Romance and Short Men

Usually it's wives that tend to be more romantic, but in our marriage, that's reversed. I like romance when it's directed towards me but I rarely do anything romantic for Paul. I just don't think of it. I have bought him cards over the years and I never get around to giving them to him. When I do give him a card, like for his birthday, I usually just write something short and sweet like "All my love, Sarah." When he gives me a card, he writes me a letter! I really need to get better at this. Today the mailman brought me a card from Paul and inside it was a poem he wrote me about how much he is anticipating this weekend (we're going away overnight for our 16th anniversary) and what our marriage means to him. Then, when I went out to the van, there was another card from him with yet another poem for me! I will never understand why this man loves me so much. But anyway, that was a very nice surprise in the midst of a busy Tuesday. Added to that is the knowledge is that Paul hasn't had much sleep lately. He worked all day Friday, Saturday, and Sunday. Monday morning he had to leave at 2am to do a job. He said he slept for maybe 2 hours in his van in the Walmart parking lot before going into work. Then, last night he was home before 8, but at 11pm that cell phone started ringing and he had to go up to Des Moines and do another job. He got home around 2, I think. He was off by 3 this afternoon, though. I am blessed!

I had to take Ben in for a physical today, even though we just saw Dr. Steinmann last Wed! He has to have this for the Child Health people who arrange his waiver (for his respite services). The dr. said that Ben will be of average height topping out around 5'10", he thinks, based on his current growth charts. 5'10" is average? That sounds kind of short to me. Maybe I'm just used to tall men. My dad is 6'2" and my brothers are pretty tall. I think Paul is average at just 6' . So I would not consider 5'10" to be "average" at all. But, the dr. could be wrong. And it could be that all those steroids Ben was on when he was little have stunted his growth. I have noticed that he is shorter than the other 12 year olds at church. The dr. says he will always be skinny, too. Well, no kidding! I then asked him if it was even possible for people with cerebral palsy to be anything but skinny. He said no, that when you have cp, you cannot consume enough calories to make up for what the body burns. I have always suspected that was the case, but never had it confirmed before today. Ben has always eaten a tremendous amount of food, but I always reasoned that it takes him so much more energy to move his body than it does the rest of us. Turns out I was right in my thinking! Of course, if I had been taking him to the dr. regularly all these years, maybe I would have known that before now. But I got really burned out on drs. after Ben's early years when we practically lived in the drs. offices. And then once we quit vaccinating, I found it irritating and stressful to go the drs because of the flack I usually got when they found out my kids were not only unvaccinated, but that I wanted them to remain that way. But maybe, now that we have found Dr. Steinmann, who doesn't even bat an eye at my vaccination decision, I'll take the boys in for yearly exams.

Well, it smells like supper is ready - better go check before the smoke alarm goes off. For some reason this post is justifying on the right side. It is driving me crazy! But I can't get it to switch to the left! Better quit, then!