76. Special Delivery

Luckily, I remembered to get Savannah and Sean's IEP's and testing documents during the move, so transferring the information to their new school was easy. I didn't need Savannah's until the next year but at least I had them when the time came. I also had both schools mail me the children's work, journals and such. When I opened the packet from Mrs. Livingston, Sean's kindergarten picture was in it.

Savannah's second grade classmates made cards for her. It was hard to tell what she was feeling but she sure smiled when she saw all of them. I think she was glad to be in "Birmington".

by Margaret

To Savannah From Elisha

75. Inner Strength

Andrew Wyeth . Wind From the Sea . 1948

Monarch The aria slid past sheers, filled the iron room with feather-soft notes. The music took her face from the pillow, mesmerized her sorrow. Her worries squirmed in her underbelly like half-butterflies in search of detail, identity and light. The sparrow-song set the tempo, cocooned the fear of what-to-do wonder. She peeled back the quilt, gave milkweed skin to sun-silk heat. Her sorrow flew to the throat of the bird. It did not swallow, instead, it sang a new song, and created a monarch. ©2000 Peggy Putnam Owen

74. Super Human

Within a two week period, the children were in a brand new school and home without the comfort of all of their familiar things. I grabbed what I thought would be the things they would grab on my way out of Harlingen but later Savannah would ask things like, "Did you get my marble game"? I always spoke the truth about the move but somehow I think Savannah knew way before I did that her dad and I should either be apart or quit our nonsense. 

Savannah was excited to be around her cousins who lived just around the curve so I didn't worry about her too much. I worried about her in school but at least she had the balance of family close by. Sean was a different story. He had tantrums every day which was not unusual except that he was in a new place and had yet another reason to throw down. I burst on the scene with him and the school was not prepared. Even though it was their "job", Ms. Hughes and Ms. Murray were two of his best teachers in that they handled him with great patience and genuine super human effort to help Sean communicate and accept the transition. They only had a month left before summer which probably helped!! Sean qualified for school in the summer which was minimal but very helpful. They had time to hire Ms. Wright, his one-on-one para-pro to help him ease into first grade. 

Even though I'd left one battle behind, little did I know that my biggest battle was just beginning. I had to constantly draw on my inner strength and focus on the possibilities. I was going to make things right. I was coming out of denial and correcting the wrong. I believed in myself. Didn't I?

73. Stalling

Since I was served divorce papers in Texas, I had to appear in court a week after I'd made the move to Birmingham. I had booked a flight before Dad and I left the Smith's, so it was just a matter of making sure the children were taken care of and taken care of they were. 

The week before I flew out of Birmingham I managed to get replacement birth certificates, social security cards, blue forms, and the kids enrolled into Mountain Brook Elementary. During the collecting of my things, I neglected to take the filing cabinet with all of our documents in it. The cabinet was destroyed so I had to start from scratch. The stars were aligned and new files were created.

With the support of Jo and Gary and my good friend Beth, I was able to work some to help establish (to the court) the fact that I was already "dug in". I was not returning to Harlingen even though it was requested by the "other side". My new home was in Birmingham.

The court date was set on a Friday so I made it down to Pat's on Thursday night. This hearing was to prevent me from moving myself and the children to Birmingham. If ruled in his favor, it would only put off the inevitable - I was going to live in Birmingham! Besides that, I was already there! I arrived at the courtroom in Harlingen bright and early in my borrowed dress and shoes. I was nervous and felt my emotions rising up in my throat. This was it. I turned the corner and saw my husband's "team" of supporters, and I sunk. I had no one with me. I hurried to the bathroom, went into the stall and broke down. I was mostly hurt to see our counselor, the preacher man aka Woody, there on his side. As hurtful as it was to see him there, it explained my instincts about the counseling to begin with. He didn't offer counseling to support me too. He was there to try and fix me. Aren't counselors suppose to be neutral?

In less than ten minutes I dried my tears, gave myself a good pep talk, pulled up my big girl panties again and marched right out of that bathroom with my head held high. I stood within eyeshot of the other side and occasionally glanced at his whispering team of supporters. I finally went into the courtroom and listened to the other cases to pass the time. When the case of "Owen vs. Owen" came up, the two attorneys represented each of us and within a matter of thirty minutes, the judge ruled that I did not have to move back to Harlingen. Child support was established *whoopie cushion noise* and I was free to go.

On my way back to Pat's I stopped by Houston Elementary and talked to Sean's first teacher, Sylvia. I was thankful for being able to look her in the eye one last time and let her know what she meant to all of us.

By the time I made it to Pat's house the tension in my shoulders lessened, and my thoughts about the morning were farther apart. It was hard to believe that a month earlier I was planning a more peaceful, agreeable end to my marriage. 

Turned out that the court date was scheduled on the same day as Jack's birthday party so even though I was not in the best of moods, it was a wonderful distraction. 

I flew home the next day to face a harder truth. Sean still had autism.

72. Changing Lanes

My dad had rented a Penske Truck for five days. Within these five days our goal was to drive ten hours to Harlingen, load it, stay the night at Pat and Jack's, head to Shreveport the next day, do some more planning, gather the children, drive to Birmingham, put my dad on a midnight train back to Shreveport, find an apartment, unload the Penske Truck, and return it at the local Penske Truck place in Birmingham. Mission accomplished!

Booyah!

:an exclamatory statement, often said when someone is extremely overjoyed. Often people do a hand movement simultaneously as they say 'Booyah'(clinching fist and thrusting their elbow downward vertically)

I threw in an extra hand movement too. *evil grin* What? I couldn't help myself. I waved "goodbye" to my past life, is all. 

It was time to get busier. And busier, I got!

71. Pressure Release

Sean had just turned six when the bulging bottom had finally fallen out of our home life. All of us were feeling the strain. Sean was not yet potty trained in the #2 area but he had mastered the #1. I was standing there once when he was training for #1 and after he peed for what seemed to be for-feakin'-ever, he looked into the toilet and did the sign for yellow. Along with it he said, in a slow deep voice, "Yeeeellllooow". "Bipers" were costly so I really wanted him to move on and do the deed in the toilet. He knew the sign for 'brown' too. I thought, 'Come on, already!'

While dad and I were 'killin' time' in Texas, my mom was in Shreveport with the kids. I can't even imagine what it was like for her but as always, according to her, everyone was fine and dandy. Dad and I stayed two nights on the road but by the time we got back to Shreveport, Sean had taken his first dump in the toilet! I was almost jealous that I hadn't been there to witness it! I couldn't help but understand it all. It couldn't have been a coincidence. Sean was away from me and his dad long enough to relax and take a dump. It all came down to pressure in more ways than one. All I could do was give him a "high five".