On
Thursday after work I took Ashley to a pediatric dental office to have them
look at her amazing Technicolor tooth. I tried to leave work by a
specific time to get to my mother-in-law’s house early enough to avoid any of
the predicable delays, only it just didn’t work out for me. I had to
help Judy find some registrations that I entered for a special program, so that
put me behind a good 15 minutes. Judy is so nice about the hundreds
of questions that I ask her on any given day, so I was glad to be able to help
her out. I rushed out of work and drove to Gisela’s house as fast as
the law would allow. I swear I got a red light at every single
intersection I came across! So I get to Gisela’s and immediately my
eyes are drawn to the sleeping form on my daughter on the couch, still in her
pajamas no less! Now I know for a fact I had mentioned this appointment
three times during the week and twice in the morning. Gisela asked
me what I was doing there so early and suddenly remembered about the
appointment I had told her about. I set my nieces about to finding
Ashley’s shoes and socks while I woke her up as slowly as possible and changed
her clothing. She was also covered head to toe in mugre and sweat so
she didn’t exactly smell like a flor either. I managed to get my
complaining daughter changed and wiped down with a damp cloth.
I
hustled us into the car and stowed the bag with Ashley’s clothes and diapers
and off we went. There was no help for it at this point; we were
going to be late. Anyone who knows me knows just how much I despise
being late for anything. On a typical day I am at work at least 30
minutes before the start of my shift and I’m out of sorts if I’m not
early. Anyway, we were making good time until we got to a certain
portion of the freeway less than a mile from our destination where traffic slowed
to a crawl. It was at that point when the receptionist from the
dental office called me to make sure I was aware of our appointment. I
advised the receptionist that we were less than a mile from their office but
stuck in traffic at the moment. She said that if we were more than
15 minutes late, we would lose our chance to be seen and a fee would be
assessed for insufficient notice since they have a 24 hours policy. We
managed to arrive at the office exactly 10 minutes after our set appointment
time. I spent the next 10 minutes filling out paperwork while Ashley
played with the toys in the lobby. By this point she was actually in
a rather good mood which is rare when you have to wake her up from her
nap. We were shown back to the exam area and Ashley sat on the chair
all by herself. The dental assistant looked at the tooth in question
and checked for any sign that would indicate a problem. Ashley was
not happy at all after the initial exam since the dental assistant had to push
and pull on her tooth and the surrounding gums. They decided they
needed an x-ray so she had me sit down in the exam chair and hold Ashley on my
lap. As she draped the lead apron draped over us, she asked me if
there was any chance of my being pregnant. I started laughing. I
just couldn’t help it! Luckily she took that as a no and didn’t ask
for an explanation. We had to restrain Ashley for the x-ray because
the bite thing they use was a little too big for her mouth so she fought
it. The x-ray was clean; there was no damage to the root so I was
told what signs to watch for regarding the tooth. Otherwise Ashley
is doing well with her teeth and doesn’t need her first real visit until her
last molar comes in which should be within the next six months. Beautiful,
one less thing I need to worry about! I am so happy I have such a
healthy, mostly well behaved girl. I attribute the mostly well
behaved part to her being a normal toddler, which also makes her highly
entertaining. My favorite thing that she does these days is when she
wants to play with me or my mother. She jumps and waves her arms
while singing, “boo boo, boo boo!” That is her version of the
classic taunt, ‘nana nana boo boo’ which only makes it funnier when she does
it.
Speaking
of Alberto, he called me tonight. Now we get to see how the phone
system the jail uses measures up. As long as this call cost me less
than $10, we’re coming out ahead! On Monday we’ll go and see Alberto
again at jail and talk about which other family members he is going to put on
his list so that they can visit him. As far as I know, they require
visitors to have federal or state ID which would make Gisela unable to
visit. I’m not sure exactly who of the family has ID, so I’ll have
to ask on Monday before we go visiting. It felt so good to hear his
voice. I really took it for granted that when he was in Mexico I
could call him anytime. It was one of the few things that were
keeping me sane through this whole mess.
So
I have a few goals I am working on: losing weight, gaining control of my
financial situation again, and finding a permanent job. I feel bad
about looking for another job, but I just can’t wait and see what happens
anymore. I really like where I am working. The people are
great, the work is satisfying, my supervisor is wonderfully understanding, and
the pay is… direct deposited. I wish I could say the money was adequate,
but because of my goal of financial stability I have to be honest and say I was
better off unemployed sadly enough. I was literally going insane
from being at home all day with my father, but I didn’t have the additional
expenses that come with working full time. After taxes I still make
more at my job, but with gas and daycare figured in I definitely come out
behind. When I say I’m living the dream, what I mean is I’m
desperately trying to get out of the vicious cycle of living paycheck to paycheck. Some
dream right? Well I have to start somewhere and I certainly can’t go
back to school so I need to work with what I got. On this happy
note, I’m off to bed. Sweet dreams!
Ciao
Spanish
words/phrases from this post:
mugre:
dirt
flor:
flower
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