Just when you think you've gotten rid of them...

      Our second-oldest daughter is married to a guy in the Foreign Service of the U.S. State Department, and she has followed him around to all sorts of strange places during their married life.  Their first two kids started out in the States, but from a very early age those two have lived abroad, and the remaining five know nothing else.  They get to come to the States for 'home leave' every summer, and one of them described it like, "going to Disneyland," and then they go to back to their real home in Tajikistan or Kazakhstan, or Uzbekistan or Whatever-stan.  Kind of a different perspective.  

    Anyway, they've been here for a couple of weeks, and it's been a lot of fun.  First was Topsail Beach with more cousins than I could keep count of.

     They got to catch up on the latest fashions in fingernails, 

and get reacquainted with their cousins, like this was one being fed by Grandma.  Who else could look so good feeding a kid while wearing Shark Dark™ glasses?

     Then back to Raleigh, where a friend of ours let them infest their pool several times.

     And after that they tried to steal my car.

 

     Grandma took the oldest daughter out to lunch with her cousin, and they shopped for new dresses.

     It's amazing how much your IQ appears to increase in a 'borrowed' pair of your grandfather's reading glasses, which he'll go crazy hunting for later.

 

      Or how much that IQ can appear to drop with a pair of googly eys.

     Or how strong you can get by working out.

     Or how many cardiac arrhythmias you can cure with a pair of paddles.  (If I were this guy, I'd ask for a copy of her medical license.  BEFORE she used the paddles.)

     There have been lots of good walks,

 

as well as some plain old hanging around. 

     The gang got to go to beloved Uncle Mark and Aunt Amy's who live on the water in Maryland and they got to go sailing and climbing on Mark's big climbing walls.

     Back in Raleigh, the toy bin had to be checked out.

     And several went flying with Grandpa.

    And the fish needed to be fed.  Or lied and said they needed to be fed.  Can't trust a fish. 

 

    It has been a great visit, and there have been lots of fun and sweet moments.  Though the house has been chaotic, it has been worth every extra load of laundry, every extra trip to Costco and all the rest.  

     We wouldn't trade these moments for anything.

 

Dave & Paula

She did it!

      Paula is one of the most consistent, tenacious and organized people I have ever known.  Our sister-in-law (one of her closest friends) saw this card, bought it, brought it home and asked her kids, "Who does this remind you of?"  With no prompting, they answered in unison, "Aunt Paula!"

     There are things that bother her that don't cause me any problem (which speaks badly for me, by the way) such as:

or

or

      She pointed out that in addition to the corner of the sheet being out in the picture above, there was NO MATTRESS PAD!!

     This has been great in our married life....mostly.  It means that the house is always neat, the weeds are pulled and the spices are in alphabetical order.  Of course!  Who would dare do otherwise with spices?!

     Note:  I was sternly reprimanded for leaving the cabinet doors open taking that picture.

     The wash is done and neatly folded so that all the towels are stacked the same way.  The pictures are all straight and there are "hospital corners" when the beds are made.  I've been informed that at times I don't stack my jeans the right way, and she will take them out and arrange them correctly.

     Let me emphasize that this is almost always to the good.  Our home has a quiet and peaceful spirit, and while I laugh and give her grief on occasion, I consider myself lucky to be married to her for this and a million other reasons.

     As you've read before, we spent almost five years in South America, and through a LOT of hard and persistent work, she became fluent in Spanish.  She spoke over 300 times in various public meetings and never required a translator.

     We've been home now for nine years, and starting soon after that, Paula signed up for the DuoLingo app.  She says that learning the language was the hardest thing she's ever done, and doesn't want to lose it.  Consistent with her persistence and diligence, she almost never misses a day to "feed the owl," the way the app refers to the daily task.  (Because of her diligence, she can skip very occasionally if we're en route to Kazakhstan or something.)

     So, she made it!  Three thousand days in a row!

    She was asked, "So, what now?"  "4,000 days!  Duh!"

    Not long ago, a friend of a grandson bragged that he had a 200-day streak on DuoLingo.  Nathan laughed and said, "OK, my grandmother is closing in on 3K.  My GRANDMOTHER!"  Take that!

     I have to admit that although I laugh a lot about it, Paula's persistence, diligence and organization are one of the reasons that I love her.  I'll post again when she hits 4,000.  And then 5,000.

Dave

Be careful who you pick for friends

      Because you may have them for a looonnng time.  

     I graduated from the Medical College of Virginia (now VCU School of Medicine) in 1981.  

     During my four years there, I made a lot of good friendships and actually had a lot of fun - mixed in with a lot of hard work, long hours, scary situations, sad outcomes, and...you've heard about the rest.

     The first two years of med school were mostly spent in the classroom, with a few early exposures to patients.  However, the third year, we were thrown in the deep end of the pool without our floaty wings.  The class divided itself into twelve groups to begin the clinical rotations, and these groups formed more-or-less organically.  My friends and I declared ourselves to be "Group 12."

     One of our gang was from my congregation at church in Northern Virginia and I'd known him since about five years old.  Another interviewed at MCV the same day I did in 1976, a couple of months before I met Paula at BYU.  Several were accomplished musicians, and we began meeting at someone's house after big tests to overeat and play music.  I was honored to play alto sax (poorly) a couple of times with the band that was formed, The Cyanotic Blues Band (get the joke?  "Cyanotic" means "blue" - OK not that funny.)

     At the end of medical school, we scattered to residencies in just about all the big branches of medicine.

      We thought we'd had it tough in med school, but as interns and residents we were tossed in the deep end without a life jacket, and this time there were a couple of cinder blocks tied to our ankles and there was someone standing on our head.  

     After THAT was over, just working 70 hours a week felt like a vacation, and we even got PAID!  Woo-hoo!  

     However, over the years Group 12 devolved in to Christmas cards and an occasional visit if we happened to be in that part of the country. 

     Those with whom I was closest have turned out well.  One has been the chief of staff at one of the most prestigious hospital systems in California.  

Another is a professor of anesthesiology at a top-tier medical school, was the head of the national academy of pain specialists, and has testified in Congress concerning hospice care.   

The one with whom I've remained closest became a senior partner in a large ophthalmology practice (and a really good kiteboarder!)  

 Meanwhile, I hung out and caught babies.

     But we're all getting older and are beginning to feel it.  Cancer, serial orthopedic difficulties and what we look like in the mirror have made that clear.  So someone finally called time out for a huddle.

    And it was great!  All four of us are still married - and to our first wives!  We met at the beautiful home of  our buddy in San Diego and took in a Padres game.  Yeah, they lost, but the hot dogs were great and we laughed a lot.

      We toured some good restaurants in San Diego and ate far too much!

      We hit the San Diego zoo!  That's Paula on the left.  (She didn't eat THAT much!)

     We watched the video of our senior med school "Take-offs" in which we made fun of our attending physicians and played some pretty good music, and we laughed some more!

     It was a great four days, but the best part was seeing that everyone had stayed on course.  We all had honorable careers and had stayed true to our ethical bedrock, which may have been naive at first but which proved in the long run to be the right way to go.  

     Do it all over again?  Are you NUTS?  But feel blessed to have found such honorable life-long friends?  Absolutely.  

     So, be careful who you pick for friends.  They may be with you a lot longer than you think.   

Dave & Paula

And now, something really nice

      Our daughter Ashley lives in Astana, Kazakhstan with her husband and (now) six kids.  Kathleen, their oldest, left last August to begin college at Brigham Young University - Idaho,. As part of the financial agreement with her parents she found a job cleaning university buildings on the 4:30 AM (!) custodial crew shift.

    As luck would have it, an honorable young man from Indiana was also on that slacker shift, and they became friends, then serious friends, then girlfriend/boyfriend and finally affianced by early 2025.  We were sent by her concerned parents during our November trip to Utah to check this guy out, and we reassured her folks that he seemed OK.

      We were calmed by a) he was putting himself through school, and anyone willing to do custodial work at 4:30 AM gets some points, b) he drives a 1996 Camry, which earns both he and Toyota some more points, c) he served a mission for the Church in the Philippines (add some points), d) he has six sisters (more points plus automatic admission to heaven for surviving THAT), and most importantly, e) he seemed a gentleman and treated our granddaughter kindly.

    So the wedding plans were on.  Initially, the rest of the family would come to the States in July for their between-country break, attend the wedding and then decamp to the annual joyous family mess on a NC beach.  However, Kathleen and Brian moved the date back to April at the end of the BYU-I winter semester.  This meant some serious travel for the remaining eight back in Central Asia, but hey...

     Our daughter wisely rented a great big Air BnB in Rexburg, ID, home of BYU-I and the gang arrived a few days before to find their luggage, the house, and some degree of sanity after a 30-hour sojourn from Kazakhstan.  Others in the family also gathered.  There were pots of pasta, games, kids, laughter and a lot of love for the two days prior to the Big Deal.  

     And finally the Big Deal itself, on Thursday April 10th.  Everyone got spiffed up and looked great.

 

    They piled into the cars in their usual dignified fashion and headed for the Rexburg, Idaho temple of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints.

     The ceremony itself went well; no one fainted, Kathleen and Brian both said "Yes," and emerged a new married couple.  Kathleen honored her mother (and saved some serious custodial earnings) by using her mother's wedding dress, which her mother had borrowed from her sister, and...

 

     And then picture time!  It may be considered kind of the draggy part of a wedding, but it was honestly fun hanging out and talking on a beautiful day.

 

 

     We had to leave the Air BnB by 10:00 AM that morning, which was before the wedding, so after a nice noisy big luncheon, the family headed to cousin Stephen and Sarah's house in Rexburg, where they packed up their pretty clothes and started the long trip back to Kazakhstan.  

 

     This is the real stuff in an otherwise confusing world.   Conflicts rage, politics do strange things, people try to figure out how to be happy, and in the end, what really matters are the simple things - our relationships with others and just being good. 

     We feel humbly blessed that another bond in our beloved family has been forged.

Dave & Paula