Mother, My Shero

I held her frail ninety-five year old life ravaged body as she began to breath slower and slower with longer pauses in between.  How odd it felt to just let her die.  For ninety-five years she had fought hard to stay alive, so that she could give and love all that were blessed enough to be in her sphere of influence.

At the age of twenty the doctors told her that she had severe kidney disease.  The year was 1939.  There were no kidney transplants.  Surgery was not advanced enough to repair the congenital abnormality of her kidney tube.

They told her that she would spend her life as an invalid.  She would need to rest the greater part of everyday.  She should NEVER marry, and certainly she should NEVER attempt to have children.  She would die young because of the ravages of her kidney disease.

She called a beloved friend sobbing.  Somehow her friend managed to understand Mama's sob infused words.  The friend's reaction?  She began to laugh.

Mama said for years afterwards, "I thought she had gone crazy.  This was certainly not a circumstance that would inspire laughter!"

The friend finally said, "Oh Sarah, you're going to learn to take such good care of yourself that you'll outlive the rest of us."

Mama remembered thinking, "You can DO THAT?  That's a possibility?"

Thus began an intense research program.  Mama found all the books that she could and studied kidney disease.  Some of the ideas that were encased in books old and new did NOT work.  Many of the ideas DID work...obviously, because she DID outlive most of her friends, and most of her family.  (Her sister, younger by 13 years is the only living member of the family.  Even spouses are all gone).

Her beloved friend who told her, "You'll out live all of us."  Has been out lived by many, many year

Mama had many health problems throughout her 95 years.  Yet she seemed indestructible.  She still babysat for her grandchildren, and then great grandchildren until she was 90.  She made almost 80 quilts in her 80s and sent them to her grandson who was deployed to Iraq.  He gave them to Iraqi children in need, and to soldiers that were struggling. 

At ninety-five she was in a care center, unable to do much of anything for herself.  That was the ultimate blow for Mama, losing her independence.  I used to remind her, "Mama many of the people in this world NEVER get to be independent.  I reminded her of the multiple times in MY life when I have needed help with toileting, walking, clothing, etc. etc.  Still, it was hard to the day that she died to have others doing these things for her.

What is the point of this post?  The point is that many would think of my Mama as an ordinary, average, woman.  She was never in a political position.  She was certainly never wealthy in earthly ways.  Most people on this planet have never heard of her.  Yet Mama was my Shero.  (You know Hero, Shero...Heroine may be spelled differently but it's pronounced the same as Heroin.  That is a drug).  The amazing women that I know are SHERO'S!

Mother held her sister's head so that a doctor could swab and expose the wound.  (Aunt Della had two skull fractures as a child, bucked off a horse both times).  The doctor was amazed that Mama could be such a calm practical nurse at such a young age.

Mama was the woman that you wanted around in a crisis.  She learned early in her life to face the hardest things that life can hand you the need arises.  Is there such a thing as an "ordinary" woman?  I think that the phrase ORDINARY WOMAN is an oxymoron.  I have seldom met an ORDINARY woman, and my Mother was not one.  She spent her life serving and loving others.  That to my mind is truly EXTRAORDINARY!

Modern Times???

1919 was the year of my Mother's birth. The year seems about as far removed to her great-great grand daughter as dinosaurs, and cave men.  Even to those of us who have lived beyond pre-school, spanning a great portion of two centuries seems astonishing.  When Mother was born there were only three automotive vehicles in all of Bountiful, Utah.  Most of the citizenship still were using horse and buggy for transportation.

Her Father owned one of the three autos.  After Grandma Hatch helped to deliver Sarah (my Mom), her Dad, David Howard, got Grandma Hatch in the car and drove her to Farmington to deliver another Grand baby, Jane Wilcox, Sarah's "twin" cousin.  There were NO paved roads.  There was a two lane track in the earth.  It was probably snowing that day, February 15, 1919.

There was no electricity in their home.  At night they retired early, and when they were awake in the time of darkness they used coal oil lamps.  Their lovely brick home was warmed with a fireplace.  Their was no source of heat in the back bedroom where Mom spent her first years.  She and her sister Della shared a bed.  They would pretty much shiver themselves to sleep.

Plumbing, including running water, and a bathroom were not a part of those years.  There was a very well built outhouse just far enough away from the house to keep from making the house smell.  Yet it was not so far that it was unbearable to make that trip in the dead of night in the winter.

"Modern" technology from that era was far...so very far from today's ideas.

The telephone was even extremely different then.  There were not enough phone lines for everyone to have a private line, especially in the country.  The protocol was this.  You would lift the phone and listen.  If there was no one speaking you would connect to an operator who would dial a number for you.  The operators back then in the tiny towns knew pretty much everything, and anything, that people shared on the phone. 

Mama's Grandma Hatch had a Victorola.  That was a device that would play music.  You would wind it, and it had a long arm with a needle in the end.  You would place that needle on a spinning surface.  The needle and spinning created sounds.  The music would start so quickly...distorting the music, making it sound a great deal like a music box with lots and lots of cracking, staticky, ambient noise.  Then as the machine wound down the music would become slow, slower, and then eventually stop until again you again wound the device.

Laundry was a back breaking process.  You would scrub the clothing with soap, often lye, sometimes made by hand.  The lye was not too partial about whether it was cleansing soil out of clothes, or skin off hands.  Then came the wringer.  You would push the soaked, dripping clothing through two long pieces that clamped together to squeeze as much liquid as possible from the clothing.  Sometimes the clothing would take multiple trips through the wringer.  Unfortunately, if your hand got caught in the wringer it would also try to squeeze any liquid from there.

Now if you've survived the scrubbing and squeezing part of the process you will now carry the incredibly heavy batch of laundry outside.  There you will meticulously pin each item on to a clothes line to let the clothes dry...sometimes it would take all day long.  In the cold winters of Utah you either put your clothes outside and let them freeze dry, or you hung your clothing in your house.

It was a good thing that most people only had 2 or 3 outfits each.  If I tried to wash my laundry in that method, it would take me 2 or three 3 DAYS just to wash my own clothing!  When did we decided that we needed at least one DIFFERENT outfit every single day, and many times 2 or 3 outfits in ONE DAY?

Most medical maladies could be treated with"plasters."  Plasters consisted of some sort of paste, spread on a rag.  For example milk and bread were boiled together, then spread on a large rag to make splinters fester and come out.  (I actually saw my Grandma Cheney use this method.  After 5 days a large nasty splinter that would not come out entirely by tweezing had was all gone.  The splinters that had been inside her arm were now on the plaster.  Mustard plasters, I'm still not quite certain how that was made but I believe that was when you took the herb mustard, mixed it with water created a paste, then heated it.  Next you put the mess on a rag, and then put the mess on the suffering person's chest for chest colds. Or onion plasters...I think the best thing about bread and milk poultices, or onion plasters was that you could eat them if you were hungry!  lol 

Many maladies were treated with alcoholic spirits of some type.  My Mama was given whiskey or rum for many health complaints.   I'm pretty certain that the alcoholic spirits did NOT do much to cure or treat the physical malady.  However, I AM quite certain that they made you "feel" better, if you get my drift?

Here are some positive things about that era that we don't always remember.  There were NO power lines to clutter up the horizon.  There were only a few phone lines.  There was no bathroom, or indoor toilet to scrub.  We didn't NEED the television or the internet...we had the "Party Line," on the telephone, and THAT was actually much more "real," than REALITY Television is today!  The nights were really, truly dark, and ever so quiet.
Air pollution?  I don't think those two words had even been linked.

I wish that we could all take a safe trip to and from the past.  I would love to just be the "fly on the wall," watching my Grandparents, Mother, and Father just go about their everyday lives.

We quite obviously have NOT achieved the time travel type of technology yet.   I am grateful that people from the past left stories behind to teach us.  I hope that we NEVER become so arrogant about our "Modern" times that we think that those people who lived in a very different time were inferior to us in any way.  Let us never forget that the internet, smart phones, and all the miracles of technology in this era would not, and probably could not exist had it not been for all the inventions of the past.

HOW?

I have heard that there ARE people who never cry, never struggle, never feel like life is caving in on them.  My response would be either, "They are delusional and in a rubber room, right?  Or, what mood stabilizers and anti-depressants are they taking...I want some!

Of course, I would be grimly joking about both of those responses...well sort of.

It's about to get, really, really, real in this post so if dark reality offends you...RUN AWAY NOW!  Before I climb into that dark reality may I just share a short story?  Of course I can...THIS IS MY BLOG!  I can do whatever I want!   (Of course you can also chose NOT to read it...)

When times were awfully, darkly, dark for Nyle and I we would do our best imitation of Sir Robin in "Monte Python's, Holy Grail."  "Run away, run away!"  This was "brave" Sir Robin's response to any part of life that got just a little bit TOO real.

Nyle and I ran away into music, thrifting (visiting thrift shops and garage sales), books, but mostly movies.  Nyle earned his undergraduate degree in Film and Theater Directing.  An irony in his college education, he quit attending college for many years, for many reasons.  One of the reasons was that he would often HIRE his professors when he was working professionally.  He had to humble himself to take classes from men who he had sometimes taught the material that he was now learning from them.  (If you find the previous statement confusing, think about Nyle)?  He finished his diploma because he had the most credits from this college, AND my job earned him free tuition.

Well I am now facing another one of the hardest challenges of my life.  My beloved Mother is 95 and dying slowly, by inches, of kidney disease.  The cursed illness has chased her all of her life.  NOW it decides to eat her alive?  I guess I should feel gratitude that she has been able to live an incredibly full, selfLESS life.  I am...it just seems that with all the good that she has done in this world God should graciously let her go to sleep and just wake up in a better place, instead of letting her come apart in teeny, tiny, little inches.

Far be it from me to understand why one house is destroyed with the people inside in a mud slide, and the house next door is completely intact, with the people inside?  Why do
 people decide to kill their neighbors over nothing, or everything? Why did my precious baby boy die inside me at 4 months of pregnancy, and my beloved Mama lives to be 95?

I DO believe that asking WHY is an exercise in futility.  On the other hand, asking HOW?  Now that is a power question.  HOW, do I face this?  HOW do I cope with the loss of my Mother, Husband, Father, and health, and still find ways to find joy?  How do I keep getting up in the morning and living when there is so much and so many types of pain in my universe?

I ask this HOW question as a rhetorical question.  I DO have some answers in my life.  Today I had a rip, snorting pity party.  It was attended by a party of ONE...after all that is who I will be for the next however long I stay on this planet, which if I follow after my Mother, Grandmother, and Great-Grandmother will be a ridiculously long time.

There were times in my married life that I adored, loved, my brilliant, creative husband.  There were also times that I loved him, but I wanted to strangle him!  In other words I loved him but didn't LIKE him from time to time.

So, why would I believe that I would ALWAYS enjoy my own company?  The worst part is that when I didn't like my husband, or the many, many roommates I've had in my life, I could LEAVE...and do something else for awhile, and then I was usually pleased to return to whatever relationship we're referring to.

When is the last time that you tried to leave YOURSELF?  If I go in another room, I follow.  If I go to a movie, I come with me.  I just can't seem to chase myself away!  I can't even run away into a movie like I did with Nyle because it just makes me miss HIM EVEN MORE, and I'M still there with myself

This post is not intended to inspire, uplift, or anything particularly positive.  Except for one last idea.  I am NOT quitting.  Tomorrow morning will come, and I WILL go back to living the best that I know how.  Maybe that in the end is the true answer to HOW.  Just keep putting one foot in front of the other...or if those feet are no longer capable of standing, keep living...whether you are in bed, a walker, crutches or a wheelchair...and I have done some of my best singing and dancing from a wheelchair.   Just keep doing your best...and allow yourself to throw a brilliant pity party once in awhile! 

Bingo the Man, Not the Game, AND CERTAINLY NOT the dog!!

He had discovered that his lower spine was basically collapsing in on itself.  The nerves were malformed into his legs.  This was causing him incredible pain.  Sometimes the pain was so severe that he couldn't walk.

One of his teachers in college begged him to play a small role in a play.  Nyle Smith was his name.  Acting was his passion.  He was rather embarrassed to play a tiny role in a play that was in a tiny theater.  He was used to accolades for great big parts in important plays.  He decided to put a NOM DE PLUME (a fancy way to say false name), on the program.  Bingo Smith sounded like a name that NOBODY that knew him would recognize.

Nyle was embarrassed by his mobility issues.  They set the blocking of the play in such a way that he didn't have to move much.  He basically stood in one place to deliver his few lines.

"There are no small parts, only small actors," is a quote commonly used by those who love acting.  Nyle proved that quote totally, completely true.  He did so well that he was reviewed in newspapers across the region. 

Then came the exciting news.  He had been nominated for an extremely prestigious regional acting award.  The "Irene Ryan Award" was coveted by any college student who felt that theater was not only in their blood but it just might BE the blood, the substance that flowed through their veins and gave their body sustenance.

Oh wait, let's change that...Nyle Smith had not been nominated.  Hmmmm...what name do you think they used?  Oh wait, the name on the program.  BINGO SMITH was heartily acknowledged for his acting talent! 

Nyle was unsure whether to laugh or cry, and I believe he did a little of both during the agonizing process of waiting, waiting for the process to be followed.  He did not ultimately win the award.  Being nominated was a HUGE thing in the uniquely insular world of college theater. 

The problem was that NYLE SMITH was NOT nominated.  No, much to his everlasting chagrin "BINGO SMITH." was the nominee. 

That nickname stuck to him like a burr on a fluffy dog (wait, isn't there a SONG about a dog named Bingo?)  Nyle grew to enjoy that nickname.  Bingo...is a nickname that I called him from time to time. 

Thank BINGO SMITH for being such an astounding actor, but better still, being an astounding man!

A Mother's Hands

Remarkable contrivances hands.  They help you to scratch, eat, clean, write, and about a million other things.  Just for a minute hold your hands up and look at them in the light.  Now stop and think, what do YOU do with your hands?

The child was about 7, nervous, speaking in his Primary group at church.  (Primary is like Sunday School for children of 3 to 12 years of age).  He stumbled along in his speech for a minute, and then it happened.  He looked at the group and froze.  Full on panic filled his young features.

Before someone in the group could rescue him his Mother was by his side.  I had not noticed that she was there silently observing, and sitting with a group of young children.  A long standing Mom myself of two beautiful daughters my memory quickly reached backwards.  I remembered the way that I had handled such terror.

Then an ordinary thing made me catch my breath, and tears welled up in my eyes.  This young, lovely Mom did not rush in and take over her son's speech.  He looked up at her with love, she looked back at him with love.  Then she put her hand on the boys shoulder and just stood next to him.

Encouraged by his Mother the boy finished the talk.  When he stumbled a bit at the very end she did lean down and whispered the last words to him. 

I was playing the piano for the children to sing.  I had a very difficult time playing the next songs.  My eyes were misted, my soul filled.

My Mother is 95 years old.  She weighs around 95 pounds.  At 5 ft. 6 in. that is far too thin.  She is frail, she is weary, she is longing to return to my Papa who passed away 23 years ago. 

Last night I went to visit Mama at bedtime.  Living in a Retirement Center she doesn't live far from her family.  She was already in bed slightly asleep.  I awakened her gently.  As always she smiled up at me.  I happen to know that I AM her favorite child.  At least until one of her other two children are around.  Then THEY are her favorite children. 

The bedtime ritual that our family practiced has become reversed.  For all those years that Mama would come to OUR bedsides, sing, tell stories, pray, we now come to HER  bedside, and sing, read scriptures, and pray.  At first I thought it was to comfort her, and I suppose that there is a little measure in that.  I have come to realize that comfort flows to ME as I tuck her in.

I use some comforting oils on her hands, her forehead.  I massage those Mother's hands.  They are so frail now.  The veins stand out like mighty highways on the land.  The skin is elegantly wrinkled about the tiny bones.  After I massage her hands she touches my cheek.  At 57 she still brings me peace, just by touching my face with those hands. 

I sing to her, I pray for and about her, and then I prepare to leave.  I hug her, and we don't want to let go.  The everydayness of life invades our quiet oasis of peace and love.   I leave reluctantly but gratefully knowing that there are people there that will care well for her. 

As I drive home I think of how those hands, comforted me, held me, guided me, and a few times chastised me by swatted by backside.  My soul fills with joy at the exquisite beauty of a Mother's hands!

Casual Sex???

Casual sex.  The connection of these two words drives me slightly mad.  Casual, meaning not formal, with no commitment or long term concern.  Sex?  Well if you are not certain what that is, please close this post...quickly!

Here is the practical aspect of this idea.  I go on a date (still really, really weird to even consider after being married to the man that I love for 27 years), and we have a lovely dinner, speak about our various likes and dislikes, and then we go to one of our homes and get naked?  REALLY??  First of all, NOBODY in my lifetime will ever be frightened by the sight of my naked verging on elderly body.  But more importantly, to me this action is far too intimate to share with a partial stranger.

Oh I know some wonderful young people might read my blog and say, "It's not like that for us.  You're only young once.  It doesn't hurt anyone as long as it's consensual.  This lady is just an old prude." 

Let's examine the possibilities that sex brings.  Creation?  Does anyone stop and think that this activity has the possibility of creating NEW LIFE?  In my life there has been nothing more powerful, connecting, and magical than the loving action between my husband and I as we created our beloved daughters.  They are grown now I still look at them and think of the love that created them.

My sweetie used to say, "I will NEVER create another human being to come to the world with less than perfect circumstances.  Any children that I create will come to a family filled with love."

I'm stunned and appalled when I watch all the television shows that the sobbing women are there to determine the paternity of their children.  They don't know for certain who the Father is, because they had sex with multiple partners during that time.

It does seem practical to me to say, "If you're going to risk creating a child...make CERTAIN who the Papa is!  There is a way to do that you know.  Monogamy may be considered old fashioned in today's world.  So let's look at the physical consequences of multiple sexual partners, not my ideas about morality.

Sexually transmitted diseases are a threat that have multiple heads.  It rather reminds me of a Greek myth where there was a creature that when you cut off it's head it would grow two back.  There are so many dangers out there.  Aids?  Herpes (which can lead to cancer), Unwanted pregnancy, and ever so many more. 

I have been told ad nauseum that it is simply impossible to save sexual experiences for after marriage, or at the very least until you are in a committed relationship.  I have a very old fashioned word to say to that idea...BOLOGNA!  We are sentient creatures with opposable thumbs.  We ARE CAPABLE of reason and intelligence.  We do not HAVE TO be dictated to by our hormones.

Now there is a group that says, "Sex is a very healthy activity."  They have forgotten the most important part of that comment, "Sex is a very healthy activity, when it is engaged in with a committed, connected partner!"  When you participate in sex with multiple partners you are literally playing Russian Roulette, not knowing when a random bullet will catch you with a deadly consequence.

Repression?  For nearly 60 years I have heard over, and over, and over again that remaining celibate makes you repressed, unable to fully experience life.  I would say again with force, BOLOGNA!  I still enjoy listening to pop music in America.  I enjoy most types of music.  On the other hand some of the lyrics make me extremely cross.  "Let's go all the way tonight, no regrets, just love?"  Or here is a goody,  It begins, "Tonight, we are young, so let's set the world on fire..So tonight, when the bar closes and you feel like falling down, I'll carry you home my love."  He carries her home because she's too sloppy drunk to return home on her own power.  Loving isn't it? 

How many times will the young be sucked in to the idea, you are only young once.  So you need to experience sex, drugs, drinking, cigarettes, anywhere that your hormones, and desires lead you.  The fallacy of this is obvious, because that attitude may insure that not only are you only young once, you probably will never GROW OLD!

There is an enormous difference between love and lust!!  LUST is the drive, the throb of your hormones telling you, do whatever you want to.  Have sex with anyone.  How many times have we all heard the line, "If you loved me you would...?"  So to prove your love your partner expects you to compromise your values?  That is lust.

Love...love is what makes you pull together as a couple after 21 years of marriage, and 22, and 23, and 50 and 60 etc.  Love is the power that gives vitality and support to this life. Last night I visited the Care Center where my 95 year old Mama lives.  My girls and I took her for a spin in her wheelchair.  There was a lovely couple in the hall and we began to chat.  She was in a wheelchair.  He was pushing the wheelchair, even though he was 89 years of age.  He told us, "I've been married to this lady for 60 years.  I love her more now than I did on our wedding day."  NOW THAT, is love!

Lust?  Lust is a very cheap shoddy imitation of love.  Lust drives otherwise intelligent human beings into all sorts of compromises.  Lust is as old as the earth.  This idea is well illustrated by the story of King David in the Bible.  He had EVERYTHING!  He was ridiculously wealthy, he commanded a kingdom.  He had countless wives and concubines.  Yet on one, "I'm bored," kind of nights he strolled on the roof of his palace.  (It was much cooler up there in the night breezes than it was in his enormous palace.

Across the street was a very large home.  There on that roof, where he could see, was his neighbor Uriah's wife taking a bath.  (Seems like it's lacking privacy to me, but again cooler up there.)  Good old fashioned lust hit him with a vengeance.  He lusted after his neighbor's wife, even though he had HUNDREDS of women already committed to him!

His neighbor had only ONE wife.  David had his neighbor, an officer in his army (and a good one according to the narration), put at the front of the action so that he was killed.  Then he proceeded to marry Bathsheba.  Does this seem like a recipe for LOVE?  Or a result of LUST?  He never forgave himself for killing a neighbor, a friend, to take his one wife.  So he spends the rest of his life miserable, even though he is married to Bathsheba.

I give this example to show that this situation is NOT NEW!  It is as old as the world.  If I could just reach one person...young or old, and prevent them from facing unnecessary consequences due to giving in to lust instead of practicing love, it would make me ever so happy!

I wish that I could shout in a voice loud enough to be heard all across the world, "Lust is NOT love.  There are ALWAYS consequences when sex is considered casual."  Lacking that power, I will write a post in my blog hoping that someone, somewhere will read it and change their lives. 

I have not even started on the emotional, spiritual consequences of casual, nothing really matters.  , types of sex.  I will write about that another time.  Please friends in the world, WAKE UP!  Making love is a beautiful, connecting action, one that can create family.  Do not EVER take it lightly.  Remember it as an incredible gift that must be used ever so carefully!

A Buoyant Bum?

Language is constantly changing, rearranging.  The English language in my lifetime has exploded.  Or maybe it's the American language that has grown so very, very fast.  Whether English or American I think you'll agree that it has gotten really, really BIG!

Bum...in my childhood referred to both a homeless person AND to your gluteus muscles both maximus and minimus.  In this post I'm going to use the later definition of bum.

As a small child my Father determined that I WOULD  learn to swim.  There were two impediments.  #1.  I was and am allergic to chlorine.  #2.  My bum.  I think I just heard someone say, "Your WHAT?"  Please refer to paragraph two above.

My parents were the type of people who believed that little things like allergies were not permanent blockades.  They believed that there was some way, some possible way to control my symptoms so that I could live a relatively normal life.  Thank Heavens for parents like that. 

So back to my bum.  My first swimming lessons were scheduled before I reached the double digit age of 10.  That one did not work because I developed pneumonia, possibly from swimming in chlorine...hmmm.  The 2nd set of lessons (we're not going to let a little thing like pneumonia stop us, right?) went much better.  Medical science had developed better antihistamines.  I did very well indeed until....until I discovered that I could not physically dive head first into the pool. 

Oh I COULD put my head into the water first.  That was the easy part.  The hard part was getting the rest of me to follow.  The minute that my bum reached the point in the water where it was supposed to follow my head, neck, and torso under the water, my buoyant bottom floated gleefully to the top of the water and the rest of me followed. 

I repeated this experience, over, and over, and over, until my 20's when I determined that for whatever reason I was not going to be able to dive in my lifetime.  On a positive note (my parents were all for focusing on the positive), I probably would not drown...my bottom was more successful than a life preserver at keeping me atop the water.  On the downside, (tiny little pun intended) if I was in the water face down, my bum would keep me buoyant, but my face would be down in the water!  EPIC FAIL.

Of course any one that reads my blog knows that I am extremely fond of drawing analogies.  Here is the analogy.  Life has a very nasty way of pushing us down, down, down, and down, possibly a thousand times or more (depending on if you live to be 95 like my Mommy or 54 like my husband).  What happens when you are pushed down under that water?  Do you just stay there?  That would be a negative choice, unless dolphins have learned how to read and are now reading my blog.  Dolphins would be OK under water....there may be another analogy in that thought, but I think we'll skip it.

My buoyant bum is a wonderful gift to me, because it never allows me to STAY down.  It makes me pop up from the water like I have a life preserver attached.  That is as it should be.  We need to keep a spirit of buoyancy in life.  Nobody can survive for long in this life without knowing how to bounce back up from the tragedies, and sometimes just the plain old everydayness of life.

If you are NOT blessed with a buoyant bum...(so sorry for you...no just kidding) put buoyancy in your heart, or in your head, and just keep popping up from the watery trials of life, over, and over, and over again. 

If you feel that life is hopeless and it will never get better...you are wrong.  After all...the antihistamines now are amazing!