Mama Always ~ L.A. Brown, Author

It has definitely been a banner year for me, well, me, Chris and Andrea. We came off of 2011 with the loss of our beloved Aussie, Draco in November to foster a soldier's dog in January. Angel was not allowed to go home to Korea (where she was born) with her family who was being relocated there because she lacked a blood titer. We fostered her for two and a half months, getting her the necessary titer and shots; getting the proper sized kennel and finally getting the necessary passage and escort to get home. We could not have done it without the help of many friends and their friends and of course, United Airlines who waived the normal fees to get her home to her soldier and family. My many thanks to Sandra, Janet, Christopher, the Air Race family, James Bear Branch Animal Hospital and Home Again for getting her back to her family. I am sure that there were so many, many more who were in the background that helped with this endeavor, God knows who you are and I'm sure that He ...

Blah! I hate allergies! You know, I never had any until I moved to Tucson, then all heck broke loose! And to think, Arizona is supposed  to be a place where allergy sufferers go to get relief. Yeah, right! I found out that I'm allergic to all kinds of wonderful stuff now and its all due to the dust and dry air of Arizona. When I first got here, I was OK with it. I mean, I grew up in the desert of Nevada...north of Reno to be exact. There's more dirt and sagebrush out there than I can even fathom. So, I figured that when my first marriage broke up and I went home to mommy and daddy in Arizona that it was a pretty good place to make a fresh start. I was miserable. Not only was I broken hearted and broken, but I had a two year old Downs child to deal with. It took me a bit to decide to quit mourning what used to be and to look forward to what will be. With the grace of God and a lot of help from my folks, I got back on my feet, got a job and started doing sneezing here and there...

You ever have one of those nights when you look at the clock every half hour? How about turning your pillow twenty times just to find a cool spot and then it disappears after five minutes. Or perhaps, you get in one position just to find that your leg/arm/shoulder/hip/foot fall asleep so you turn over even though you now have pins and needles, to a more comfortable position just to have the other side do the same thing? If you have animals that sleep with you, maybe they sleep behind your knees or at the small of your back....when you move, they move. Its too warm...its too cold...the fan is blowing on my head...the crickets are too loud, someone in the other room is snoring. The cats are scratching in the litter box....the wind is blowing something against your window or there's a gecko that is crawling on the window and with the light behind it makes it look like t-rex. Well, yeah, I had one of those nights. It pretty much started when I came to Arizona. As soon as I stepped of...

Yeah, some things don't mix well. Fire and gasoline, for instance or bedbugs and sleep. Another thing that doesn't mix well is extensive travel on airplanes and fibromyalgia. Never mind that I had a softball for an ankle for two days thanks to ankles that like to go out on me . Go figure, something that is supposed to be a long term relationship with the rest of my body and it steps out on me more often than an unfaithful husband. Doggone it. Anyway, the moment that my ankle actually goes down until it resembles an ankle and I have to get on a plane to get Andrea. Poor kid misses mama. She's been with Grandma and Grandpa longer than she should have been and Grandma is overdue to get some much needed surgery on her back. Just for reference, prayers are coveted for that situation. Please and thank you. So I get on the flight to Arizona and I'm in a seat by myself. No one on either side of me because I'm in a single seat on one side of the plane so I have no one to...

I promise, I will never scoff at folks complaining about jet lag again. As I am typing, it is now quarter to one in the morning and I'm wide-stinking-awake. Go figure. So, to recap yesterday. I got practically zero sleep the night before because now I have this weird thing that if I have an alarm set for myself, I won't sleep right. I haven't figured it out yet, maybe its something deep in the memory banks that hates alarms and knows that it is my deepest desire to take a sledge hammer to any alarm clock that is meant to wake me from my peaceful slumber. I don't know. The funky thing is, if the alarm is set for someone else, I could care less and will sleep like a baby. Hmm, I can't figure this one out. Anyway, so no sleep from the night before equals mass quantities of deeply strong coffee to stay coherent enough to make it onto the planes to bring me home, so we stop at Starbucks on the way to the airport in Okinawa. Their idea of venti is roughly the size of ...