The Nightmare Probability

  

 

 

I will not be sleeping in my bed tonight. Quite possibly never again. 

No, I'm not mad at Hubs. If so, we all know that he'd be the one not sleeping in the bed tonight.

 

Before I explain what happened last night, let me tell you of a previous experience I had, many years ago, back when Hubs and I had just moved into an apartment in Connecticut. 

 

Hubs was at work. I was unpacking boxes when I saw movement out of the corner of my eye. There, in the middle of the room was a spider. Now I don't like spiders in general, but this was a huge, grey, long legged, gargantuan spider, the size of which I'd never seen. I was terrified. There was no way I was touching that thing, I certainly wasn't going to try to squish something that huge {{gag}}, maybe I could put a plastic container over it, a paperweight on the container and let Hubs deal with it.

 

That was the plan.

 

I grabbed a container, and tried to convince myself to get anywhere near the monster. That's when it happened. It started to run, I threw the container at it and I started to run. I ended up standing on the arm of the couch. But where did it end up?

 

Three hours later, Hubs came home and there I was, standing on the arm of the couch, eyes the size of saucers, rotating and scanning the room like a human periscope.

 

Hubs checked that house, top to bottom, more than once. I stayed right where I was, micromanaging "pick up the couch, look under the rug." When he'd finally given up, he told me it had probably gotten out the sliding door.

 

Probably?

 

Probably?

 

I probably wouldn't end up living in the Midwest.

I probably wouldn't get pregnant in the early years of IVF.

I probably wouldn't have an FBI file.

I probably wouldn't have a kid light my car on fire.

I probably . . .

Not that I knew then all of the improbably probabilities I be living later on, but one thing I knew right then and there was that, in that particular moment, I wouldn't be doing "probably."

 

Hell-to-the-NO!

 

What I also knew is that I probably (more than probably) wouldn't, in the forseeable future, be in the laundry room, reaching into the washing machine. I wouldn't be in the kitchen reaching into cabinets. 

 

I'd be in the den. Standing on the couch. In perpetuity. Or at least for the life span of a gargantuan spider.

 

 

Garlic Ranch Orzo

 

Fast forward to last night. Or I should say this morning. It was actually about 5:30 am, I had been asleep when I suddenly heard fast galloping across my ceiling. Yes, it was that loud. I looked up and saw an enormous beetle, scurrying across the ceiling from the middle of the room, to over my bed. 

Terrified, I jumped out of bed and turned on the light. I was shaking, my heart beating a mile a minute. I looked up at the ceiling and saw nothing. Hubs, famous for sleeping through tornado sirens, was sleeping away.

 

 

 

I woke him up and we checked the ceiling again. Nothing. There's a vent there but it was closed, and honestly, this thing would have to lose about 20 pounds to fit in it anyway. We climbed up and checked behind the headboard. Nothing. We used flashlights to check under the bed. Nothing. 

Hubs was convinced I'd just heard something outside and scared myself awake, but it didn't matter, I was up. For the day. Maybe forever.

 

And face it, there's just no way I'm going back into that room, shut off the lights, and do anything other than picture an enormous beetle galloping its way towards my face. No, I'm going to have to turn my bedroom over to that thing.

 

Even though I've spent the better part of the day convincing myself that it had probably just been a nightmare.

Probably.

Garlic Ranch Orzo

                                                                       ©www.BakingInATornado.com

Printable Recipe

Ingredients:

1 1/4 cups chicken broth

1/2 cup ranch dressing

2 TBSP grated parmesan cheese

1/2 tsp salt

1/4 tsp pepper

1 TBSP dried parsley 

2 TBSP butter

1 cup orzo

3 cloves garlic, minced

 

Directions:
*Preheat oven to 350 degrees. Grease an 8 X 8 baking dish.

*Whisk together the chicken broth, ranch dressing, parmesan cheese, salt, pepper, and parsley in a large bowl. Set aside.

*In a skillet over medium heat, melt the butter. Once hot, add the orzo and garlic to the pan. Cook, stirring, for about 3 minutes, until the orzo starts to brown.

*Add the orzo to the bowl and mix. Pour into the prepared baking dish and cover tightly. Bake for 40 minutes. Uncover carefully, and stir.

Facets of Fear: Word Counters

Counting my words again. 

Today my fellow Word Counters and I are sharing our monthly group post. Each month one group member picks a number between 12 and 74. All participating bloggers are then challenged to write something (or a few somethings, as the case may be) using that exact number of words. Today we all share what we came up with.

 The October number is 68. 
It was chosen by Mimi of Messymimi's Meanderings.

As I've been doing in these Word Counters posts, I've chosen a theme and am using my word count multiple times in keeping with the theme. This month I've chosen the theme Facets of Fear.

~ I'm writing about fear today, it is October after all. This month is associated with fear, thanks in part to Jason Voorhees, Michael Myers, and Chucky (to name a few). Not to mention the fact that I'll never hear a chainsaw without the hair on the back of my neck standing up. But fear isn't just for October, there are many facets of fear in our everyday life.

~ Loss: this is probably one of the most painful fears we have. We all fear loss of many different types, from small and annoying to huge and devastating. I just bought my son renter's insurance, which is actually fear of loss of our belongings, a smaller loss in the scheme of things. The most powerful fear is the death of a loved one. Cancer sucks, by the way.

~ Change: also known as fear of the unknown. There is reassurance in the status quo. Many people are actively fearful of almost any change, find comfort in what we know, the routines that keep us organized, the way things work for us. Change can bring on anxiety, extreme anxiety for some. Anxiety is not fear, but is often a byproduct of it, making this fear a real threat.

~ Stagnation: just as change brings about anxiety, there are also many circumstances in which we fear being stuck in a rut. Same old, same old only takes us so far. We need to grow, to open ourselves to new experiences. Stagnation in a relationship can bring it to an end. 

And who wants to eat the same things every night? Variety is the spice of life, after all.

Shrimp and Scallop Bake

~ Scary movies: I'm convinced that scary movies are fear's version of fun. This is the kind of fear I started this post referring to. It's terror, but not real terror, not for more than a few minutes, anyway. We may very well jump out of our seats, scream out loud, so it's real fear, but it's immediately followed by a laugh, realization that it's all just make believe.

~ Real life creepy crawlies: lions and tigers and bears, nope (brave statement since I've never come face to face with them outside cage at the zoo). Spiders, now that'll do it for me. Not only will we scream, but we'll run (and if you're anything like me you run till you drop), and unlike the Hollywood version of fear, and we'll never follow it up with a laugh. 

~ Others: This fear makes me the saddest, and the angriest, because it's the basis for bigotry. We designate people to groups based on nothing but our own ignorance, on what makes them different from us: their religion or looks, or politics or sexual identity . . . We should only assign value (in terms of whether or not we want them in our lives) by their actions and their character. Period.

~ Ourselves: This is a destructive fear. It's self doubt, insecurity. Truth is, the vast majority of mothers I know have suffered from the paralyzing fear of doing the wrong thing, saying the wrong thing to our children, often resulting in overthinking the situation. It's the fear of being the cause of harm to those we love. If only we could all go back and reassure our past selves. 

Here are links to the other Word Counters posts:

Messymimi’s Meanderings 
On the Border 

Shrimp and Scallop Bake

                                                                       ©www.BakingInATornado.com

Printable Recipe

Ingredients:
1 1/2# large shrimp, peeled and deveined

1# sea scallops

1 1/2 cups broccoli florets

1/4 cup olive oil

3 TBSP cooking sherry

1 TBSP lemon juice

1 tsp dried parsley

3 cloves minced garlic

salt and pepper to taste 

1/4 cup melted garlic and herb butter spread

1/4 cup grated parmesan

1/4 cup Italian seasoned breadcrumbs 

2/3 cup crushed Ritz crackers

 

sliced lemon for serving 

Directions:
*Pat the shrimp and scallops as dry as you can. Place in a large bowl with the broccoli.

*Whisk together the olive oil, sherry, lemon juice, parsley, minced garlic, salt, and pepper. Add to the bowl with the seafood and broccoli and stir to coat all of the ingredients.

*Grease a 9 X 13 baking dish. Preheat oven to 400 degrees.

*Mix the seafood again, then distribute evenly into the prepared casserole dish.

*In the same large bowl, mix together the melted butter spread, parmesan, breadcrumbs, and cracker crumbs. Sprinkle on top of the fish and broccoli.

*Bake for 25 minutes or until the shrimp and scallops are cooked through. The shrimp will be pink and the scallops will be opague.

*Serve with slices of lemon.

Changing Instincts

I was recently approached online by a woman who wanted me to share her Facebook page. It’s called  Brittany's Message.

Curious, I went to her page. She talks about having a neurological condition that affects her muscle tone and speech. Brittany tells the story of having been in a local restaurant with a friend ordering food at the counter. Her friend ordered but the employee apparently could not understand Brittany and walked away.

She and her friend went to eat elsewhere, but the story doesn’t end there. Brittany wrote an honest and respectful letter about her disease and the incident itself. She took it back to the original restaurant where the employees read the letter and apologized. Brittany is adamant that she’s not looking for pity or sympathy. She’s trying to disseminate her message: “Everyone has a voice and deserves respect.”

My thoughts, my questions really more than thoughts, grew out of our discussion. They’re about instincts.

I don’t know Brittany, I can’t vouch for the veracity of her story. I’m a skeptical person in general but I do believe her. Either way, the truth of the matter is that a story does not have to be factual to inspire thought and discussion.

After reading her FB page, Brittany didn’t like my first reaction; “your page is heartbreaking and heartwarming.” She shot right back at me “why is it heartbreaking??”

I told her that it’s heartbreaking because in this day of so much awareness in terms of differences; be they physical, racial, sexual preference, religious . . . we still instinctively recoil from people who are different from us. I talk to my kids about bullying (I even wrote a post about it called I Apologize), about celebrating differences, striving to understand as opposed to giving in to fear of the unknown. I want the world to be a better place for them. I think they’ll do their part, but it hurts whenever I’m reminded that many others may not. After all, this is the environment in which my children will live.

She responded with tolerance: “many people just don’t know.”

I don’t accept that. I cant. SO much is available in terms of information. SO much out there about bullying, about acceptance, a virtual plethora of awareness. Especially with the internet, social media, blogs, etc. How can people not know?

But part of what’s heartbreaking to me has nothing to do with knowledge, it’s the other component, instinct.

We have instincts as a way to ensure survival. There are very basic ones; to procreate to continue the species, to drink when thirsty and eat when we’re hungry.

Bacon Cheddar Beef Rolls

Bacon Cheddar Beef Rolls

(going to the grill)

Fight or flight is a real and a purposeful instinct as well. It has years and years of evolution behind it. As I understand it, it’s a chemical reaction to fear and it’s steeped in self-preservation.

Fear is incredibly powerful. I believe that fear is the cause of bullying and ultimately is at the root of most all forms of hatred.

Withdrawing from a fearful situation is instinctive.

And the unknown is a major component of fear. What we don’t have experience in, and therefore have difficulty understanding, can cause stress. What is unknown varies from person to person based on their life experience. How they perceive the unknown varies too. What evokes fight or flight in one person can just be a challenge to another. This is where I see hope.

Two situations that can cause the same instinct: If I’m afraid because I’m alone in a dark parking lot and someone seems to be following me, I want that adrenalin pumping. I want fight or flight to set in. I’d imagine we all do. But if I’m uncomfortable or even afraid when faced with a stranger exhibiting, for instance, unusual body movements and slurred speech, when I’m behind a counter of a lighted restaurant with coworkers there, do I want to instinctively react in the same way? Do I even have a choice?

In the restaurant scenario, I choose to believe that there was no thoughtful animosity in the worker’s withdrawal from the situation, just an instinctive retreat from the unknown. You could fear that the customer is high on some drug or possibly drunk, fear that you’ll insult them by asking them to write down their order or by asking their friend to help because you don’t understand.

Ultimately, though, I want a world for my children in which we err on the side of insulting by reaching out as opposed to insulting by walking away.

I’m fully aware that there’s a maturity, an intellectual, and a life experience component, the whole nature vs nurture thing. And I know that there are strategies for changing our behaviors. This would apply to situations in which there is time for rational thought, long past the point where fight or flight would have kicked in and resulted in an instinctive response.

But I also think that part of changing the mindset of our society is the hope that we have some control over the neural pathways involved in instincts. If they differ from one person to the next, we must have some ability to impact them. But how? If fear produces a chemical reaction in our brain, can we change those reactions, create different pathways, instinctively assess situations differently, distinguish between levels of circumstances that cause fear?

There are so many lessons we teach our children. And, honestly, fear is one of them. When my kids were young I wanted them to have a healthy fear of dangerous situations. I didn’t want them falling into a pool or running into traffic. But do we give enough thought to and direction concerning distinguishing between situations that should legitimately invoke fear and those that are unknown, but benign unknowns? I’m not sure that I myself did.

Instincts are, by definition . . . well . . . instinctive. So can we mold them? Re-route them? Where there are beneficial components, can we tweak instincts without eradicating them completely?

I hope so.

 

PS: Thank you Brittany, for initiating the conversation, inspiring thought, and allowing me to incorporate your story into this discussion.

Bacon Cheddar Beef Rolls

                                                                          ©www.BakingInATornado.com
 
Printable Recipe
 
Ingredients:
2 # lean ground beef
2 TBSP seasoned salt
1 tsp garlic powder
2 TBSP chopped roasted red peppers
2  chopped scallions
1/3 cup cooked, chopped bacon bits
3 slices of sharp cheddar cheese each cut in half
OPT: Shredded lettuce
6 hoagie buns
 
Directions:
*In a bowl, just barely mix the ground beef, seasoned salt, garlic powder, roasted red pepper, scallions and bacon bits with your hands. Don’t over-mix.
*Separate into 6 fairly even pieces. Roll each into a log about 5 inches long. Flatten each onto a piece of plastic wrap.
*For each of the 6 meat rolls, take a half of a slice of cheese, fold it into thirds, place in the center of the meat and re-form the beef into a log making sure the cheese is enclosed inside. They’ll be about 5 ½ inches long and resemble a sausage. Roll each separately into plastic wrap and refrigerate the beef rolls for one hour and up to a day.
*While your grill is cold and turned off, grease the surface. Heat your grill to medium. Remove each beef roll from the plastic wrap and place on the grill. Use tongs to turn them so they cook on all sides. How long will depend on how hot your grill is and how you like your hamburg cooked. I cooked my approximately 20 minutes to medium.
*OPT: toast the hoagie buns on the grill while the beef rolls are cooking.
*Place lettuce in the bottom of each hoagie bun, top with beef roll.

Scariest Thing Ever

A couple of weeks ago a group of bloggers and I posted a Secret Subject Swapiversary. My friend Outsmarted Mommy got my prompt at that time. It was “what is the thing you are most afraid of?” You can read her sweet and thoughtful response here: Don't Let Fear Take Over.

At the time, I was trying to decide whether or not to keep blogging. The month of October and Halloween in particular is just my favorite time of year. I get really creative with food. I get to play with ingredients to make them look fun or funny or gross or scary. What’s not to like, right?

But I was having trouble with the writing. Writer’s block had taken residence in my guest room . . . well, in my whole house really . . . for close to two weeks and I always vowed that if I had nothing to say worth reading, I’d just stop. I had reached this point before but had gotten past it. This time I wasn’t .

And then just when I though all hope was lost, inspiration hit me in the shower, which is its normal spot. But it had never happened like this before. Either way, I knew exactly what I was going to write about, the prompt I had given my friend Outsmarted Mommy: What is the thing you are most afraid of?

Spooky Trifle

So what are you most afraid of? For you it might be Norman Bates standing outside your shower with a knife. Not me. For me, the scariest thing I could think of was right in the shower with me.

Let me tell you that when you’re naked and standing in a little box, you do not want to look up to see this:

Because in that moment it looks more like this:

So what did I do? What do you think I did? I’m a blogger, right? I flew out of that shower, crashed down the stairs naked and grabbed my camera, of course.

Happy nightmares, friends.

 

Spooky Trifle

                                        ©www.BakingInATornado.com

 
 
Printable Recipe
 
Ingredients:
Brownies: You can use a boxed mix or make your own using this recipe without the candy bars and the baking chips:  Butterfingers Brownies
1 package of Cheesecake instant pudding mix
1 package of white chocolate instant pudding mix
4 cups milk, separated
3 drops of red food coloring and 12 drops of yellow food coloring
10 drops of red food coloring
6 Chocolate cookies, crushed
6 Ghost “peeps”
3 small plain cookies
3 large plain cookies
Food decorating gel
12 Mini M&Ms
1 Fruit roll up
Gummy worms
Opt: I made “grave stones” and letters out of white candy melts and food coloring
 
Directions:
*Using the decorating gel, attach candies to the rounded side of the cookies to look like eyes.  Attach a small piece of fruit roll up as a mouth. Set aside and allow to set.
*Coarsely cut brownies into bite sized pieces.
*Make the cheesecake pudding according to package directions adding 3 drops of red and 12 drops of yellow food coloring when mixing. Make the white chocolate pudding mix according to package directions adding 10 drops of red food coloring when mixing.
*Put half of the brownie pieces into a glass dish.  Carefully arrange the cookie people and ghost peeps rimming around the edge of the dish above the brownies.  Add the Cheesecake pudding into the center of the circle formed by the cookies.
*Add the rest of the brownies on top of the pudding, then the while chocolate pudding.
Sprinkle the crushed cookies over the top of the white chocolate pudding.
*Arrange gummy worms and any other decorations onto the top.
*Keep refrigerated.
 

An Open Letter

I have an acquaintance who is trying to live her life and raise her children the best she can.  In that struggle, she’s found herself in a unique circumstance.  She has proven her bravery by allowing the world in.  She’s been blogging her challenges, successes and failures at George. Jessie. Love. as she grows and parents in a situation she never expected to be in.

When you put something out there publicly you take a chance.  You are embraced by support but can also be pummeled by derision at a time when you are at your most vulnerable.  Here’s the thing about these situations. We don’t choose them, we’re just trying to live through them in the way that is best for our families.  They are infinitely more difficult if another component is to be publicly chastised.

I feel for her as I, too, have been in a situation I never expected to be in. I was also open about it, and was met with both support and criticism.  I’m in another one now that I am unable to share, I really don’t know if I would even if I could.  I don’t think I’m as brave as Julie.

Please know that we, all of us, have morals and values.  They are not specific to one religion or political party.  We all make choices based on our beliefs, morals and values, but I’ve yet to see a religious tenet that requires us to berate the choices of others whose actions don’t fall in line with ours.

Hatred and intolerance are a by-product of fear.  Those of us who are different from you:  be it our religion, color, nationality, abilities, sexual preference, physical or mental afflictions . . . we are not different out of any desire to frighten you.  As we walk our paths and make our decisions and live our lives we don’t make our choices based on a conspiracy to hurt you. 

When we are uncomfortable with someone’s life-choices, here are our choices as I see them:

*We can give in to our fear and publicly criticize those who choose a different path than the one we, although not in their situation, imagine we would choose. In my estimation, this is the ground zero of where bullying comes from.

*We can acknowledge that we imagine our choices in that situation would be different, maybe even better, but out of kindness and respect choose to keep it to ourselves.

*We can decide that even though these wouldn’t be our choices, we truly don’t know what these people are going through and compassion and support are key components to making the world a better place.  The world is full of people who are different from us.  Really, it’s OK to embrace that.

As we live our lives if we make mistakes (and we will) others can relish in that, even see it as proof that we were wrong to begin with. They can choose to kick us while we’re down or they can choose to help us back up.  Either way we will get back up and we will carry on.  With you or despite you.

This is a letter I sent to Julie back in February.  I share it, with her permission, in the hopes that we can all take a step back and rethink the purpose served by harshly judging others publicly, even those who admittedly put ourselves in the public arena of our own free will:

Julie:

Through comments of mutual FB friends I’ve seen some of your recent posts relating your experiences in going through your daughter’s journey. From the few posts I’ve seen it’s clear that you’re not naïve, you understand that there are people out there who will question your path.  You’ve started to construct a shield by both surrounding yourself with people who are supportive and blocking the access of those who would judge you harshly.  As you gain strength from those who support you, I recommend that you also consider the position of those who will judge you harshly. 

In terms of being judged, I can draw a lot of comparisons between your situation and the choices I made 20 years ago when I learned that the only way I had any chance of having children would be through IVF, in-vitro fertilization.  I took an uncertain path fraught with physical pain, emotional turmoil, baby steps forward and grand jetes backwards.   I, too, was open and honest about my choices, surrounded myself with the support of friends and family (which, mind you, is so much more difficult pre-FB), but I also found that you can’t escape the negativity forever.  I started IVF in a new (to me) conservative state in a locally unprecedented program headed by a doctor brought in from yet another state. This elicited editorials in the local paper making it clear that God made me infertile and by going through this process I was going against God’s will.  Let’s be clear.  You will be faced with hatred.  They are coming, with guns blazing.  They will aim a baseball bat at your head and chances are that bat will have God’s name on it. 

If, in your own private moments, you let those thoughts in and come to terms with exactly how you feel about them, I hope that this preparation can actually become another part of your shield.

I was pregnant 4 times with 5 children (including the twin of my older son, who I lost along with one of my tubes in emergency surgery during a tornado warning while my husband was out of town – no, not LOL – well, maybe LOL now but certainly not then).  While visiting family and pregnant with my younger son, I woke up at my mom’s house cramping and in a pool of blood.  My sister dropped everything, came to get me and stepped on my heels following me into an ultrasound kindly set up by a local gynecologist I hadn’t seen in 20 years.  We cried when we saw the heartbeat.  I had come home to name my first son in Temple and ended up sentenced to bed rest and double injections.  I was the only one not at the naming. At any point I could have (and if I’m going to be honest, did) question whether “the haters” were right.  Is God trying to tell me to stop? 

"They” say that God made me infertile, and changing that “goes against God’s will.”  Really?   I’m that powerful?  Or does God give us all challenges?  I ended up far from home at the same time that an amazing doctor ended up in that same place.  The time, the place, the doctor, these are all tools given to me by that same God.  No matter how difficult life gets, I cannot believe that God did not want these kids to exist, that it was a battle between God and I and I won.  Absurd.   I now have 2 sons, ages 16 and 17.  My 17 year old is currently putting me through all kinds of hell but I still do not question what I went through to get him here.  “The haters” forced me to look at my path through theireyes and the resulting strengthened conviction is a gift.

Ultimately you have to decide which of God’s children you think provide him/her with the most pride:  Those who ACT with BRAVERY based in LOVE, or those who JUDGE with HATRED based in COWARDICE?    

The haters say “how COULD you?”  We say “how could we NOT?” 

Those haters, invite them in Julie, then kick their ass!

Karen

*A final note:

There is a 35 acre plot of land in the midwest purchased by a Jewish Temple, an Episcopal Church, and a Mosque.  All three are building there together.  There will also be a fourth building, a Tri-Faith Center.

Those holy places are being built together because a large group of open-minded people committed to respect, even embrace, difference.  These people have the compassion and the courage of conviction to see that as a society we will be healthier and we will be stronger if we are able to be different . . . together.