Bilateral Schizencephaly, one open lip & one closed, with partial agenesis of the corpus callosum

A mouthful, I know. But that's what's plaguing my new nephew Caleb right now, and I have had a lot of questions lately about what exactly it is and how it's going to affect him in the future. So I thought I'd put up the medical terminology and give you a few links to start out on, and if you still want to learn more you can google 'til your fingers drop like we all have been doing for the last week. :)

http://www.emedicine.com/radio/topic622.htm

http://www.ninds.nih.gov/disorders/schizencephaly/schizencephaly.htm

http://www.emedicine.com/radio/topic193.htm

http://www.ninds.nih.gov/disorders/agenesis/agenesis.htm

But you know what? Despite the grim picture painted by both these websites and the doctors, Caleb is doing a lot better than we expected already and he's got a lot of promise in him. So do not despair! There is hope. Where there is life, there is always hope.

But a few prayers never hurt anyone...

I want to live here!

http://www.cnn.com/2008/WORLD/meast/06/25/duibai.tower/index.html?iref=mpstoryview

So who wants to give me the millions of dollars I'll need for rent? :)

Hahaha...funny, coming from the girl with $12 to her name. ;)

72 hours, 5 hours of sleep, and totally worth it...

My little sister went into labor on Friday and had a baby late Saturday night (11:28). The baby boy is relatively healthy so far, although he is in NICU for some problems breathing (people gotta do that) and for weak reflexes...but he's getting stronger and I know it's thanks to a lot of prayers and faith from lots of family and friends. We may not get to keep this boy around for long, for an adoption is in consideration, so it's impossibly hard not to get too attached. But a new baby boy is always nothing short of a miracle.

No one should look this good in labor.

Mom's touch...

I think we hit a record of most non-related visitors during labor...

And here he is, a brand new baby boy!

A very nice nurse helped her out during the homerun stretch...

So very tired, after such a long and hard labor...but you did it!

Like I said, Paul, you're gonna have to wait a few more years!

Breathe! Relax! It's over! :)

Pupusas

In honor of the whole Latino culture thing, Paul is in charge of Ward Lunch this Sunday and he is teaching me how to make pupusas. Pupusas are a Salvadoran dish, kinda like a corn pancake stuffed with cheese, peppers, beans, or meat, and topped with tomato sauce and this stuff called curtido, which is a slightly fermented cabbage/onion/carrot mix with vinegar and spices. Sounds strange, but everyone on any website I've found for 'em says they are to die for. I'm excited to try 'em. So that's what I'm doing today as I wait to go volunteer again...shaping out the pupusas under Paul's tutorage. Yay for culture!

No hablo espanol!!!

So, this week I began my volunteer work at Lafayette Adult Resource Academy, currently (and hopefully permanently) located in Washington Elementary School. I now tutor the beginning ESL class on Tuesday and Thursday evenings. I LOVED the training portion, which lasted two full mornings and in which I got a first-class tour of the place, stories from the director's life, and most importantly some practice in tutoring. Last night was my first full 3-hour class period, though, and I was pretty wiped out. Too many worksheets, my eyes felt heavy by the end of it all. We'll see, though--another volunteer there said that it's something new and different every week. And the teacher is a really nice, open lady. So I'm still excited. And there are always conversation labs I could volunteer in if I need to switch it up.

I should probably explain that my personal philosophy is that when in an ESL class, you don't have to know the native language of the students. They are there to hear, speak, read, write, and learn English. I'm not suggesting that we devalue or exclude their native language and culture--quite the opposite, in fact. But if they are there to learn English, the best way is by immersion, as with any foreign language. One of my personal pet peeves is when I tell someone that I'm interested in teaching ESL someday and they say, "Oh, you speak Spanish?" or "Oh, what language do you speak?" My answer to the latter is always an abrupt, "English!" The thing is, of course, Spanish is the second most used language in the United States, and around here is "the" language to speak. Looking back on things, it would've been the most useful language to study in high school, while Japanese would've been the most fun and personally rewarding. As it is, I studied French. (Et je l'ai appris bien, merci beaucoup!) Go figure. And then American Sign Language. But I digress...

I have a boyfriend who's fluent in the Spanish language thanks to a mission in Vancouver, but I don't speak a lick of it. I can read a fair amount because it's so similar to French in some ways, but to hear it I may as well be listening to Turkish. (Which, by the way, everyone in the evening class is from Mexico or Guatemala except one girl, from Turkey. The Asian group, sad day, meets in the morning classes...) So while I still maintain that if I were teaching the class I'd structure it so that English was the focus, I'm realizing that as a tutor I can't understand some of their questions and they can't understand some of my answers. Some students are right with the teacher as they all fill out those blasted worksheets, but others are lost and without a model to follow they don't know what to do. So I need to learn some Spanish. I don't care enough to study it fully--a decision I will probably someday regret--but I certainly do need to get some of the basics down.

Note: The reason I don't care enough about it is that there are several places in the country, Lafayette included, where Spanish is NOT the major minority language spoken. Polish, Dutch, Korean, Chinese, Japanese, French, and several of the middle-eastern countries have their own well-established communities, and often in urban areas you'll have all of them mixed together in a single ESL class. Spanish will not help you then. I am going to Japan in two years to teach English in a middle school there for a year. Do you think that Spanish will matter there? Not really. My point is that there are other cultures out there that matter, too, and students from many places of the world, and so to be an effective ESL teacher you either have to know every major language in the world (but I'm no John Henry Jorgenson), or you have to know English and use it wisely. I'm stuck with the latter. The only reason I really care now is that Paul speaks it, and we want our children to speak it, so I'm going to have to learn it eventually, anyway...after I get some Japanese down, of course. :)

But for the purposes of this volunteer experience, here are the first ten Spanish phrases I will learn:

1. Me llamo Celeste. My name is Celeste.


2. No hablo espanol. I don't speak Spanish.


3. No entiendo. I don't understand.


4. Como te llamas? What is your name?


5. De donde eres? Where are you from?


6. Donde esta (el bano)? Where is (the bathroom)?


7. No me gusta. I don't like it.


8. Creo que si/no. I think so/I don't think so.


9. Que tengas suerte! Good luck!


10. Una lengua nunca es suficiente. One language is never enough.

What do you do when you have nothing else to do?

Here's our answer. We found this ridiculously huge plastic bag in Amanda's room and had a little fun with it last night...

Top 10 things to do with a bag this big:

(10) Start up our own Star Labs.

(9) A really big prop for ribbon-dancing gymnasts...

(8) An umbrella for escorting large crowds to their classes on campus.


(7) A wind tunnel, or some sort of haunted house tunnel, at least...

(6) A ridiculously large trash bag that would take us the entire summer to fill up...


(5) A cocoon, for all of us beautiful butterflies out there...

(4) A slip-'n'-slide.

(3) A giant baggie...but where's the fridge large enough to hold us? Ziploc, you're goin' DOWN!

(2) An elementary school P.E. parachute!

(1) A huge plastic teepee for pow-wows.

WHITES WILL VOTE FOR MCCAIN

(Disclaimer: This post is a satyrical response to news articles and stories I've seen entitled "Latinos will vote for Obama" and "What Will the Black Women of Lafayette Vote?" and "Why Didn't More Women Vote for Hillary?")

There's no doubt about it--with Hillary off the democratic ticket, women are now at a loss as to who will gain their vote. With no one sharing their double-X's, shouting "Solidarity, Sister!" and making women a target of shovenistic photos and comments across the country, thereby gaining the support of women who have faced similar bouts of discrimination in their personal lives, well, clearly they are incapable of now choosing a candidate based on merit and common interests and ideas about where they want to see this country go. (For but one example of this discrimination, scroll down to the photo at the end.) With men at the forefront of the election yet again, voters are hungry for a president that looks just like them. It looks like this presidential race of the 21st century will come down to just that--race.

And Whites will vote for McCain, with all other minorities voting for Obama.

Shout hoorays, ye minority women, for you no longer have to think about who you're going to support in the race. No more cameras will be pushed in your faces and asking you about your vote, because the question is no longer raised. It is obvious that while you may have been torn between Obama and Clinton in the beginning, for both reflect different aspects of your identity, your vote has now been all but decided for you.

Sing huzzahs, ye Latinos, for although your beloved Clinton is out of the race, heaven knows none of you could agree with McCain--I mean, c'mon, he's WHITE. Obviously he could never have your best interests at heart and you could never vote for anyone who hasn't walked a mile in your oppressed shoes.

Rejoice, ye Whites, for although by all projections of the government you will by the year 2050 be a minority in this country, perhaps your White Man will relieve you of the threat now, change the rush of the tide while he has a chance. No one has asked you yet who you are going to vote for in this historic election, because, frankly, no one cares. Everyone already knows--if you're not Black, why would you vote for Obama? And if you're not a woman, Hillary couldn't possibly be a serious thought in your mind. No one bothers to do studies about how you will vote, because you white men have been voting for hundreds of years and you've always voted for White men--why question the obvious?

No, the issues do not matter. The platforms of both parties are so similar in nearly every respect, with only a few key points that have sharpened into a heated debate (the results of which will influence the daily lives of millions of Americans--especially the too-often-neglected poor--and the relations we have with other nations in this global economy), and who needs to listen to all those words? Ideas? Please. Clearly, an educated votership is beyond any expectations for you. Don't worry about it, dear voter. Look in the mirror. Then pick the candidate with the same skin as you. We all know that's all you can see in this election, anyway, and all that we can talk about...you may as well be public about it.

Celeste Darland is a freelance writer and an avid Obama supporter, and the views and opinions of this article in no way reflect the views of Blogspot.com or any of its affiliates. No animals were harmed in the making of this article, except that I did eat meat for breakfast as I wrote this...sorry, Charissa.

When waking up is hard to do...

As many of you readers may already know, a few years ago I had a major back/hip injury that caused me to withdraw from school at Brigham Young University and retreat home to my dear Lafayette to recover. After 4 months of physical therapy and another year on a cane, I found myself a job in a factory (of all places!) and then wound up at Purdue University, which is where I'm at right now. My hip and back are no longer spasming, and I can accomplish a lot of what I want to do. This is all fantastic news, for which I am truly grateful from the bottom of my heart. I remember how difficult it was to even get up off the couch, or up stairs, or to sit back down anywhere, and I remember the pains of watching my friends go on with their lives, move freely, graduate, marry, etc., while I literally sat on the sidelines and watched. I also remember those friends who stayed by my side the entire time and offered help and companionship throughout the entire journey. I'm grateful for that trying experience because I learned in inexplicable ways about compassion, gratitude, humility, patience, waiting on the Lord, and friendship...among other things.

• However, it has been a few years now and I still feel like an old woman when I go to bed at night and have the wind knocked out of me while I try to reposition myself, and then again as I wake up in the morning, almost always with a headache and severe back pain. When I walk or run for very long at all, my hip muscles begin to spasm and I start to feel the oncomings of sciatica and I freak out and do stretches over the course of the next several days so it doesn't set on full-blow. I'm only 25, but between the stresses of certain things going on right now and this physical struggle I feel like I'm 75. I'm tired. My whole being, inside-out, is exhausted. I have no motivation to do much of anything, least of all work out or take care of my body in any way. I'm frustrated that the more attention I give to it, the worse things seem to become. Throw into the mix my goiter that I can't afford surgery for, which makes occasional breathing and swallowing difficult (but not life-threatening, Mom!)...I don't know.

I'm not writing this to complain. My life is still beautiful and I have good friends and family and a boyfriend who all love me and make my life worth living. I have a firm belief in a God that loves me and is literally my Father in heaven, who makes these things into a beautiful experience and who gives me the strength to overcome any of my weaknesses. But I guess I just want to acknowledge the fact that my insides are tired, and waking up is hard to do sometimes, and so if sometimes I react badly to things or I seem like I get frustrated over minor setbacks too easily, maybe now you'll understand the "why" of it a little more. I've had a lot of experiences lately where small things have become crazy-large blowups, on individual scales and congregation-wide scales, and I'm tired of pretty much all of it. I'm tired of being judged by people who don't know the whole story, and of people judging others when they don't have the whole story.

• People are people--we're human, we're flawed, we make mistakes every day. That in and of itself is not a sin and it is not the end of the world. People have bad days. People have bad months. People say and do stupid things for stupid reasons. People hurt each other, intentionally and unintentionally. People lie, or mislead. People have habits that are hard to break. People are largely a product of their environment, and in spite of the fact that they have their agency sometimes they react to their surroundings instead--and by "surroundings" I mean the total accumulation of all their experiences and the trends that various individuals have displayed that have affected the moment they are in. Sometimes, frankly, people suck. And that is a very hard thing to swallow when you love them, or hate them, or are apathetic. 'Cause when you love them you want better for them so it's hard to accept those flaws, and when you hate them you start to understand them and can't hate them anymore, and when you're apathetic all of a sudden these people become interesting and you can't help yourself in becoming interested. It sucks most of all when that person is you, and you see in yourself all of those bad things and wonder if there's any good to be seen at all--especially when no one seems to bother looking deeper for it.

SO, the point, a challenge of sorts:

• To any of you who may have made it this far, who bother to read my blog at all, I challenge you to find one person that you really just can't stand, for whatever reason--whether that person be an in-law, someone who has wronged your family or you individually, someone who has abused their power, a teacher, an old but lost friend. Take that person into your mind and try to find 5 good things to say about them. What has made them the person they are? The mistakes, even if malicious, that they have committed--what about it makes them, as a human, worth forgiving? What do their friends have to say about them?

I'm not saying this will be easy. I have a person right now that I personally hate with every fiber of my being, and a small but powerful group that I have a lot of resentment for because of how they have handled various situations regarding this person and my family. I don't know if this challenge can be met. But I will try. And I hope you will all try, too. Elsewise, we will all end up like this old lady before our times and then the world will be full of the living dead. I want better for us.

Rain, rain, go away...AND NEVER COME BACK AGAIN!!!

Okay, not never. But I gotta tell all of you that are enjoying fine weather across the world, Indiana's wet. Very, very wet. I haven't done the research, I just know that every time I forget to pack along my trusty umbrella, it inevitably rains, even if there's not a cloud in the sky before hand. And I just checked weather.com, and 5 of the next 10 days will involve rain...and those 5 are spread out. :( Stupid rain. Don't get me wrong, I'm glad we have water. The plants will need that. And so will we.

But the corn crops haven't even been planted yet. And the Wabash is looking awfully high...after flooding in February, I'm not ready to repeat all that. And I'm tired of having the hems of my heavy denim pants be wet. And most importantly of all, when am I going to get to play sand volleyball?!?

I have a nice umbrella, but if this keeps up, it may not suffice! Who's gonna build me an ark? :)

Let's stop doing those rain dances, kids, and send some of this rain out to the areas of the country that actually need it! However...if I gotta live with it, I sure hope I turn into a girl like this one--it looks like fun! Very Poppins.

Raindrops on roses, and whiskers on kittens...

These are a few of my favorite things:

Flowers: lilies (especially stargazer lilies), daisies (especially gerbera daisies), roses, and orchids.

Animals: horses, dogs, monkeys

Numbers: 3, 5, 12 (least favorite: 2,4,6)

Colors: pink, purple, blue

Languages: French, Japanese, ASL

Books: Peter Pan; The Joy Luck Club; The Ender Series; Stargirl and Love, Stargirl; Pride & Prejudice; and The Screwtape Letters

Foods: taco anything, gyoza, fruit juices, breads, and almost anything with chicken in it.

Desserts: chocolate chip cookies, milkshakes, brownies a la mode

Words: yakusoku (Japanese word for "promise"), alliance (French word for "covenant"), celeste (pronounced the Italian way, cha-les-tay, meaning heavenly, which people I love call me), and phenomenon (do do--dodododo). :)

Books in the Book of Mormon: Enos, Mosiah, 3 Nephi

LDS Temple: Washington D.C.

Season: autumn

Subjects: social studies, language arts, and fine arts (foreign languages somewhere in there)

Saying: "Hitori ja nai, yo." (Japanese for "you're not alone!"

Asian dramas: Nobuta wo Produce & Hana Kimi