Inspiring Words From Nancy Turner

The value of your story
9:28 AM PDT, April 19, 2008
As I catch my breath here between three-a-day book events while touring Arizona for the One Book AZ program, one thing comes to mind. That is, that this story, my story, would have been very different if a man in 1920 had not bothered to write his story. It was Henry Prine's memoir that put our family history on the map in Arizona, and inspired me to write my first novel. In these posts and profiles of myself, I have proudly - because they represent years of hard work - listed degrees that I earned along the way. BUT! I began writing that first novel long before I had even gone through the local community college. And Henry, my great-great uncle, had never been as far as high school. What I'm getting at is this: It's never too soon nor too late to write something. Your life is yours alone. No one else has lived it, no one else can tell it. You don't have to have a string of degrees to begin, nor even a sense of spelling and grammar. If Henry had waited until he could "do it right" it wouldn't have been done, and oh, how much I would have missed!
I want to encourage everyone to write your story. Not just where you lived and when, although those things are important. Write what you remember about your important events, what holidays were like, what you remember being surprised at, or not liking. Remember a food you loved or hated? Remember a gift you treasured or a secret you told to your siblings? Something as simple as a pair of new shoes is a great thing to a child. You don't have to be something unusual to be a writer. The fact that you write makes you a writer. Leave a journal, leave a memoir, leave a letter to a great-grandchild yet unknown. It's reaffirming proof of our existance, and I can't begin to count the number of people that have said to me, "I have my great-grandfather's letters to or from ____, and I treasure them!"


Happy writing!

Peanut #3

I had my first OB appointment today. It started out a little rough:

MA enters room.

MA: So your a self pay?
Me: Yes
MA: Are you just in transition, will your insurance kick in soon?
Me: No, I'm paying cash for services. I already called and talked to billing.
MA: We have an office on the South side of town that is much less expensive than this office.
Me: Is there a problem with me paying outright?
MA: No, it's just that you'll get a better discount for cash if you go to our other office.
Me: How much of a discount? Do you have a difference in the schedule of fees?
MA: Let me see if I can get that for you. The NP will be in soon. The first appointment is just a meet and greet.
Me: I'm sorry, I wasn't notified of that when I made the appointment. I expected to at least come away with having the fetal heart rate monitored.
MA: Let me talk to the NP and see what she can do...

Okay, I was feeling pretty peeved at this point.
#1 I'm not paying to meet a Nurse Practitioner.
#2 The billing should have been sorted out and confirmed when I called initially.
#3 Insurance and medical billing is one of the largest legal rackets around. AUGHGHGHGH!!!!!!

NP enters the room

NP: Blah Blah Blah medical history, blah blah blah date of last pregnancy, menstrual cycle.....
Me: I'm sorry, did the information I entered into your system last night(via online medical records) not get recorded?

NP: Oh, I'm sure it did. I just haven't gotten a chance to look at it yet. This first visit really gets you established as a patient and do an initial pap, and STD screening, the next two appointments...
Me: I began spotting a couple days ago, I'm fine now. I really need you to check the fetal heart beat, so I know if this is still a viable pregnancy or not.
NP:Oh...Okay... Sure, let's get you fixed up in the ultrasound room.
Me: Great, Thank you! I actually said all this very nicely, despite my irritation.

The rest of the appointment went great. I received a few great shots of our little peanut number three. Nubs and all. The doctor said I had a "pretty" ovary, and my fibroid is about the size of an almond. I opted out of the other unnecessary procedures for now.

Lisa from billing came down and gave me a schedule of fees. Turns out the real savings comes from getting my labs done on the Southside- rather than paying 350 I'll pay 150 per lab appointment. (I only need to make two lab appointments.) The NP assured me she wasn't sending me someplace scary... I explained I was familiar with the area-I shant be afraid...

$240 dollars later, I left the office feeling happy and satisfied. I got my ultrasound, and everything looks just peachy. Hurray!!!!

We had an electrician come out and fix our outdoor electrical problems today. So we should be ready to go with a lawn again. Yipee.

Waiting...

Favorite pics of the week:

Things are moving along in the Green household. Hannah and Noah love school. Noah has had a great week so far. A Super Sport award, 100% on his Spelling test (+the three challenge words) and a note home praising his writing. Bike rides, swimming, play dates, birthday parties, piano and guitar have them very preoccupied when they are not in school. It's safe to say we are back on board the time warp machine that seems to turn days into hours and hours into minutes. Summer did not last nearly long enough for me.

We are about eight weeks pregnant now. We wanted to keep it to ourselves this time around but as "fate" would have it no such luck. So I'm trying to embrace it now with a positive attitude that all will be well and I won't have write another blog post explaining that we are no longer expecting.

We haven't told the kids yet, though they have been within earshot of conversations. I really don't want them to be disappointed again. I go between letting myself get super excited, and thinking that the pregnancy has already terminated. So now I just need to wait.

I can't believe how tired I am at the end of the day. I've been feeling queasy for quite some time now, but threw up for the first time yesterday-then I felt great. (To much information?) I'm one of "those" women who really love pregnancy. I've been pretty fortunate to have an easy go of it with both Hannah and Noah. I like the biology behind the miracle. It's all pretty fascinating to me.

I've been busy with family and photography shoots, and start school next week. Jared has been busy busy busy too, and now he has come down with a horrible cold.

Goodbye Izzy...Hello El Guapo!

Okay- We did it. We bought a new car. A fully loaded 2006 Toyota Sequoia. I actually got a little emotional when I over heard the dealer say they were going to send Izzy to auction. I couldn't help but imagine our not so dependable suburban being bought and sent across the border only to witness the horrors of who knows what. Who would sit in those seats where our family has had so many wonderful memories. I felt like I was betraying a good friend. I KNOW this is ridiculous. It is an inanimate object- with no feelings. I guess I have been so grateful for the service that it rendered our family since our return to Tucson, despite ALL the mechanical issues we have had to face this year. We put so many miles on it. Sniff sniff. Although the image of Izzy just cutting the engine during a high speed chase, does bring a giggle.

Okay-I blame all this on my early exposure to Stephen Kings horror movie Christine.

Hannah and Noah are much more reasonable- they were ready to say goodbye as soon as they found the wireless headsets that accompanied the DVD screen in the back of "El Guapo". In fact we had code phrases we taught the kids to let us know if they liked it or not in front of the sales person. If they didn't like it they could just say they like Izzy better. If they did like it they were to say- "I don't know mom, it's not white." They really like this especially Hannah. I wonder what the sales person thought when they kept repeating "I don't know mom it's not white." As far as Jared...He loves it, and has had great entertainment poking fun at me for my overactive imagination and silly emotions.

So I decided on the name El Guapo due to the attractiveness of the monster that now calls our garage home. Noah hated the name- he wanted Batman... El Guapo has stuck and hopefully I'll get used to all the niceties. Right now I'm still having a hard time looking at it and not feeling the sting of Izzy's betrayal and a continued car payment...

Pioneer Fun Trumps Bad Attitude

I'm in my third year as activities coordinator. 1st year- WOW! I get to plan parties!! How great is that! 2nd year- This is nice I know what I'm doing this year. 3rd year-Ugh...they want me to plan another activity. I really hate my attitude right now. So yesterday,(last Saturday) it was the pioneer breakfast activity. The alarm sounded at 5:30 and my grumbling began. I had forgotten cups, so as Jared drove out to the activity in a separate car (he had to work later that morning) I had some time to reflect on my poor attitude and ask for some help in the matter. I arrived to a lean showing of members-mainly the cooks and youth asked to help, but we ended up having a great showing. My spirits were lifted by the enthusiasm of others; their willingness and excitement to serve, and their energy and excitement to participate in the activities. All the children had a wonderful time. Despite my poor attitude the Lord had blessed our ward that morning. I felt my own prayers were answered as I left the activity feeling so uplifted.

Where Did I Put Those Rose Tinted Glasses?

Despite my great week there are a few things that are troubling me. A few days ago I was watching a late night news show where Barack Obama was being interviewed about his previous opposition to the surge that has succeeded in Iraq. I noticed how well spoken he was, how confident and I thought hmmm, he has a strong chance of beating McCain. I had visited his campaign site earlier in the month and had compared it with McCains. While I agreed with nothing that Barack was promoting, he was thorough on his plan of execution should he win the presidency. McCain, who I agreed with in SOME areas was full of catch phrases, and very unclear as to how he would go about the changes he felt were in order. But I've missed my point... Here is a portion of the interview: Moran asked what Iraq would look like now if Obama's policy of withdrawing in the face of the violence had been implemented.

"That is a hard thing to speculate," Obama said, "The Sunnis might have made the same decisions at that time. The Shii’as might have made some similar decisions based on political calculation. There was ethnic cleansing in Baghdad that actually took the violence level down. And so, as I said before. Nobody has a crystal ball. If we did you just hire the guy with the crystal ball."

It was one of those moments where I said... Did he just say that...did he just put a positive spin on "ethnic cleansing". Is ethnic cleansing the PC term for genocide? I waited for the interviewer to say something-anything about that statement. He just moved on.

Maybe I misunderstood, I thought. Surely that's not what he said.. So I googled it. The first article I came to was from a 2007 interview on the Today show.
DAVID GREGORY: You heard Secretary Rice say there is progress in Iraq that cannot be ignored. She spoke about when, not if, the United States prevails in Iraq. Do you see it that way?
BARACK OBAMA: I think it's important to understand that after two days of testimony [by Gen. Petraeus and Amb. Crocker], here's the bottom line: that having put an additional 30,000 troops in, and continued the same course we were on, we are now back to the horrendous levels of violence that we were back in June of 2006.
So there's no doubt that we've seen some measured progress in Anbar province, primarily because the Sunni tribal leaders made a political decision there that they would work with the coalition forces. We've seen a very modest reduction of violence in Baghdad, partly because entire neighborhoods have essentially been ethnically cleansed. Those are all positive things, but we are now back at the levels of violence we were 18 months ago.

Then I found the transcript from the interview that I had just watched.
I had not misunderstood. When has ethnic cleansing ever been an acceptable means of "reducing violence" during war. Isn't ethnic cleansing a horrid form of violence in and of it's self.

Closer to home, I was told second hand that the park that is supposed to be built around our new library is receiving opposition from environmentalists. I tried to look more information up about it, and have not been successful. I am so angry. Just miles away a builder plowed down thousands of acres of prime Sonoran desert at the base of a mountain. They plowed it down before they were issued permits to do so, built 3 model homes then abandoned the project due to the housing "slow down". Did it make the news?-NO. Did any protests take place? NO. Did KB homes just get a billion dollar loss tax write off. YES. This makes my blood boil.

Do you ever feel like the world has just gone mad?

I'm disappointed at this election year. I don't like McCain. I don't think he will make a good president. I'm sick about the high probability of Obama winning.

I just read another article about Central and South American countries bending to the will of Venezuelas president Hugo Chavez. Cheap fuel beats out US loyalties. He and Russian president Dmitry Medvedev and Vladmir Putin all seem very cozy.

So let me get this straight we have no good presidential nominee, Asia owns us financially, we may get a replay of the Cold War, terrorists can infiltrate our borders with ease, and the American people are at their witts end because they can't afford their McMansions and Plasma TV's, and are willing to move to a socialistic economy so they can mantain a false standard of living. We protest parks and look the other way for huge housing developments built on nothing more than speculation and tax write offs. GREAT! Time to build up that food storage, and go cry on my big pillow.

PS.
While in California IndyMac shut down. There were lines of people outside the bank demanding their money. I wonder what the depression looked like as it was happening. We all have seen it in retrospect.

I Love My Life!

I really do. My week has been productive and full. I have had three photo appointments, lots of play time with Hannah and Noah, visiting time with good friends and family and to top it off Jared and I are going out to see Batman. WOW, that's a good week. Something awful must be in the works... Just kidding...Really I'm kidding. Here are some pics of the Hopkins I took this morning.

I love the Hopkins! Aren't they cute. Their girls are adorable. Braelynne was not in the mood for taking pictures this morning despite my best efforts in peek-a-boo. But she managed to grace me with one smile-which was very appreciated. :) Next time I'm bringing candy...

I have to admit I'm staring to feel in a little bit of a photo rut. I need to break out and do something creative. Madison are you ready to be my model? I think I'm going to call you right now!

Here are some shots from last night.