

It would be heaven, if it weren’t for all the kids banging on the door.

I hope this comes across as well as I want it to. Some background:

1. It’s parent-teacher conference time at school. I am a little tired, so no drawing for this story.

2. I haven’t been sleeping terribly well lately due to the cats. 4 a.m. is giant-paw-on-the-face time. Seriously, Ralph, back off.

3. This morning I woke up with a headache, and we had a walking field trip in the rather cold weather, So I put on a bright shining brave face and was as sunny and cheerful as possible.

Now here’s the story: Once we got back to school I was a little fuzzy headed, and sat quietly during lunchtime. The children however were amped up and busy. Brycen sat across from me and ate very little as he wiggled around in his chair. Near the end of lunch he said, “Mrs. Sommerer, there’s something wrong with the lights.”

“Great,” I thought to myself. “One more thing I have to do afterwards – change lightbulbs.”

Then Brycen told me, “They keep going off and on. Watch.” and – dead serious -he went blink blink blink blink.

It was everything I could do not to bust a gut. “Yes. Yes, they do.” I calmly responded. No reason to burst his bubble.

Thanks Brycen, for helping my head feel better.

That calendar in the hallway at work is talking to my soul again. This time it’s not shaming me – I actually agree with it. (See how fickle I am? When it’s bossing me around, I hate it. When I agree with it, it’s not bossy at all – it is wise, like me.)

This current round of hammering-it-into-the-ground advice-giving has to do with contentment. It says you should stop after an accomplishment to appreciate what you have just done – not rush onto the next thing. Savor life and all that. Yeah.

i like these calendar pages. They affirm me. I am heavily Type B. I can’t fathom how Type A’s function without having some sort of stroke. All that perfectionism and ‘goals’ and organization? I can sit back and appreciate an accomplishment all day long. Heck, i’ll write a post about it!

Then again, I am sure Type A’s can’t fathom how I can be content sitting on my sofa typing a post in a messy living room with a smelly cat leaning on me.

How Type B am I? So Type B that I’m pretty sure I have one of those calendar pages upstairs in my pants pocket (I put on my pajamas at 7), but I’m too lazy to go up and get it. There’s a cat on my lap, you might remember. I’ll look for it in the morning.