Nice Day ... lost the anger
Hi … this is just me … I wanted to write a short note before going to bed. I wanted to say that we are not angry any more. While I’m not foolish enough to say that it has gone away forever, I can say for the day it has stopped. Actually, it happened not too much later than when sweetie pie came over. We were finishing our coloring and he let us complete the picture, but we hadn’t gotten into the shower yet. He said some stuff and then dragged our sorry bottom part into the bathroom and shut the door. We were too crabby. He’s a pro on getting us to do that which we don’t want to do. I don’t know why we didn’t get mad at him even though he was laughing and teasing us.
The shower felt important, but after we were through and the water was turned off we just sat there longer. BUT, when we came out … there he was standing naked posted at our bedroom door. We went forward two arms stretched out for a hug. Well, beside that he had some other ideas. We, umm, lost the bad space.
Afterward, we went to the Spring Fling. It was the most terrific thing. Almost all the families were there. We ended up with 293 people there and one of the parents had found out from the other sister that it was soon to be Sister’s birthday. So, that was nice. They had special flowers for her. Sr. seemed in a pretty good mood. Not that she didn’t get crabby at times, but for the most part she stayed smiley. Maybe she just needs a naked person! Mmmm…
There was good mingling, though not a lot by us. We kind of stayed grounded in our chair, but there was a lot of people up and around and we got visited quite a bit. The treat of the evening was that an old client had come with her mother. Pretty sure the mother is in her late 60’s or early 70’s. Today, she looked beautiful. We didn’t see her until later though. We helped the old client take pictures with some of her old friends and staff. We had a good family style dinner, and then the dancing started. We snuck out with a couple of sets of smokers … ahhh… There was a lot of noise in there. It was a live band doing all the clients favorites.
After a while they started the part where they are naming off raffle numbers. I sat down in the back off the craft table. I had worked there a while before dinner. I specialized in the $1.00 items. Hehehe I had to hand in my money each time to the other staff. *Sigh* I felt bad because I sold some stuff that was in a bag, because we were running low. Then I found out it was stuff that belonged to a parent who’d left it under the table. They shouldn’t make me do responsible stuff I guess. *Sigh* Anyway after the Sister got up to watch the craft table for a while, the old client came back again. It is difficult understanding her speech, but usually we catch enough words to make sense of it all. We had a good talk, but then toward the end, she said something about her brother being in the hospital a couple of weeks and we could see how that upset her. She said that she had to look for her mother. As it turns out she was by us practically just across from us. I hadn’t been focusing on seeing peoples’ faces. Of course then, I had to get up and give her the biggest hug. She would like her daughter to go back to the center, but because of illegal alien status, she can’t get the Medicaid funding to pay for the program and transportation, which is now a rule. Before Sr. had bent rules, but the state policies changed. I don’t speak Spanish, but I needed to find out what had happened to the brother. He was the one that did all the communicating/translating before. I looked and looked and couldn’t find one of the Spanish staff or parents who could help me out. So, I went to a perfectly innocent stranger who “looked” Spanish. Fortunately, she not only knew how to speak Spanish she did it with graciousness due the respect of the client’s mother. She passed on the message that the son had been asking for me, so I made the commitment that I would call on Tuesday when I get back. There were more hugs … shoot I just loved that family … AND, every Christmas she brought us Mexican sugar COOKIES!!! Just gotta love THAT kinda treating! Hehehe
Anyway after a while, our friend had thought it might be time to leave. We had been there for four hours. The clients dance/singing presentation was wonderful, they all got the sweet flowers, and they powerhoused the dancing after the dinner was over. It is all very grand, everyone is dressed so nice. The family of six we were seated with was all Spanish speaking, but my favorite state worker and the old banker who sat with my friend and me both spoke Spanish. YAYYYYY!!! I got so many passerbyer hugs, they must have figured out we were ok folk, cuz there were a lot of smiles happening. HEY, I forgot my candy on the table!!!!!!!! Shoot. Well, beside that … all went very nicely. The atmosphere was festive and the moderator was one of my clients mothers who did a great job on the mike and in translating everything English to Spanish. While I was watching over the people sitting in the back by the Sister, I thought to ask her where she was from originally. She proudly stated she’s been a Chicagoan all her life. Then she asked me. I told her I came from Minneapolis. She asked and we told her my ex-husband was from one of the western suburbs outside the city. Somehow looking out at the crowd between African American, Spanish, and even Chinese, I felt very proud at how far I’d come in life. I was perfectly at home, even though we worked in the city where we knew absolutely no one beside these people from the Center. Yup, yup quite an event! This is my home, I don’t think I’d be able to ever go back to Minnesota. Finally, after 25 years, I feel like I’m a Chicagoan!
The drive home with our friend was short. I think his proudest moments was when one of his favorite clients came over to ask his help in tying the tie. He spent his time handing out his candy for each of the clients that stopped by to say hello. I’m so proud of him. He’s such a nice person. AND, after quite a bit of work untangling my cords umm computer … he helped me to set up the new monitor. We couldn’t figure out what to do with only one space for plugging in either the blue cord or the white cord, so we had to abandon the old screen for a little bit, BUT we got up the new … Holy corimbo … 24 full inches. Woo Hoo!!!! I know, I know … bedtime … need to do that too. Just couldn’t go to sleep without a little JD and breaking in the new monitor … She sure is a beaut! Tomorrow?? Better test her on some papers :)
posted by Ann Marie @ 3/18/2006 09:36:00 PM
Comments: 4
