Off to the Dentist
So I had my teeth cleaned today and now they are shiny and smooth. Growing up, a trip to the dentist meant a day full of stress and worrying. My mother would typically take me after school, so I’d be sitting in the waiting room worrying until that door opened and they called my name. I would actually be a little queasy because of how worried I was. They’d walk me back to the chair and off we would go. I would hope that I did not have a cavity, but most of the time, that was not the case. A new appointment would be scheduled, this time with needles and drills, adding to my stress level. Read more »
Posted: September 16th, 2008 under Improvement.
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I have some friends who are policemen, some who are SWAT team members, and some who are in the military. Suffice it to say that they are all highly trained. One is an expert marksman, one an expert tracker, one has twenty years on the beat, and another is a decorated officer. It is always interesting to get together with them and hear the stories they tell. The lack of intelligence in the common criminal is astounding, but I guess they wouldn’t be criminals if they were intelligent. It is also interesting to listen to them talk about tactics for different situations. I remember one discussion in particular was what the military trains their troops to do in case of an ambush. Now I never expect to find myself in that situation, but the concepts they teach are easily applicable to dealing with life’s daily problems. 
In a couple of weeks our neighborhood garage sale happens. The third Saturday of September each year, our entire neighborhood shuts down. I’m speaking literally. There are so many cars in our division that roads become one way. Parking is any place on the street you can find, otherwise park in the neighborhood across the street and walk. Besides the usual garage sale stuff, people roll out smokers, bake cookies, bring out the ice cream truck, and just about anything else they can think of. For six hours or so the entire neighborhood turns into a giant carnival. 
Growing up I loved to play baseball more than any other sport. I’d play catch with my dad in the backyard, break out the old wiffle ball and bat with friends, and when I’d go to my grandmother’s house, there was always a baseball game across the street. When I became old enough, I started playing on the town’s youth league. I remember it being a weird mixture of fun and unholy stress. I was pretty insecure at the time and there was always at least one bully on my team that I had to deal with. I was also afraid of getting hit by the ball. The main issue was that although I’m right-handed, I bat left-handed. Given the minority of lefty hitters, the pitchers just did not have much practice there so I had to dodge my share of balls. Still I did enjoy playing the game. 
As you can imagine, it gets pretty windy in Oklahoma, especially during the spring. There are tornadoes, of course, but we also have days of very strong straight line winds and these often do as much damage, if not more, than the tornadoes do. I remember one year, the straight line winds smashed the windows of cars inside a parking garage at a local mall. I couldn’t imagine coming out and seeing all that broken glass around your car, talk about stressful. Well one day we had strong straight line winds and as I was in the kitchen, I heard a loud crack in the back yard. Since we don’t have any trees there, I thought nothing of it. I figured a limb fell off one of the trees in my neighbor’s yard. Turns out, I was wrong.