Children,
Marc woke me up at 9:30 on Saturday morning to announce that he had decided to invest his money in the depressed Los Angeles housing market. His boss had urged him to build some equity by making mortgage rather than rent payments. I have been advising Marc for years that paying out nearly $2000.00 a month on rent is like flushing money down the toilet but does Marc heed his mother’s advice – no he thinks it’s crap. Unfortunately he had called a real estate agent before me. My stomach muscles began to tighten as I heard how he had given away his uppermost price point and the size of his down payment – his sum worth! I sat on the bed, phone in hand fighting down the panic as I listened. I quickly pointed out that he should have given the real estate agent a range under his top price because they always try to get you to go above your price point and that to put down a healthy down payment might cost him his life if he found himself unemployed, foreclosed and not welcome on Mother’s couch! Marc had not thought about keeping a nest egg or investing money in one of my ventures. He was prepared to risk all for a one bedroom condo within walking distance of a beach. My bowels began churning with this rough start to my day. I plopped on the toilet to quiz Marc about where I was suppose to sleep when I came to stay with him – surely he needed a two bedroom, two bath condo. He said that would not be possible on a $300,000 budget. I suggested that he could consider locations further away from the beach; after all he likes walking and did have a bike until it was stolen. He asks how he’s suppose to get all his stuff to the beach – I suggest he can easily use a back pack – he’s not sure that his back is up to the challenge of a beach towel, a pair of flip flops, a book and a tube of sun screen. My bowels explode as I realize that Marc is putting himself before his mother yet again.
We move onto discussions about tax credits, loan approvals and the possibility of his being able to tackle a fixer upper. I quickly reminded him of the time we volunteered as a family to paint the classrooms at Aquinas East: his painting skills were so awful that you all threatened to quit unless I set him home – you thought (and probably still do so) that he was a disgrace to the family name. Then there was the time that Norm and I trusted him to oversee the contractor working on our fixer upper in Cedar Falls. The fire department had to be called out when he turned on the furnace and the brand new shutters flew away with the first gust of wind. Marc needs a turn key condo.
His agent has sent him over some listings – all at the top of his budget of course and Marc has done some searching on the net and the only place he has found that meets his criteria is a new retirement community for those fifty five or older. I immediately scream down the phone that I qualify so obviously this needs to be a mother/son venture: he can buy it in my name and live there until I decide that I want to live out my days basking in the Californian sunshine. We all know that Marc is doomed to take care of me in my old age as everyone else will make sure they are either out of the country or married by then. I urge Marc to check out Realtor. Com and head to the kitchen for my bowl of Raisin Bran which I really don’t need as Marc has done such a great job on my bowels. I call him back later in the day with a few more pointers and learn that he might be looking at properties the next day. Sunday afternoon I called him again expecting to hear all about his afternoon with the realtor only to find out that she cancelled with some lame excuse about back up offers. I told Marc he needed a new realtor. Norm thought I needed to fly out and help Marc from himself. Coryn predicted that the lemon of the real estate listings for the decade would be sold to Marc. By Sunday evening Marc had soured on the whole idea and decided it was too much pressure to find something before the tax credit deadline next month.
I have much better news about Sean’s foray into home ownership. He and Bryn took just one week end to settle on a two bedroom, two bath Condo which is just minutes from us on I435. Sean took me to his home inspection and I was very impressed with the large rooms, closet space and two out- door areas. It formerly belonged to a ninety seven year old lady so the décor is very dated but it only needs cosmetic work – something with which I shall be delighted to help. Sean and his realtor negotiated a great deal and he plans on closing at the end of this month .Sean’s purchase has made Bryn even more desperate to sell his house so that he can reverse roles and rent from Sean. The cost of living in the Condo should be less. Unfortunately for Bryn house prices have dropped in his area, and the recent serial rapist that has struck in his Waldo neighborhood is not helping to attract buyers. Unfortunately Elizabeth lives in the same neighborhood and has to deal with this threat constantly like every other female in the area. We will all be glad when he is caught.
On a happier note one of the things that we are all going to be enjoying this summer is the pool at Sean’s condo. I can just see Mia with her sunglasses on, sunbathing between Bryn and Sean! The neighbors are probably going to suspect Sean of housing illegal aliens when his siblings all show up to use the pool.
February the 17th we celebrated your dad’s 82nd birthday and our 35th wedding anniversary and we were fortunate enough to have Ming Lee here to celebrate with us. He arrived the evening before and was picked up by Josh at the airport and apparently Bryn and Sean met up with them at some bar so that Ming could have a taste of the single life again. He ended up spending the night at Coryn’s although by the time he and Josh got there she was asleep. The following morning Ming, Josh and Bryn took your dad out to lunch while I made his birthday cake. We decided to have Oklahoma Joe’s Barbeque for dinner – most unfortunate for Ming as it was Ash Wednesday and he was not able to eat meat that day. However he made a sandwich to enjoy an early morning snack on his way back home.
February 28th we celebrated Joshua’s 30th birthday – the age I was when I gave birth to Leslee-Ann, our 6th child. Josh requested a dragon for his birthday cake theme and showed me some elaborate fire breathing Chinese dragon cakes that looked like displays from the Smithsonian. I suggested that he lower his expectations to something more along he lines of Puff the Magic Dragon. Expressing his disappointment in his mother’s unwillingness to emulate the artistry of a professional cake decorator he conceded to a much simpler design.
The day before his birthday I made the cakes so that I could spend the 28th attempting to cut them into the required shapes and hopefully follow the assemblage directions. I decided to use food coloring, frosting and cool whip to turn my cake shapes into a dragon. Unfortunately Bryn and Sean arrived and stared at the computer image that I was endeavoring to copy. They looked at my cake and declared I needed another batch of frosting, chocolate cookies for the spine, marshmallows for the eyes and orange candies for the claws plus fruit roll ups for the fire breathing effect. I explained that I was going for a more sophisticated style - showing them my tubes of food coloring and my black icing for the eyes. The boys were not impressed and accused me of being too cheap to duplicate the cake that their big brother had requested. Since they were too cheap to even buy him a present they decided to compensate by heading to the store to purchase all the cookies and candies they thought the cake needed. I whipped up another batch of frosting while they were gone, tinted it a lovely shade of green and tried to frost the legs to the body, the curvy tail sections to one another and arrange the head pieces against the whole round cake I had cut in half and filed with strawberry jam and upended as the body. The boys were much happier when they saw my progress and virtually took over the decorating. Thank goodness it’s my birthday next. The stress will be on my children to produce a cake for me.
Speaking of my birthday, it will be a very special celebration this year because my friends Becky, Evelyn and Sherry will be coming down for the weekend. We will also be celebrating Becky’s birthday as she will turn the same age as me the following day! I am hoping for dry weather so we can visit the Overland Park Arboretum. Unfortunately Jeremy will be missing my big birthday event (which I am sure Norm and my children have planned) as he has to attend a bachelor party that weekend. Of course he wishes he could ditch that commitment in favor of my celebration but he can count on Norm and I to be at his birthday bash a couple of weeks later! Between these two birthday weekends Craig and Leslee-Ann will be visiting so April is going to be a very hectic month. I will be stripping beds and whipping up my usual gourmet meals!
My body is having a great deal of trouble adjusting to the time change. On Tuesday morning I was still in bed at 9:30 am when Elizabeth knocked at the door with Drew and Mia. I quickly pulled my robe on, let then in and headed for the kitchen and a cup of coffee. I was babysitting because Elizabeth had a doctor’s appointment. After Elizabeth had topped Drew up she left the kids to my care- which frankly isn’t too good at that time of the day but I quickly rallied. I propped Drew up on my bed and opened the blinds so that he could enjoy the squirrels and birds outside and pulled a bureau draw open for Mia so that she could pull everything out while I hastily squeezed into some clothes, brushed my teeth, washed my face and put my presentable face on for the day. Of course Mia loves watching the transformation and demands make-up too! Elizabeth called after her appointment and offered to get lunch so I called an order into Bolings which she picked up on her way back. We were eating at the kitchen table when Coryn arrived. She’s on Spring break this week. She declined our offer’s to share our Chinese lunch as she had actually already eaten. My children never seem to arrive at my home with a meal already in their tums.Coryn entertained Drew while we ate and then we chatted away the afternoon.
On Wednesday I drove your dad to an Endonist that we were referred to by our family dentist. I had taken your dad to have his few remaining teeth cleaned and the hygienist noticed an abscess above one of his front teeth. After an X-ray the Endonist declared that the root of the tooth appeared to be fractured, leaving no alternative but to extract the tooth – something we would need an appointment with an oral surgeon to accomplish. How I miss Chuck Holmes and our one stop dentistry experience. This will necessitate a trip to a fourth dentist to have a replacement tooth added to his upper denture. I think he is going to have full dentures very soon as he has lost two of his few remaining teeth within the year. I do remember questioning the wisdom of trying to save these teeth when it was determined that most of them needed to be removed. I bought Norm some nuts in hopes that crunching down on them will cause his tooth to fall out and then I’ll super glue it to his denture. That will keep your dad from putting our money where his mouth is!
Thursday morning I managed to stagger out of bed around 10:00am and had just eaten my bowl of raisin bran and was sipping my coffee when I heard the yelps that herald Ollie and Buster. The boys immediately jumped all over their beloved Grandma and sent my coffee sloshing over the sides of my cup. I mumbled something to Coryn about unleashing her dogs on me at the crack of dawn to which she replied “Mother, it’s practically lunchtime”. She had decided that her dad would take us out to lunch, that she and I would go to Stein Mart’s grand opening and then take a walk with the boys. I fed the boys dog treats and contemplated dressing myself for the day. Coryn headed to my bathroom and returned announcing that she was going to have to go on a diet because she had just weighed herself and was horrified to see the scale fly past her usual weight. I tried to console her by pointing out that she looked more like Beyonce and Jennifer Lopez now than say that overly skinny Sarah Jessica Parker.Coryn didn’t like the comparison. She grabbed some skin around her middle and told me that she had love handles and would need to give her gym membership a work out. I just hide mine under another layer of blubber.
Coryn returned on Friday morning to take her dad out to breakfast (I thought she was on a diet) which was fine with me as I was still in my robe again at ten in the morning – I haven’t been able to fall asleep before 1:00am all week. I wish they would stop messing with my internal clock – I’m getting too old to adjust. Of course it is no trouble for your dad as he sleeps all the time anyway. Elizabeth dropped Mia off later in the day so that she could attend a self defense class in her neighborhood which is being very pro-active in dealing with the rapist threat. Mia was spending the night and thankfully she is on my schedule so we went to bed late and both woke up at 10.00 the next morning. We had fun with our craft projects and I built a bridge out of chairs and ottomans to walk across our make-believe crocodile pond in the family room and as always Mia commanded me with “Megan, you try it” so I had to heft myself up and walk across enough times to burn lunch.
Josh, Bryn and Sean have all been in Austin, Texas attending some music festival – a twelve hour drive and at least five people in one hotel room! Apparently all the food and drink are provided by various recording companies trying to promote the acts on their labels. I would imagine that they could have built a row of Habitat for Humanity homes for that investment!
Ming-Jon has been busy playing tennis at indoor courts through the winter and is looking forward to moving his game outdoors soon. Kay is home on Spring Break this week so I shall try to phone her for some updates. I know she is searching for a summer job.
I spoke to Trevor, Angela and Ethan recently and Trev has been granted a brief reprieve at work as they are keeping his plant open at least a few months longer than originally planned. Ethan has also found a job and is still weighing his college plans. I think it may be himself that he needs to weigh as he has apparently not being sticking to his diet like his Auntie Megan.
Now I come to some very exciting news: Mother is now blogging at: www.mothersnewsletter.blogspot.com
for those of you who would prefer not to receive a hard copy of my letter. I will continue to mail my newsletter to you unless you tell me that you only want the E copy.
Love your high tech Mother whose blog is doubtless bookmarked on your P.C.’s.
