Tattooed and ringless

It was a pretty good movieOne thing I don't do on this blog is talk about my health.

Too personal and so excruciatingly boring, I wouldn't do that to my dear readers.

Today is no exception.

However.

I must tell you what I saw on a recent visit to a doctor's office.

It pains me to reveal this but the physician to whom I refer is an OB/GYN.

No, I am not sick and no, I am not with child. This was purely routine. But thank you for your concern.

The only reason I give you that tidbit is if I leave out the rather personal part -- i.e., that I was seeing a gynecologist -- the other part won't make any sense.

So I'll bite the bullet.

TG ... I don't know how old he was but I'm guessing about one year old

The thing is, I was obliged to cool my heels in the waiting room twice that day -- each time for at least twenty minutes -- so I got to do a great deal of watching.

Oh, I jotted a few things down in the journal I always keep with me, and I flipped through a People magazine, but mostly I observed the comings and goings of ... real people.

Not in a judgemental way. In an interested way.

But, as it turned out, in a sad -- and eventually exasperated -- way too.

Because of all the expectant mothers and new mothers who trooped in and out of the waiting room, most accompanied by what I had to assume were the fathers of their offspring, I couldn't help but notice.

They all had tattoos but not one of them had a wedding ring. At least, not that they were wearing.

Baby TG held aloft by his loving dad ... who was married to TG's mom

The abundance of tattoos and severe paucity of rings applied to both genders.

In other words, I don't think the ringlessness on the part of the mommies was attributable to swollen summer-pregnancy digits.

I think we must face the fact that very few -- if any -- of the couples were actually married.

Meaning, they all had the time, money, and inclination to get "inked" -- many times over -- and, as the bulging bellies and rattle-festooned infant carriers attested, they all had the time and apparently the inclination to make a baby.

But no time, money, or inclination to engage in matrimony.

Now about those tattoos.

TG enjoying the great outdoors, circa 1953

What in the name of all that is holy is it about the expanse of skin constituting the outside of a person's leg between the knee and the ankle that begs to be covered with a lurid, writhing tattoo?

I am only asking. Because yes, it baffles me. Nearly every leg that walked by in that waiting room featured a massive work of ink.

This tattoo thing started small in the general population. I seem to remember twenty years ago, people beginning to get itty-bitty hearts and butterflies and maybe a shamrock or a teensy fairy here and there.

A shoulder, an ankle, what have you.

Now? Huge grotty dark shapes and forms, faces and words, symbols and signs, vines and leaves, bloom grotesquely over entire backs and down arms and up legs and around necks and across bosoms and the Lord above only knows where else.

I tire greatly of it. I'm sick to death of seeing it, if you must know.

TG flanked by his doting parents, Stan and Dolly .. first birthday perhaps

I remember the mind-numbing hours I spent in the waiting room of the doctor who delivered all four of our children.

I do not recall that great numbers of babydaddies swelled the ranks of we mommies who whiled away entire afternoons because Dr. Chung was across the street at the hospital, delivering a bundle of joy, his appointments lagging more and more behind.

In fact, I cannot remember any. Fathers in the waiting room, that is. Oh, I'm sure there were one or two over the ten years I was having children but it was definitely not a normal occurrence.

TG, my husband and the father of my children, never accompanied me to a single OB appointment. For one thing, he was working. For another, I didn't need him trailing after me every minute of the day.

And at least ninety-five percent of the expectant and new mothers waiting with me wore wedding rings. As in, they were married women.

None of us had a tattoo. I for one never will and nobody who calls me mama had better ever come home with one either.

TG's only brother, Ron ... circa 1954

I'm sorry if that offends someone. Allow me to remind you that you click out the same way you clicked in. This is not Disney World and I am not the Easter Bunny.

But I liked those days. We were better off. People for the most part still got married before they had kids. You almost never saw anybody "inked" unless they'd been a Navy man or something, which was fine.

The occasional anchor on a bicep I can handle. I can even tolerate Johnny Depp having his mother's name tattooed on his arm and his daughter's name inked across his chest above his heart. Pirate!

But even that boy has gone too far.

What America needs is fewer tattoos and more wedding rings.

I imagine there are children who are scared out of their wits by some of the gruesome images stamped on the skin of adults in their lives. That's a crying shame. It's not normal and it's not intelligent. In fact it's decidedly low-rent.

Little kids need a mommy and daddy who are not "committed" or "in a relationship" but who are actually married to one another.

Me and my big sister, Kay ... circa 1958

In case you don't get my drift, I mean one man and one woman. Yeah, in addition to being opinionated I'm traditional and narrow-minded.

Deal with it.

The next time people see an inking establishment they should just walk on by. Please spare the rest of us having to look at yet another stupid tattoo.

And that is all for now.

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Happy Tuesday

The miracle that is Michael

If you're new to IHATH you will not know about my nephew Michael.

If you're old to IHATH you may remember a little bit about him.

I blogged on the subject of Michael in May of last year, in a post entitled I left mylar in the sky over Greenville.

It was about the fact that in the early spring of '10 Michael contracted a rare disease known as Guillain-Barre Syndrome.

At the time he got sick, Michael was a young, strong, hard-working, devout and devoted family man.

He was living the dream as husband to his beloved wife Marie and father to his adored son Tobias.

But Michael came down with a stubborn respiratory infection in late winter and, after a few weeks, one day discovered he could not walk.

Within hours Michael was paralyzed from head to toe.

For the better part of the next year Michael divided his time between stays in the hospital and a long-term acute care facility.

He's been home for a while now and, as you can see, he's having great success in rehab.

I believe my sister's eldest son will fully recover one day. Oh, he may not ever be exactly as he was before the battle with GBS, but I think he'll come close.

Because the kind of faith and strength and humility and determination he'll need have always been hallmarks of Michael's life.

As you can see, his fighting-sweet spirit and sense of humor have yet to desert him. Both will serve him well over the long haul.

I know he and Marie would appreciate your prayers.

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Somebody said that it couldn't be done,

But he with a chuckle replied

That "maybe it couldn't," but he would be one

Who wouldn't say so till he'd tried.

So he buckled right in with the trace of a grin

On his face. If he worried he hid it.

He started to sing as he tackled the thing

That couldn't be done, and he did it.

 

Somebody scoffed: "Oh, you'll never do that;

At least no one ever has done it;"

But he took off his coat and he took off his hat,

And the first thing we knew he'd begun it.

With a lift of his chin and a bit of a grin,

Without any doubting or quiddit,

He started to sing as he tackled the thing

That couldn't be done, and he did it.

 

There are thousands to tell you it cannot be done,

There are thousands to prophesy failure;

There are thousands to point out to you, one by one,

The dangers that wait to assail you.

But just buckle in with a bit of a grin,

Just take off your coat and go to it;

Just start to sing as you tackle the thing

That "cannot be done," and you'll do it.

~Edgar Guest~

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There really is no place like home

Especially when you've been gone from yours for eleven days and ten nights.

That's ten nights separated from my bed. Me no likey.

And that's approximately fifteen hundred miles traveled. By car. Through the Carolinas, Tennessee, Kentucky, Ohio, and Michigan.

And back.

So now I'm home at last but I'm momentarily too tired to even wiggle.

Tell you about my travels later, 'k?

I leave you with this photo of Rambo the camp dog, whose tuckered-out expression perfectly mirrors my own.

Happy Sunday!

The luxury of liberty

I pledge allegiance to the flag

Of the United States of America

And to the republic

For which it stands

One nation, under God

Indivisible

With liberty and justice for all.