If You Want Me To

Song by Ginny Owens

If You Want Me To

The pathway is broken
And the signs are unclear
And I don't know the reason why you brought me here
But just because you love me the way that you do
I'm gonna walk through the valley
If you want me to

Cuz I'm not who I was
When I took my first step
And I'm clinging to the promise you're not through with me yet
So if all of these trials bring me closer to you
Then I will go through the fire
If you want me to

It may not be the way I would have chosen
When you lead me through a world that's not my home
But you never said it would be easy
You only said I'll never go alone

So when the whole world turns against me
And I'm all by myself
And I can't hear you answer my cries for help
I'll remember the suffering your love put you through
And I will go through the valley
If you want me to

This is one of my favorite songs. I came across this about 1 month after my husband left us. It was an extremely hard time in my life...the hardest, and I was struggling to make it through the next 5 minutes let alone the day. For some reason I heard this song on the radio and it really made an impact on me, so I went on the hunt for the CD not even knowing who sang it. Somewhere I lost it in the last year and just bought a new one the other day so I could enjoy it again. Now that I have been reunited with it I just wanted to let you read the words because they mean so much to me. If I was smart as some of my computer Geek friends, (I won't name any names, because they know who they are) I would put it on here so you could hear it, but alas you might just have to ask me for the CD the next time you see me.

What Is A Mother To Do?

Well it has happened! The day that I have most dreaded. The day this mother hoped would never come. And in the end…I survived it even better than I had thought I would.

Devon came to me 2 nights ago and asked me if he could get his ear pierced. There I said it! Yes, he came to me with the protection of his dear sweet cousin (Jenessa) and asked if he could mutilate his body.

It was the worst thought possible for me to think of my baby boy getting his ear pierced. On several occasions over the past 14 years I have thought of the possibility of him wanting one. For some reason it is just one of those things that I have never really thought was cool. Yes I realize that it is sort of a weird thing coming out of my mouth since I myself have a nose ring...And my 16 year old daughter has one as well. (I took her to go and get it for her 16^th birthday) But that is different…isn’t it? Apparently not!

He and his cousin had planned to go over to a friends house that evening to do the dirty deed themselves. Being the good boy that he is, he decided that it was best to ask permission first. Good Boy Devon! (yes I am still in shock about that) As I have said it is something that I had thought might be a possibility and so I have pondered long and hard of how I might respond when the time came. A while back I decided that I would not fight the battles that really were unimportant. You know, things like hair color and pierced ears. (still have a problem with pierced lips and eyebrows though) After all I have dyed my hair for so long that I can’t even remember what the natural color is anymore and as I said I have a nose ring.

Well the evening was a bust for him as the friend couldn’t have them over and so this procedure began to take place at home instead. Jenessa got the ice cubes for freezing and Devon sanitized the earring as per his mother’s instructions. After ½ hour, and a lot of noisy commotion the 2 of them come out of the bathroom for a breather. The ear is not any closer to being pierced than it was before they began and all they had to show for it was a lot of melted ice. (Okay really it was a little bit pierced) Jenessa is frustrated with Devon and Devon is frustrated with Jenessa. Coming to the mom for a little direction (will they never learn?) they ask what to do. Well let’s just say to the shock and short discomfort on Devon’s part that the ear got pierced. So not only did I agreed to this barbaric thing but I think that I even did it for him! Now I look at my baby boy and wonder how he got me to be a part of it and think... What kind of a mother am I?

She'll Be Coming 'Round the Mountain

Maybe I will tell you a little bit about me that you wouldn't neccesarily know.
I grew up in Fruitvale, BC. Go ahead with the jokes...I have probably already heard it all. We lived up on an old ski hill that was no longer in use and so it was growing over with brush. It was a pretty nice piece of land but of course because it was an abandoned ski hill, it was on the side of a mountain. Great for a view, but sucked for the walk home from school as it was 2 miles mostly up hill. I quite often would ride my bike to school. That was always a quick trip due to it being all down hill all the way there. I would time myself and try to better the time it took each week and when I was at my best, I would try to mix it up a bit by riding it with out hand on the handle bars. This was a difficult task as it was not all straight road but with practice I discovered that it could be done for 3/4 of the trip. The other 1/4 was to put the breaks on for extreme speed on corners. Come to think of it it would have been totally awsome for lugeing in the summertime. In the winter the neighbour kids and I would all pile on crazy carpets and take the slope that way. This was not always the safest thing because there would be times when a car would be taking the ascend up as we were going down. It would take some fancy footwork to get your carpet out of the way in time as not to be face to face with someone's bumper. The kids and I always though it was great fun but the drivers of the cars never seemed to have the same humor of the activity. Many of them probably having to go home and clean their shorts.
As I am sure you have guess by now...what goes down must come back up. Yes, the joys of getting to school were not the same joys as walking home. And I mean walking home. (But didn't she say that she would ride her bike to school. Yes, Yes she did.) Let me remind you that it was 2 miles straight up the side of a mountain. I am not talking the kind of hill that you have to go up to get to top of these bumps they call 3 Hills. I am talking mountain. It was hard going when you walked it without the backpack on your back...but when you had to push the bike too. Let's just say that I didn't get a lot of friends volunteering to come over to my house afterschool.

Well, one day I was taking the decent down the mountain with a neighbour friend of mine. She was delivering newpapers and I was along for the ride. We were at the steepest part of the hill when I hit a pothole that I was sure hadn't been there the day before. It wasn't a really big pothole but big enough to throw my small ten speed off into a different direction. My body didn't get the message soon enough about the change of direction and let's just say that it didn't end well for me or my chin. I don't really remember much about the whole incident...just remember my dad coming from out of what I though was the blue and him taking me up to the Dr.'s office. Apparently the Dr. was good with a needle and that was what I would be needing. It took 15 stiches to put my chin back together that day. And in the end I have to tell you that I took the decent down that hill a little bit slower from then on...at least fro the rest of that summer anyhow.