Teen Drinking A REPOST

With it being Back To School Week, I was thinking about all my kids moving on to High School. I just think that this is worth saying again.

 Today I was thinking that I had to find something else to write about. I didn't have anything interesting to say. And then all of a sudden I started commenting on one of my girl's Face Book Post, and I realized I needed more room. Thank you Sabrina.

She posted this " Teen Drinking is Very Bad , YO I have a fake id though"  Of course I couldn't leave this one alone. I love her way too much to keep my mouth shut. So Sabrina, this is for you and all of my other kids that have come through my life these past few years. Keep in mind that even though I am of a more interesting age, I started out just like you and I have made my own bad choices.  For me, I was very lucky that the consequences of my bad choices did not cost me what they could have.

This statement is so true, Teen Drinking is Very Bad. But do you know why?  I mean I could go on and on about all the bad things that could happen to you. All the consequences of the actions that it could lead to. And I could just tell you how stupid you are for doing it.

I am not even going to pretend that I know if you do or don't...if you have tried or not...because I don't. Just for fun, I am going to pretend that I do know and you have made the choice to drink at some of these parties that I keep hearing about. This is sort of the scenario I imagine is happening. And this is the story I am telling of you and your friends.

You are out with your friends and although you never have before, tonight your boyfriend made you really angry because he was making eyes at another girl and you found her text on his phone.
You get to the party and everyone is having fun. Some one asks you if you want a drink...maybe they are playing a drinking game and you say no at first, but you are mad at your boyfriend....so you think that it will be okay if you just have one. After all you are tired of always being the "goodie two shoes". And because you have never done this before, 1 glass of  "punch" makes you giggle and laugh like nothing else. And everything is so funny...Why not have another? By this time, you are really having a great time...everyone is laughing with you or AT YOU...but you didn't notice that......It had gotten very warm and maybe you .....take off that long sleeve t-shirt that you are wearing over a tank....And that really cute bad boy is paying attention to you....

Who are you at the party with? Are they drinking to???While you are losing control, who are you trusting to keep you out of trouble. Because right now girls...guess what...you are no longer in control of what is happening to you. How does that feel? Oh right, you don't know how that feels, because you can't even feel your lips right now...and you are still having fun...I am not going to lie to you and try and tell you that it feels bad...because right now it doesn't...Not yet.... And that really cute bad boy is probably kissing you on the neck and laughing and encouraging you to have another glass of "punch"...And your really getting warm now...and you might take off that tank...and all of the "friends" there are encouraging you to do just that. Especially that really cute bad boy...NOW, Who has your back...because now you have lost your control completely. You have numbed out the person you are and now there is no one standing in your way to "fun"...Or A really bad CHOICE...For instance... Who Drove you there? and how are you going to get home... Oh, maybe it is that really cute bad boy...because by now he is in "LOVE" with you...There are many scenarios that can happen now...and guess what...It doesn't really matter which one I write about, because you have lost control and it isn't up to you anymore. Who has your back? hmmm Well since this is my pretend story, your best friend that you came with only drank 2 glasses of "punch" but it was her first time also...So she is going to drive you home. But you are not ready to go home yet and so she decides to leave you here. She takes your other best friend home with her...He has had twice as much to drink and is throwing up and someone throws him in the car. He didn't have control over that either, because he was passed out. His choice and control was gone. ...Remember that really cute bad boy...well he promised to have your back because now your drinking your 3rd glass of "punch" and he really "LOVES" you now.... And by now you are getting so warm, and can't really stand up, so this really cute bad boy takes you inside where you can lie down until you feel better. Oh don't forget your warm, so he helps you take off some more of your clothes. By now you also "LOVE" him and well I think you know what comes next. Is this your first time? Well if he didn't use a condom, you won't get pregnant will you...because it is only your first time....HAHAHAHA....WRONG...hmmmm But you have no say so right now because you trusted some one else to have your back and gave away your control.... Well let's hope this is the end of this...This really cute bad boy never used a condom in his life and let's just say this isn't his 1st or even his 20th time..He is that really really cute sexy bad boy...Wonder what disease he might have..OH right you gave up all control, so you can't even ask the question or demand that he wear a condom or even have control enough to say NO! So you end the night puking up your guts and then you WAKE up with a STRANGER....So you get up wondering what happened, because you can't remember....WHAT? where is your friends... So you get up look in the mirror at the person you don't even know, because...For the past 12 hours, you have no idea what that person in the mirror has been doing. You can't  even find your phone, and what about your friends and your parents.... OH GOD...I am going to die...NO you won't, you might wish you were dead...but you won't die over this....Unless that really cute bad boy STRANGER has a disease... Where are your friends? Well since this is my party..so to speak ...let me tell you what happened.. Your best friend who only had 2 glasses of "punch", well she drove herself home...And your other friend well remember, he got sick and passed out and they threw him in her car....Well they were driving home and She didn't stop at the stop sign because she was changing the music on the radio so she could party on the way home, and she hit a truck and well, the good news, she is in the hospital, with a broken leg and arm...the bad news, your other friend was laying in the seat without a seat belt. He went through the windshield and another car hit him and he is in the morgue....As for you...you could have HIV, Hep C or just be pregnant at 16. You go ahead and choose...because I doubt you are going to worry about any of that until you bury your friend.  And the one that is in the hospital...she may have to serve some time in jail...of course everyday for the rest of her life she will live with the fact that she killed her friend. I don't how you see this story ending..of course, I could have gotten it all wrong, you got drunk for the first time, started throwing up and your parents were called. All three of you got home safely and the worst that happened was a huge hangover and maybe being grounded for the rest of your life...or maybe a month...I know that you are all just kids...well I guess I should say YOUNG..I read on Face Book just the other day that being Young is not an excuse to be an idiot...hmmmm... I am not trying to scare you. You have to decide what choices you make. But when you are drinking, you cannot make good choices.

Who will you trust enough to be in control of your life when you are not? When you choose to drink or do drugs, you are trusting the alcohol or drug to be in control for you. Whether you think it is okay to drink or not, Do you really want to relinquish the control you have and let someone or something else make the choices when You will be the one to suffer the consequences. Are you willing to let someone else play Russian Roulette with your life? Because that is what you are doing. I love you all and just want you to have all your hopes and dreams come true. Right now, you haven't even lived long enough to know what all your dreams are going to be. Someday you will find someone to share your life with and you will have children and then you will have new dreams...so please don't let bad choices take away all that can be or might be. I want to share with you something I wrote for Anna on her 13th birthday. This is what I hope for all the kids that come through my life.

"You hope that every choice she makes will be the perfect one. You know that the odds are against that. So you hope that the bad choices she makes will have just enough consequences. ..just enough to affect her life in a positive way. Just enough to give her the wisdom to NOT make them again."

Twilight Fantasy: Kirsten Stewart, Tom and Katie, Princess Di are Real Life

Actually this isn't a post so much about Twilight as it is about the people in Hollywood. With the break up of Tom and Katie and the leaked indiscretion of Kristen Stewart and all the other lives of our favorite actors, actresses, singers, and ect. It is getting on my last good nerve.

 Some people think that it is our "Right" to know everything about them. That somehow they OWE it to us..that their entire lives should somehow be an open book. But their lives are full of family and friends and all the things that make life LIFE. For them, their private lives are almost an open book. And all the magazines and news programs really make it their business to know everything about them...just to sell more news and magazines. No one should be on "the Job" 24 hours/7 days a week...but it seems they can't go outside and have an ice cream cone, or tie their shoe without someone snapping a picture.  And of course if they don't cooperate with all this press stuff, the Paparazzi will just make it up. Well some of them do that anyway. 

Tom and Katie..like them...love them...or hate them...or just plain don't care...Well there is a little girl that is only 6 years old and all she knows, is her world is upside down. And no matter how normal they try to make it for her...Well the normal part is...Her Mommy and Daddy don't live together anymore..and at least one of them is really sad. All of the money in the world is not going to make that go away. And people sit with cameras like vultures just to get a glimpse of one of these individuals...They snap a picture of every smile, tear, gesture that they make. They make up stories of what each movement made means. And while you may be able to keep this baby away from the so called truth, one day she will be able to read it...and even if there isn't one bit of truth in it, it will hurt her...That is the real life that this baby girl will live. Even though both of the adults in this story are older, they still have hearts and they still hurt and they still should be able to go through this ordeal left alone. Telling the story if they want...or not if they don't.. If we have to know..this deep burning need to know everything...hanging on to every word and wanting to know...like it even really matters to us...please just give us the basic TRUTH... Not what you think will sell more papers, magazines or what ever.

Kristen Stewart never wanted anyone to know her personal life. We begged her to let us in. Just give us a yes or no. And she said it right...it doesn't matter what she says, it isn't enough. Now that we know, do we have a right to judge her. What ever happened with her and Rupert Sanders..what ever happened ...guess what? It is none of our business. We don't have the right to know. Leave them alone. If you have experienced any kind of life at all, you know that life hurts sometimes. Life and the lessons we learn, are not always pleasant.  Once again, there are children and families that are being torn apart. We don't have to know. The adults in this real life drama..they are hurting. Two of the individuals came forward and publicly apologized. Why should they have to go to the public and apologize for something that happened in private? It is nobody's business but theirs.

And it happens all the time. I know that in my life, there are bunches of stuff I wouldn't want everyone to know. Should we take out an Ad and publicly apologize because we are having problems in our marriage. If we have a fight, should we put a picture of it on the cover of the newspaper. When we make mistakes and fall down...When our family is hurting by the consequences of those mistakes...should our children have to read it in the paper.

Oh and all these sources close to the individuals that can't wait to tell what they know...They should get new friends..or family. I have a few close friends that I would confide in..but if they are going to spill all our beans, they wouldn't be my friend very long. And of course everyone wants to believe all these good friends of theirs. I am sorry, but I have absolutely no respect for these "Sources". I sure to heck don't believe them. I am just as curious as the next person, but we don't have to know. We will live even if we don't have every stinking detail.

Whatever happens and however it falls out on the other side, the people involved will have a hard road ahead. It will be relived over and over again in the news and in the magazines. Forgiveness is hard enough..And for them to move on together or apart..they will have to forgive...The endless questions they will have to answer. I expect I would react exactly the same way...run and hide. And sometimes running is very dangerous. I remember 2 young Princes... The press would not leave their mother alone. They chased her, wrote about her, made her cry ...until one day they chased her off the wall...and no one, not even the King's men...They couldn't put her together again.

Father's Day

Another Father's Day is here and it reminds me how much I miss my Dad. I wish I had one more minute, hour, day, lifetime with my Dad. It wouldn't matter how much time I had, it would not be long enough. I miss him almost every day. My grandson has been talking about the "Circle Of Life" lately. I know that losing your parents is just one more part of that circle. But it is one that you don't want to face.

My dad was not always the "perfect" Dad. but he was mine. And I never questioned whether or not I was loved. If I needed anything, all I had to do was ask. He wasn't at every school program or ball game. He wasn't one of those Dads. I never even thought about it then. He was just my Dad and that is how he was.

A carpenter his whole life, you only had to tell him what you wanted, and he could build it. The smell of sawdust and sweat is the most perfect smell in the world.  His striped overhauls and pencil behind his ear, this is how I remember him as a child. Before measuring tapes came around, the wooden folded measuring tape was one of my favorite toys...Of course, I got in trouble for playing with that toy.

He built the house where we lived in Texas. After moving to Oklahoma in 1968, He built another home in 1973. Of course he had help and my mother was very capable and built the cabinets...together they built us a new home.  They bought a place at Eufaula Lake. After he retired, he made a drawing and began to rebuild our cabin. It began as a 1957 travel trailer with a room built on the front complete with a porch. When it was finished, he had enlarged it by building a regular roof over it and tearing it apart and rebuilding it from the inside out.  He had help, but the plan was his and all the trim work was his. Our little "trailer" became a very nice house.


One of my fondest memories of Dad was our fishing time. It began when we were little and he would take us fishing while visiting my Grandma. I was married and started having children when they bought the place on Eufaula Lake. While we were there, Dad got up very early and I would get up with him. If I wanted to have any quite fishing time, I had to do it before my kids woke up. Drinking coffee on the porch listening to the birds wake up was one of my favorite parts of the day. Dad would tell me the names of each one of the birds as they began their morning songs. We spent many mornings sitting on the rocks with our poles in the water waiting on the fish to bite. If we were "Jug Fishing" He would take me with him out in the boat to pick up and bait the jugs back out. Our mornings would usually prove productive and we would bring home several good sized catfish. Dad and I didn't talk much, but we enjoyed spending this quite time together.

Growing up, Dad was a grouchy man. About the time I started having my children, he began to mellow. I am not sure, but I think Grandchildren have a way of changing Grouchy Men. I sort of witnessed this strange phenomenon again when my husband and I had our first granddaughter. Ha. But that is another story.   This thing that happens when men become Grandpas showed a side of my Dad I didn't know existed. All of the things he wasn't when I was a child, he gave to my children. And when you thought you had seen everything, His grandchildren made him a Great Grandpa. It got even more unbelievable. During this period of our lives, he became ill. Between Grandchildren and fighting for his life, he became the most loving man I know. I always felt loved, but the gentle way he was after the grand kids, I never experienced as a child.

 He had been a drinking man, and right before he got sick, he gave up that part of his life. My daughter was sort of angry by this. She felt he had wasted so many years and then he got sick. I am sure he regretted all those years, but life is what it is. Life is filled with regrets and should haves and could haves.We begin to mold into a person the moment of birth. Choices, life lessons, consequences, people, mistakes, victories, failures all come together to make the person we become. And we never cease to evolve until we die.

Dad loved us each with his whole heart. He made choices he was proud of and choices he was ashamed of.  But the man he was, I was proud to call my Dad. His life taught us to be proud, to have faith, to love, and what it means to be a good person. Thank you, Daddy, for all you taught us. I miss you and think of you every day. Happy Father's Day.