We have had a wonderful spring so far with temperatures always in the mid 20s (degrees celcius).  

Last night I got to sit on my deck with my lovely husband and enjoy the cloudy skies.  We didn't last long out there in the chilly, blowing rain, and quickly came back in!  However quick our moment was, it was peaceful and simply beautiful.  Our moment to quietly reconnect and take joy in where we are.

My hope is that wherever you are in this world and in your life, whether you are with yourself or with another, that you take these moments every day to reflect.  Find your joy and embrace it.

Life simply goes by way too fast to not have that special moment for yourself everyday.

Much love.
R

“I’m sorry Mr. and Mrs. Einner, but Sean needs one more procedure,” the doctor looks at us sternly, a look of sorrow and understanding of our emotional struggles.

It is all we can do to nod our heads with acceptance.  There really is nothing to be done about it.  If it means a full recovery for our son, then we must be strong enough to help him through his pain.

The curtain closes in front of us, blocking Sean from our view. 

Together we stand, hand in hand, facing that dreaded curtain, waiting for it to open.  Afraid of what will be revealed when it does.  What feels like hours go by and still we stand patiently waiting.

“Sean will wake up in 15 minutes,” the doctor announces as he comes out from behind the curtain. 

James kisses me on the cheek before leaving with the doctor.  I wait for them to leave before I go in.

Sean is sitting, slouched over, in a sink with his legs crossed.  The procedure they did was on his legs.  Anger and confusion flood my mind.  In a panic, I struggle to lift him out of the sink.  What was the doctor thinking to place him cross-legged in a sink?  I try desperately to wake up Sean. 

A lady comes in, her arms full of boxes.  “James will be coming with the children soon,” out of breath, she puts down the boxes, “You will need to hurry to get them ready.  There are heavy gowns, socks and slippers in here for them.”  The urgency in her voice cannot be mistaken.

I am confused.  What children?

When James comes in he is holding our younger son’s hand, Neil.  There are about 10 other children behind them.  Everyone crowds into the tiny room.  I don’t know where these other children came from or who they belong to.  I just know I need to move quickly and do as I am told. 

--------------------------------

I am standing on the side of a highway.  The highway dips and turns.

“Why in the world did you choose this place?” a woman says.  She has a bad perm, lots of jewelry, and her face looks heavy with makeup.  She reminds me of a woman from a television show in the eighties.

“Because,” I answer, “you said we had to meet you at the roller coaster.  There are no roller coasters around here, but this road,” I point out to the highway, “looks like one.”

She shrugs her shoulders, “I guess it will have to do.”

“It will.  We must save the children.”

“Very well.  Good job.  My driver will meet you back here in two hours.”

“Thank you.” I nod.

She turns her back to me to cross the road where a silver sedan awaits her.  She climbs in the back and opens the window.  “Don’t be late.  You only get one chance.”

I watch as the car quickly drives away.

I turn around and find myself back in the hospital room.  Sean is laying on a bed as James keeps peeking out the door.

“Okay,” I say, “arrangements have been made.  Let’s get ready.”

I help each of the children get dressed.  There are clothes for them to wear under the special gowns.  It is cold outside and we have a bit of a walk ahead of us.  The children are quiet and help me with putting on the clothes I hand them.

“Sean, honey,” I smooth his hair, “it’s time to get up mister.”

“Huh?”  He is groggy and disoriented.

“You need to wake up now.  We need to get out of here.”

“It’s clear,” James calls from the door.  “They round every fifteen minutes.  We don’t have much time.”

I put on Sean’s clothes and put his arm around my shoulders.  “I need you to help now.”

“Okay,” he mumbles.

As he stands, he stumbles.

“My legs,” there is panic in his voice, “they aren’t working.”

“It’s okay honey,” I try to soothe him, “they are still sleeping.  I will help you.  They’ll come back soon.”

A tear rolls down his face and he nods.  His brows furrow with fear.

“It’s okay,” I say again to reassure him.  “Come now.  Together.”

He holds me tight.  His brother holds his other hand.  James ushers us out the door.  Each of the children pair up, holding hands and follow us out.  James takes the rear.

Half way to the roller coaster highway and Sean’s legs start working.  The remainder of our journey goes much faster.  We make it to the meeting point with 5 minutes to spare.  The children are anxious and cold.  We huddle together to keep warm as we wait.  A yellow school bus appears right on schedule.  James takes Sean and Neil onto the bus first and I usher the other children on.  As the last child boards the bus, I grab the handle of the door to pull myself on.

“You think it should be so easy?” a velvety voice sneers behind me.

I let go of the handle and motion for the driver to close the doors as I slowly turn around to face the voice behind me.  As I turn, I hear the doors close.  I discreetly wave for the driver to go.

“I tried not to think too much about how easy or how difficult it would be actually.” I say calmly, my heart pounding, threatening to give away my fear.  I hear the wheels of the bus rolling away.  Subtle sounds of crunching gravel.  “I just thought about what needed to be done and did it.”

I hear James and the boys screaming for me.  A tear borders on the edge of my eye.  I can’t let it escape.  I need to hold her attention; otherwise she will stop the bus.  Thankfully, she is so focused on me that she doesn’t hear the bus rolling away.

“You know you can never escape me,” she says, a wicked grin on her face.

“Perhaps not,” I admit, “but that won’t stop me from trying.”

“You are wasting your time.  You should just submit yourself to me.”

“That, I will never do.”

“Ah, but you should.  Otherwise,” she moves closer to me, “you could just lose it all.”

“Oh,” I say, defeated, “perhaps I just have.”

“What?” she asks, confused.

The bus is now gone.  It went down the first crest and disappeared.  I know that James, the boys and all the other children are now safe and far away from here.

The woman shoves me but I stand my ground.  She walks around me, searching the highway.  “Where are they?” she screams from behind me.

“Matters not where they are,” I say, “they are not yours.”  I turn to face her. 

Her back is still turned to me. 

A voice in my head whispers, ‘Run!’

I run straight to her back, shoulder first, I knock her over.  I don’t stop running.  Her hand stretches out and I feel it grace my ankle, too slow to take hold.  I run down the hill, my legs fighting to keep up with the momentum that carries me.  A light shines in front of me and I run towards it.  Through it.

When I stop running I find myself all alone.  There is no space that surrounds me.  No darkness.  No walls of a room.  Simple nothingness.

(c) Rachel Rennie 2015

Amongst moving comes purging and discovery.

Discovering what you really need and what you don’t.  Discovering lost treasures packed away when I started to have babies and didn’t want them broken.  Discovering that maybe, just maybe, I do not need to keep every piece of work my children have done at school, or all of the crafts they have done at home.

One of the things I discovered is actually something that has been sitting in one of my kitchen cupboard for years.  Twelve of them to be exact.  The box is dusty and greyed, but inside sits six perfect crystal wine glasses.  A wedding gift that my husband and I have never enjoyed.  I have never been a wine drinker.  I myself prefer a Corona with lime or a variety of other liquors.

I decided now was the time to discover wine, and use those simple and beautiful wine glasses.  With the expertise of my lovely husband, we picked out two bottles of wine.  A Rose and a Merlot.  These names really mean nothing to me! 

I started with the Rose.  It was lightly fruity with very little bite.   I found it refreshing actually.  However, I think that for me, because I liked it better when it was cold, I should only pour a half glass at a time and refill.

I decided to take a look at the website for the wine I chose, Naked Grape, to see what to drink with my new wines.  I think I will have to try out some other wines this company has to offer!

Feel free to leave a comment below or on my Google+ or my FaceBook and tell me, What is your drink of choice?  And if you do enjoy wine, what is your favorite?

As always, thank you for reading and your support.

The shock and horror that filled the young boy’s mind was confirmed as his mother was knocked over

from the scariest creature the boy had ever seen. The raccoon, who obviously had been alarmed by all 

of the noise that the footsteps and the opening and closing of appliances must have created, shot so fast 

out of that door. The boy was frozen in terror, as his mother sat on the floor for a moment, and his own 

mood was changed by the way his mother was laughing. To the young boy it was a maniacal laughter 

that was totally out of place but to the mother it was the common laughter of someone who was scared 

for no reason. The raccoon on the other hand was out the back door before anyone could even take an 

inventory of how big it was, or even its color.

The young boy again is back to thinking of what could have happened to his father. Throughout all of 

this commotion there wasn’t so much as a peep from the man in which the boy had thought would 

protect him from everything. Now he was more scared as this man he thought he knew when they left 

New York, is now doing God knows what upstairs while he was left to fend for himself with a mother 

who obviously has lost her faculties too. Assuming the boy even knew what faculties were, but then 

again he isn’t telling this story, he is just living it.

“Honey?” the mother called out trying to gauge the situation as it pertained to her husband herself. The 

silence was awkward, even in this scenario where the silence had been so terrifying. The boy is looking 

about the room, too afraid to get away, even as his mother had lost her firm grasp of him in all the 

commotion. “Honey? What are you up to?” the mother called out again. The silence otherwise 

continues.

Too afraid to go check out the situation himself, the boy simply stares at his mother wondering why she 

doesn’t take the situation more seriously. She is simply standing there brushing the years of dust off of 

her clothes. The boy stares at the door to what must be the basement, hoping that she doesn’t think 

taking him down there is a good idea, but he probably should have thought about getting away before 

she had taken his hand in hers, like she just did. The boy struggles to get out of her grasp and she seems 

to take this as the simple pangs of a young child, determined to be independent, as she grasped more 

firm. The horror of her starting to take him towards that door starts making his sweat feel cold.

At the top of the stairs his mother now attempts to turn the light on, to no avail. The light in the 

basement has apparently decided that it had no intention of looking at whatever unspeakable horrors 

lurk down there, and the boy wouldn’t have blamed it. Of course the mother was intent on walking 

down there, while the boy pulled defenseless to keep her in the kitchen and in his mind just plain sane. 

Who in their right mind would walk willingly into the basement of a house like this especially when there 

is no light to alert you to whatever unspeakable evil has built its lair down there?

The mother takes that first step downward and the terrified little boy is completely helpless to keep 

himself at the top of the stairs. His foot lands on the first step down. It creaked like it wasn’t ready to 

handle any weight much less his. The second step gave off more of a groan, then the creak that the first 

one did. Then it happened, exactly like the boy knew it would, the sound of a crack, and then the full 

weight of the boy’s mother was being held by the young man gripped with fear and roughly one third of 

his mother’s weight. Flailing in the dark like any adult without the wherewithal to just fall and get it over 

with, like a child would. The boy instinctively thought like an adult for maybe the first time in his life as 

his free hand latched onto the doorway that was barely within reach. His grasp was true, as his mother 

managed to steady herself from the broken step that had taken her and her son by surprise. She 

couldn’t want to go further, with all of the warning signs she has already ignored?

For the first time since this whole ordeal of this miserable house had been dropped in this poor little 

boy’s world, his mother did as he would have wanted her to, as she gave up on walking downward 

further into that moldy basement. She dragged him along with her as she walked back into the kitchen, 

and her son was perfectly happy to be in the kitchen for the first time today. She managed to parade 

him out into the living room, or what would have most likely been a living room had there been walls, 

and then out onto the sea of poison ivy that infests what maybe a hundred years ago was a lawn. A look 

to the left told the young boy that the running river had not changed its opinion of the house since they 

had ventured inside of it.

The mystery of the missing parent was now solved as the young boy spied his father leaning up against 

the car having an animated conversation with someone on his cell phone. His father finally said, “Ok, I’ll 

let them know,” just before he slipped the cell phone back into his pocket. He took a step towards them 

onto the lawn, that still to the little boy looked like serpents trying to drag his father into the dirt, that 

laid just below the tangling weeds. The father said, “Well gang it looks like the company won’t be 

moving me to Shamokin Dam after all, let’s get back home.”

The mother piped up, “Thank Goodness, I didn’t want to look at another house like this again. Don’t 

they all seem to look so horrible?” and with that she let go of her son’s hand and let him free for the first 

time today. The little boy finally had his freedom to do whatever he wanted to, and how did he use that 

freedom?

He plunked himself down in the sea of nasty weeds and poison ivy and started to cry. The tears of a 

miserable little boy who must have been holding in these exasperated tears for the longest of time, and 

now he had his audience to explain his angst to. Like a normal child, finally he was going to let everyone 

involved with this day know exactly where he stood, and he wasn’t going to hold back at all. His wail 

belted out exactly what his parents should have known all along was coming, “BUT THEY DON’T HAVE 

BIRCH BEER BACK HOME! HOW AM I SUPPOSED TO HAVE BIRCH BEER NOW?!?!”

Now the young boy has to hear the newest sounds that trickle upwards to his ears. It is a crunching 

sound that could only be coming from the piles of dust that his feet appear to be making footprints in. 

The eerie acknowledgement that no other footprints aside from the one he and his parents are making 

makes his stomach a bit queasy. “Don’t think,” he whispers under his breath and his mother seems to 

wonder aloud what he just said. The boy was done speaking and concentrating on things other than the 

noises under his feet, which for all he knows could be the floor boards ready to collapse. Yeah stop 

thinking.

Of course you can see the kitchen through the lack of walls but the boy still doesn’t want to go in there. 

It’s got to be worse once you get in there, and thinking about this brings the odor from out of there, as 

his mother’s firm grasp drags him closer to the kitchen. Secretly the boy is already wishing that there 

isn’t a bathroom down here, despite the fact that he suddenly feels the need to use one. The doorway, 

we suppose, as there really isn’t much distinction between doorways and missing walls, to the kitchen 

brings that odor sweeping into him, and now he could actually be sick. His eyes are watering.

The stove is a nightmare, the refrigerator looks like something out of a black and white movie, but 

unfortunately the rust and grime on both bring the only color to them both. Inwardly the boy is begging 

his mother not to open the refrigerator door, but she keeps firm her grasp as she walks towards it. What 

could she be thinking? There couldn’t be anything worth looking at in there, and even a small child who 

knows nothing about home ownership can tell that the thing needs to be removed unopened, and 

replaced, by whatever insane hermits own this home. Her hand is on the handle and the child cannot 

free himself from the grasp in her other hand. The door swings open.

Nothing.

The relief washed over the child as apparently whoever had left this home to die had taken everything 

out of the refrigerator, and even the musty smell that came from it wasn’t as horrifying as the child’s 

mind had taken him. He still can’t pry his hand from her grasp as she looks over at the nasty stove, 

covered in paint from the ceiling and grease from eons of use. Why does she feel the need to walk 

anywhere near that stove? The pleasant surprise of an empty refrigerator, is waning as the lure of a 

disgusting oven drags his mother and in turn, him over in that direction. How long have we been here 

now, an hour, two, perhaps four?

Sweat literally trickled down the little boy’s nose as he watched his once proud and tidy mother wipe 

her index finger across the top of the stove leaving a trail of grease and the ridges of it sliming away 

from the sides of her fingers. She held it up to her nose and took a deep sniff of whatever odor must 

have been emanating from that disgusting smudge of goo on the end of her finger. The boy knows that 

he will finally lose the remnants of the pizza he ate for lunch should she put that finger anywhere near 

his nose. His heart starts hammering as she reaches for the door to the oven and starts to pull it open. 

He can’t help but think that something evil had been burned in that oven and she was willing to let it 

escape. Her hand takes hold and swings the door downward.

Nothing.

A deep exhale left the boy’s mouth as another tragedy is averted. The oven needed a good cleaning, but 

aside from that there was nothing inside of it, and it could even be said that it was a lot cleaner than the 

rest of this catastrophe in the middle of nowhere. Now the fear of all fears comes across the young boy 

as his mother looks towards the corner of the room where, the only door left standing in the entire 

house blocks, something. Realizing that they aren’t actually moving now, the boy practically jumps when 

he hears that strange crunching noise under his feet but not actually from his feet. His feet haven’t 

moved. Now a squeak, then a bang, and it is all coming from underneath them. Is the house about to 

collapse? Where is his father? He hasn’t heard anything from his father in what, an hour, two, maybe 

four?

No more is the boy leaving footprints, the trail behind him is solid drag marks, because that is what his 

mother is doing to him now, dragging him by his weak hand grasped tight in her much stronger one. He 

even tried to give a pull out of her hand and she paid him no notice, no firmer, no softer the grasp that 

she has on his little fingers. She drags him, less willingly by the foot along to the door, which the boy has 

decided must go down to the basement, the basement where all that noise is coming from. The fear and 

now the anger, that his mother has lost all common sense as she drags him along to that door, that 

probably could be kicked in as easily as it could be opened. Her hand is now around the handle, and the 

boy is tugging on her other hand as hard as he can, but it won’t free him. The door swings out towards 

them.

Something.

There will be no #FitFriday this week.

Sorry. I'm packing and have had a few appointments this week.

But I will say that with all of the appointments I did up my step counts, I drank more water and I went to bed before midnight every day.

WooHoo!

Snacking? Well, I have cut back on the bread. But have not made good choices all the time.

The next few weeks will be super busy so I may put #FitFridays on hold until June.

Don't worry. #SerialSaturday will still continue. As will #MondayMusings and #WeitingWednesday.

Much love and thank you for sticking with me