Engleberts in Missouri [miz-er-ree]

Steph just called with an update.

Eric was involved in a horrific fire fight in Baquba, a city located northeast of Baghdad, a few days ago. As a turret gunner, Eric is in the thick of the fight and in a dangerous position. His Humvee was hit multiple times and at one point his turret was hit, spinning him around and leading his fellow soldiers to believe he had been shot and killed. Luckily, he was not injured. He was forced to kill people with return fire and it is weighing heavy on his mind. He wrote a lengthy description of the firefight down and sent it to Stephanie. He felt it was the only way to get it out of his mind.

Stephanie was relieved to get to talk to Eric today and put her mind at ease that he was not injured at all. Physically he is fine. But he is being injured everyday that he is in Iraq. His injuries don’t show on the outside but the sheer horror of war and the things a soldier is forced to do cause terrible emotional damage.

The constant nervousness he must feel just waiting for something to happen. Getting attacked when you’re just sitting around waiting for orders to come in or just driving along a road. The anxiety as you charge into a firefight wondering how you’ll fare.

The awfulness of seeing a buddy injured or killed. Difficulty sleeping because of what you’ve seen happen to your fellow soldiers and even the Iraqi soldiers you are fighting against. All that carnage - it’s got to cause nightmares. How do you get those images out of your mind?

Soldiers try to act really tough. To keep a stiff upper lip and not show a lot of emotion. They don’t want their loved ones to worry. They don’t want their fellow soldiers to perceive them as being weak or to lose confidence in them. They often play off what they are going through or joke about things they’ve done in an attempt to deny it’s significance. But most soldiers are very humane and they feel the horror of war very deeply - more than many of them are willing to admit. These are life-changing, soul-changing experiences.

I have no combat experience but I worry about what Eric is going through - how will it affect him in the long term? How will people’s perception of him be changed when he returns? Once these soldiers come back – with all the injuries and damage – will they be forgotten about quickly? Will everyone else forget about the war while people like my son-in-law will still be dealing with the aftermath?

I truly believe that it is our duty as a nation to pay attention and tend to the young men and women we ask to sacrifice life or limb in battle - even when we don’t agree with the war they’ve been sent to fight.

I think about this a lot when I go to bed at night. I just feel a tremendous sadness for this whole situation that Eric is in. If the war ended tomorrow, the impact on his life can’t be undone. It makes me very sad.

There will be no joy in Mudville tonight. Not because of rain - but due to illness. I had an inkling Violet wasn’t feeling 100% last night when she got home from school. Then, when she said she didn’t want to go to Awana’s I knew for sure that she was ill. Fever, cough, achy body. I think it’s a “weather change” cold - you know, when the weather gets really warm then cold then warm then damp and cold, like we’ve been having for the last week or so. We dosed her up with Children’s Nyquil and put her to bed early last night.

Two winters ago Violet had pneumonia five times. She just couldn’t seem to stay healthy so I take it pretty seriously when she gets a chest cold or the flu. Today she stayed home from school. She still had a slight fever and wasn’t feeling well this morning. She’s been sleeping most of the morning, waking up long enough to get a drink and go back to bed. So…there will be no soccer for Violet tonight.

To cheer her up I decided to finish another doll project for her. One of Felicity’s outfits (her Holiday gown) came with two different insets that you could swap to give the dress a different look. That gave me an idea…

Here is Felicity in her Summer Outfit:

Here is the same dress, minus the ribbon and hat, with a coordinating apron to change the look of the outfit:

How cute is that? Now back to our regularly scheduled vacuuming and other chores.

It’s been raining here pretty much every day for the last week or so. Some days it only rains a little - just a soft little sprinkle through out the day. Other days it’s a gullywasher. The downpour drowning out conversations. We’ve had a few flood warnings in the surrounding areas but around here it’s just puddles and soft ground. The farmers are thrilled. Apparently we had a very dry winter. The soccer moms are not thrilled.

What do you get when you mix rain, soft ground and soccer? A team covered with mud. Those cleats can really hold the dirt! After today’s practice the kids looked like they’d been making mud pies. Streaks on the face. Hands and forearms smeared with mud. Clothes that may never be completely clean again. Thank goodness Violet’s soccer shorts are black!

I learned a few things today. First, I have pretty good hand-eye-foot coordination. Second, I make a pretty good goalie - against 9 year olds who can’t play very well yet. Third, never wear shoes to soccer practice that you don’t want to ruin. Sadly, I didn’t have any old tennies that I didn’t mind getting dirty. Now I do.

The forecast calls for continued partly rainy with thunderstorms for Thursday’s game. Did you know soccer practices and games aren’t canceled if it rains? Only if there’s lightning. Thursday will most likely result in kids that look like this - I promise pictures if Violet turns into a kid-shaped mudball.

This morning I was cleaning out the leftovers in the fridge. Rinsing out the dishes and feeding the food down the garbage disposal. All was going well. Then water and bits of food started coming up in the sink on the non-disposal side.

I kept running the disposal and the water - but stopped putting in any additional food items. The water level in the left hand sink continued to rise. I turned off the disposal and the water and waited a few minutes for the water to go down. The water in the left sink did go down but only to equalize water levels in the left and right sink. Somehow the drain was clogged up.

I got out the plunger and tried to plunge out the clog. That didn’t work too well. Basically all that happened was that the water in the opposite sink burbled up in a mini geyser. Next I tried the Liquid Plumber - the really thick extra caustic stuff that’s supposed to eat through the toughest clogs. No luck.

When Steve got home he went to work on the clog. He tried several things, none of which worked. “I’m going to have to get the drain snake”. (Yes, we own our own drain snake)

So out to the garage to get the drain snake. Why is it that the more organized you try to get the less likely it is that you will be able to find the stuff you want when you need it? Anyway, after a bit of fruitless searching we gave up on finding the drain snake and Steve went to the store and bought a new one.

He snaked the drain from under the sink down to China trying to dislodge whatever was blocking the pipes. No luck. He ended up having to go under the house to get to the clog. Our drain is working wonderfully again.

Every time something breaks at our house it seems like my husband is johnny-on-the-spot with the ability to fix it. He’s fixed cars, air conditioning units, washers, dryers, hot water heaters, stoves and more. I gotta tell you it’s a quality that I find h-o-t hot!

Why haven’t you posted those pictures of the stuff we can have yet? Well, that would be because I spent my spare time working on this coat for Violet’s Felicity doll.