I don't think it is any sort of coincidence at all that I got a letter from University of Portland today announcing my acceptance to the university and to the school of nursing.

So I did get in after all. It will be a pleasure to write them a thanks but no thanks letter.

I've had a pile of sisterhood yesterday and today. I talked to my older sister last night for an hour and a half. She was so funny when I told her about my changing plans. "I'm so glad to hear you say that," she said. She's been a physical therapist for 17 years and she is fed up to the brim with health care in general and she knew what sort of stuff I was in for. She said, "When you first said you were going to go to school, you were so excited and determined and I didn't want to quash your enthusiasm but I'm just so glad you changed your mind." She's delighted about my plan and believes this is definitely the best choice for me. She has always admired my writing and teaching ability and thought it sad when she thought I was turning my back on that.

Then this evening, Amy popped by with her stepson. They were on a date--shopping at the mall, hitting at the batting cages and having appetizers for dinner at TGIFriday's. She and I chatted for a few hours. I haven't seen or talked to her in weeks. She was also delighted to hear about my change. She said that she and her husband and wondered how I thought I was going to be able to be the accessible mom that I wanted to be going to nursing school or working graveyard as a nurse. Obviously I had wondered about that, too. Enough so that I changed my mind. It was so nice to sit in my kitchen and shoot the breeze with my sister. She only lives 30 minutes away but sometimes it's like she's in another state for as much as we see each other. Our schedules have a tendency not to mesh well, and even when I'm not at school, after driving Jordyn 20 minutes to school and 20 minutes back, I'm loath to drive an additional 30 minutes to her town to see her unless it's something really great. But with school out, we've made plans to do more stuff together. I'm glad--she's a fun chick to hang out with.

And the sister sightings don't stop yet. Tomorrow, big sister of yesterday's phone call will be here in the flesh. She's driving over from Central Oregon to have dinner with us and to go see a Celtic band she likes. She's whipped up quite a party to meet us there, too. I'm looking forward to it.

How is it I can go for weeks without seeing or talking to either of my sisters and then bam-bam-bam get a bunch of visiting/talking in a few days?

I found out that Joey's teacher is retiring 2 days early (before the last day of school) so guess what? I decided that Joey's last day will be Wednesday, too. That will be so nice--no more driving!!! I'm so so so so tired of driving her to school. Especially on days when I don't have school. It takes me almost an hour to get her to school and then back home again. And then I have to do it again at 3pm. Ah--no driving.

Here's something that disturbs me. Joey's friend showed me her writing exercises journal. This girl is 7 1/2. She's 2 mos. younger than Joey. On one of the pages, she was describing the picture above and the little story went something like this: "These people are going to go live in a grocery store. I wish I could go live with them so I could eat all the food but I can't because my mom says." Can you spell eating disorder? Because I sure can. This is the same child (I may have mentioned this) who didn't want to wear a particular dress because she thought it made her tummy look fat. In another story, she was describing what could be seen through a keyhole and it was Cheese Land. She said she wanted to go there, too, and eat all the cheese. I said "Wouldn't you rather go to Disneyland and ride on all the rides?" Nope. She wanted to eat all the cheese. I'm quite worried about this child.

And on that happy note...

--L