Dear Reader:

You might remember me telling you about my incident (in a couple of earlier blog posts) in the fourth grade with explorers and explorations. I wanted the teacher, Mrs. Persons, to point out all the unexplored lands on the map (one day) so I could go explore them. She glared at me and said that the whole world had already been explored and then she let the map roll back up against the wall with a loud snap!  End of discussion! (Mean teacher!)

Every time I discover something new, these days, that I didn’t know before (that even existed) I whisper to myself….“See! See! You were WRONG, Mrs. Persons….every day I can explore and discover something new!”

As I continue exploring the frontier of my own cancer, the unknown, with this new drug I am pioneering, I realize I am exploring unknown territory for others to, hopefully, follow one day. My exploration didn’t turn out the way I imagined it as a nine-year-old child in geography class….but it is just as rewarding and exciting.

I had a comment from Johnny Johnson yesterday in reference to loving our home’s imperfections which got me thinking about our personal home explorations.

I know what you mean!!!! We did a complete remodel of our home that took nearly a year to complete due to some structural work included. After it was complete, I couldn’t find anything! It didn’t feel like home! I just didn’t feel comfortable! Now with little things settling in and relocating everything, the house is finally beginning to feel like home again. A door that makes a certain noise, the sounds the new Fridge and dishwasher makes and so on. It’s nice, but it has taken 6 months to feel like home again. Odd what the little things do to make you feel comfortable, and knowing where everything you use in your home is located really is a big deal!
I hope you have your fire going today, Mrs. Dingle, it sure is cold out! But hey, it’s probably the last couple of weeks of cold weather before Spring begins to show up. Got to love the low country!

Johnny’s remarks reminded me that our homes are the perfect examples of the combination of the five God-given senses we have been given… all coming together. Think about it. Everyone’s home has a certain smell which identifies the people living there. Certain foods that are cooked become so ingrained in our memories that we can almost still taste them. We can change material things, like furniture, but the house still reflects our basic personalities.

It is the sounds of our home, like Johnny pointed out, that really identifies the house structure as our home. For a long time during and after my first rounds of cancer treatments, I slept on the sofa in my Happy Room. I couldn’t lie flat down on my back…I felt like I was choking…I needed lots of pillow to prop up on (So sleeping, for me was in a  semi-sitting position.)

It was during this time  I came to recognize all the sounds of my home that I didn’t hear way back in my bedroom at night. The refrigerator was the biggest one. At first I jumped when the motor started up , out of nowhere in the middle of the night, but soon I came to recognize a pattern with the sounds.

The pattern consisted of seven short ‘pelting’ snaps…and then the fridge would give out a long moan. All would grow silent until the pattern started again. I, soon, realized I could chant:

“Lions and Tigers and Bears….OH MY!” (repetitively )

We soon grow accustomed to our own home’s odd night noises….but isn’t it funny that when we spend the night in another house….we are sometimes kept awake by the night sounds of that house?

When I spent the night at Walsh and Mollie’s last weekend, I took a flashlight to bed with me and after giving Lachlan his 2:00 a.m. bottle…explored the noises in more detail. It was raining so some of the sounds were made by the rain hitting different objects outside in the dark, then there were the refrigerator sounds, and Rutledge talking to himself in his sleep (“No! No! No! No! and shaking his head back and forth.) I discovered two year olds are “No’-ers” …even when dreaming.

Yesterday as I was typing this blog….I looked out the window and thought I saw the most beautiful butterfly I had ever seen….only to discover, upon further exploration, that the “butterfly” was actually the first two Formosa blooms this winter…. They were just angled so as to resemble a butterfly.

The camellias and azaleas are just as happy as they can be….both blooming away….you would never know it has been below freezing the past few nights.

After exploring Affordables Tuesday afternoon, I stopped by Ginger Snaps and Kay had a sea glass chime (hanging from her ceiling) that looked like it had been the model for Karen White’s book cover…I told Kay about it and she said she would sell if for fifteen dollars…“Sold!” I responded excitedly. It is so happy in the garden!

(With all the wind we have had lately…the new sea glass chime is having a real work-out… it sounds so beautiful!)

So until tomorrow….Try not to let a day go by without discovering something new in life. It doesn’t matter if it is big or little…the point is to just keep learning and growing!

“Today is my favorite day”  Winnie the Pooh

I picked out a Valentine bouquet of flowers for myself a couple of days ago at Publix… because I just wanted to…and put the rest of the red Valentine lollipops in a jar tied with a pink ribbon….again, because it just made me happy. Discovering what makes us joyful is a very important thing to learn! For me….Flowers, Flowers, Flowers (and a little bit of chocolate doesn’t hurt either.)