Category: Memories

On my way to San Antonio with Mary and my kiddos (and the rest of the clan) – minus my hubby :(. I am so sad about this, you have no idea. I had no intention of coming at all – one: we have no money and the extra money we do have is all being used to pay off our debt, and two: Mario hadn’t gotten his vacation request in on time (and even if he did, I found out later, he wouldn’t have gotten it for this week anyway because another guy who has seniority over him wanted this week first).

So we both decided we’d be staying home with Alaethia; the boys would go with Mary. Well, he’d be working and I’d be at home on my own little vacation, because just being at home and not working is vacation enough for me. But Mary offered to take us – the five of us – to Sea World and Fiesta, all expenses paid at the last minute. We hoped upon hope that Mario would be able to get the days off, but he couldn’t. So again, I decided I’d be staying behind too, as nervous as I was about the boys leaving with Mary. They are quite a handful.

The time comes yesterday when I’m packing the boys’ stuff, and it finally hit me: they were leaving for 4 days…longest I’d ever been away from them. The only other time was when Eenan stayed with Mary for 2 days while I gave birth to Jaylen and the next time was 1 ½ days when I left them both with Mary while I was in the hospital giving birth to Alaethia. I tried not showing my apprehensiveness in front of them because they were upset enough as it was that I wasn’t going. Jaylen even tried backing out of going a few times, but we convinced him otherwise.

Mario kept telling me over the days, “I still think you should go. You should at least get to do something this summer,” but I kept telling him, “No way. I’m not going if you’re not going.” I mean, the last time I went on vacation without him was back in 2001 when I went to California with Mary and the family and since I was still fairly new as a family member I felt really uncomfortable. I felt like Mario’s uncles were picking on me constantly, but unbeknownst to me that’s just how they play around. I now get along with them wonderfully, thank goodness. But, at the time, I felt awful and promised myself I’d never go anywhere without him again.

We got together for Father’s Day yesterday. Mario enjoyed getting familiar with his new camera, a 10mp Samsung, and loved his new Stainless Steel cross and chain. Elda made pozole for everyone and we sat around and chatted. Mario decides to take a nap on the couch. 8 o’clock rolls around and I’m suddenly surrounded by everyone and they’re trying to convince me to go on the trip. I start bawling, I’m not sure why…I felt confused, upset because Mario wouldn’t be going, because I could imagine him lonely and bored, and if I did go I hadn’t finished with laundry, washed dishes, ironed, or made him meals while I was away. I relayed my concern and Elda offered to bring hot wings for a meal and Yadira offered some taquitos LOL. Mario wakes up while I’m crying and tells me, “GO BABE. I’ll be fine. Really.”

So everyone starts shooing me out and Noelia goes to the house with me to start packing. Mary’s in the kitchen at her house making Mario meals for the next 4 days. The whole time I’m packing I’m thinking, “What am I doing?” Every time I think about leaving Mario alone my lip starts trembling and I start bawling all over again. Mom feels a little sad too because I’m leaving and starts to make me feel guilty for not finishing the CD she wanted me to compile for her. I’m doing laundry in a hurry and trying to get all of the clean laundry that’s already done folded and hung. Mario went out to the car and washed, vacuumed and cleaned out my mess for me, so we’d have a nice, clean car to go in.

I hugged Mario in the kitchen for a long time and got his blessing one more time to go ahead and go. I was so close to changing my mind so many times. It was hard leaving him this morning. But it’s only three days. Three and a half, actually.

At least we have our cell phones and Myspace to keep in contact with, though!

9:20am
We had a bathroom break at a rest stop back in Brooks County somewhere and just finished having breakfast at McDonald’s in Falfurrias. My batteries are charging, the kids are being occupied by Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix, Aly’s got her blankie and sippy and is ready to nap. I’m about to finish this entry and start on my new book, And Then He Stole My Boy Entrancers by Louise Rennison. Let’s see how many chapters I can read in 2 ½ hours (and while Aly’s in moods). I’m going to be alright, and so’s Mario. I’m really going to try and enjoy myself.

6:10pm
We’re at the hotel right now. I think I only got to chapter 2 or 3 on the road. We got to San Antonio and went straight to the Alamo. It was nice taking the kids around and introducing them to a little bit of history. They actually enjoyed it. We took lots of pictures outside, and even a few inside that I took without knowing they didn’t allow. Oops!

We got back to the car and followed behind Jose’s rental, which was behind Tommy’s car, to go eat at Las Palapas restaurant. I remember eating at one of those the last time we were in San Antonio, which was in 2003. Let me tell you, it SUCKS being last in the caravan. You have to swerve and switch lanes at the last minute. We almost died at least 3 times trying to get into another lane. 2 of those 3 times were due to yellow taxi vans swerving into our lane or not letting us pass. I was quite glad to finally get to the restaurant that started our long journey in the first place.

Alaethia was mostly well behaved. She started off with coloring “circles” on her menu with crayons and when she got bored of that she entertained herself with my tea. I held it while she drank and then she started splashing me with the straw. Once I took that away she was playing with her Gerber star puffs and when she threatened to throw her container all over the floor, the food came and all she wanted to eat was “Matoes” (tomatoes). Gosh, I hope these weren’t some of tainted tomatoes…

The boys were so full of energy that they hardly ate. Eenan made a mess of his enchiladas but Jaylen brought his chicken strips with him. Our next stop was checking into the hotel. Jaylen ate his chicken strips since it was a little quieter. I just about had a coronary when I called to the front desk and they told me they don’t have high-speed internet, but they do have dial-up and we’re supposed to bring our own “equipment”. Grr. I’d spoken to Mario just before that and he’d asked for me to upload pictures to Flickr so he could see. Poo. And we’d made plans to Myspace each other and now we can’t! I’m so sad.

After everyone had had a bathroom break Jorge stayed with the boys while Mary, Aly and I went to H-E-B with Tommy, Yadira, Yazmin and Angela.

Jorge succeeded in scaring the crap out of me, as always, though this time it wasn’t his plan. He was half-asleep when we left and we’re a few miles away from the hotel when he calls in a panic and asks if Jaylen’s with us. I laugh and tell him, “Uh, no. He stayed with you and Eenan,” because he’s always doing that to me–trying to trick me and make me worry. He says, “No really, he’s with you, right?” I said, “NO JORGE! He’s not with us! I left him with you!” I can hear him shuffling around and then he gives a big sigh of relief. He says, “Cabron, he was in the bathroom.” He muffles the phone and he tells Jaylen, “Why didn’t you tell me where you were going.” Jaylen just shrugged LOL.

We got a few things we needed from H-E-B (including two more rechargeable batteries, because I’ll just die if a really awesome photo op comes about and I miss it!). And now we’re here, resting. And I’m cold. And the kids (especially Alaethia) are running amuck. I’ll just read and maybe take a nap.

I caught yet another cold which I thought was brought on by getting soaked putting groceries in the car at Walmart on Saturday. As crappy as I felt I went to work because I knew my boss was taking turns with relatives and taking care of her mother, who’d recently been in the hospital. She was off every other day and I’d just caught up with all our work (we’d been so behind thanks to our snail-paced internet) so I didn’t want to get swamped again.

I asked John to accompany me to the mall to return a blouse and buy some jeans. He said okay; he wanted to check out video games anyway. We’re walking around looking for the store (which they moved across town, thank you) and he tells me he’s starving. I wasn’t sure if I was hungry or not, but I knew for sure I needed a seat because I was feeling dizzy and my heart was racing like it had been for the past two weeks. Elvira kept telling me, “You need to get yourself checked, girl. That’s not right.” She’d actually been telling me about a month already but I was in denial. I pinned my lightheadedness, racing heart and jitteryness to the 6 1/2 hours between my breakfast and lunch.

So we’re standing in line at Quizno’s, where John wanted to get a sandwich, and as I’m trying to figure out what I want I feel like the room’s spinning. He looks over at me and says, “You don’t look good, you’re swaying. Eat something.” Again, I blamed it on my terrible sinuses and headache, but I listened and had some broccoli soup and a Sobe drink. We sat talking for a while and I began to feel better. We stopped by the other store, I found a blouse, and we rushed home because I needed to make dinner. By the time I was done with everything I was exhausted and felt awful again. My head hurt, my heart was racing again, I couldn’t breathe because my nose was so stuffed and my throat felt like it was on fire. I started wondering if maybe I’d caught Strep. I was about to get up to take a shower when my mom said, “Don’t go to work! Stay home and get better!” I said, “No, I have to go.” Mario passes by and tells me, “Don’t go in.” And after feeling like a turtle on it’s back trying to get up to shower, I realized they were right, I was too sick. They convinced me to go to the doctor the next morning, so I got into bed and woke up early to shower.

The boys had slept over at Mary’s, Mom was staying with Alaethia, and Mario was working so I went on my own. When I’m in the vitals room they ask what my symptoms are and I told them about my cold and asked if I could be screened for diabetes. They were a bit shocked and asked why. I told them how I’d been feeling awful for the past two weeks and I felt like I might have diabetes. Then I weighed myself: 128.7. Officially THE MOST I’ve ever weighed in my life.

When the nurse practitioner checks me she says my throat’s inflamed (but not Strep), I have a chest infection and Sinusitis. She prescribed some meds for the Sinusitis (which I just realized I need to take again), Zithromax for the infection and a steroid. Then she sent a nurse in to poke my finger to check my blood sugars. After 10 minutes I could hear a commotion outside; they were in disbelief that the reading was mine. My sugar was at 203, 2 hours after I’d eaten breakfast. The nurse walks in, her expression serious, and says, “Yajaira! I can’t believe it. You’re diabetic! I’m so sorry.” I tell her, “It’s okay. I kind of expected it. Not this soon, but I did.”

She gives me menus and pamphlets for my new diet. Everything must now be sugar free and diet and no sweets other than the ones in the menus, most of which are fruits. She wanted me to go in today while fasting to do labwork and get that glucose test done where you drink a really sweet punch; usually the one one when you’re pregnant. I said fine. She said we’d try and get me back on track by just doing my diet and exercising, but she was afraid I might at least need to be on a pill.

I went to the pharmacy to get my meds for my Sinusitis and everything and started texting, calling and messaging everyone to let them know. It hadn’t hit me until then, really. I got a little teary-eyed for a little bit, but pretended it was because I’d been coughing up a lung. It was so weird having to go back to Dollar General to exchange the cough drops I’d just bought that morning because they weren’t sugar free.

I get home and tell Mom and she’s in shock. She kind of just stood there staring at me for a little while, like she couldn’t tell if it was actually me standing before her. And then I started with my diet. Edith, the nurse practitioner was right, she said it was going to feel like I was eating all day because I’d be eating every 3 hours: 6, 9, noon, 3, 6pm and 9pm. I called my boss to let her know I wouldn’t be in on Friday either due to my labs and told her about my ordeal. She said we’d even move my lunch hour half an hour earlier so I’d stay on my 3-hour diet. I’m so glad she’s so understanding.

Although I felt like total crap from the infection and Sinusitis, Eenan and I both had dentist appointments. I got the boys out of school early and then Eenan and I went. We thought he’d need a crown, but he just got that same filling redone and another 2. I got two molars on top filled that really needed it, plus a small one between two teeth on top. I still have two more to get filled but I didn’t want to spend too much with all the medications I’d be needing for the diabetes. I’m so proud of Eenan; he did much better than I thought he would. He only screamed once when they injected the Novocaine. Shoot, I almost screamed, too.

Mario and I went to Jorge and Maggie’s that night to chill out. We spent some time laughing outside and then on Myspace while Joe cut Mario’s hair Chuck Liddell-style (from UFC). We got home pretty damn late and we slept about 5 hours. Not even the shower at 7:45am helped. We got to the Dr.’s office and they drew blood and I drank that gross drink immediately afterwards. Then we waited an hour. Mario forgot something to entertain himself with so we just read forwards on my Centro and then we sort of took a nap until it was time to get my results.

We went to the back to get my results: 222. I am officially diabetic. My lab results won’t be in till at least Tuesday, but those results will state what Type of diabetes I have and if I’ll be using pills or insulin. I asked if there was any chance of just stabilizing my glucose with just diet and exercise and Dr. Edith said no, I’d need pills at least. Blah. Totally not what I wanted to hear.

We went to the pharmacy to pick up my glucometer and strips and all that. It seemed surreal. As we stood at the counter getting counseled Mario jokes, “I didn’t think we’d be doing this till we were old.” That’s so true. I was hoping I wouldn’t start having symptoms till I was at least 40!

They taught me how to use the machine and off we were with my little pack, which I’ll have to carry with me from now on. I’ll have to check myself right when I wake up and 2 hours after I eat, which’ll be at work.

We ran some errands for Mary with Aly watching The Little Mermaid in her carseat and then stopped by Dollar General so I could buy some snacks, like graham crackers and Rice Crispies cereal. Mario cruelly bought some Oreo Cakesters and he and the boys ate them in front of me at Mary’s. I wanted to hit something. But I got over it. Although I do want them all to follow my menus to keep them healthy for the future, I can’t rip everything away from them =\.

I followed my menu for dinner and oh my gosh, I couldn’t finish the amount of food. The three main meals are actually really big meals–well, to me anyway. My “fruit” consisted of a third of a whole melon! I still need to ask my doc about certain foods; I’m confused about how much sugar I can actually have, because my 8 animal crackers have 7g of sugar. I wonder if that goes for everything else? As long as I follow the serving size and amount of sugar, I can eat it?

I took me three tries (and pokes) to get enough blood for a good reading on my machine. I was disappointed to find out it was still at 170 :(. I don’t want to have problems like this for the rest of my life :(. They called me a “Rare case” at the doctor’s office today. I’m, so far, one of the youngest females to develop diabetes.

I always thought I’d shrivel up and die if I got diabetes, but I’m not shriveled or dead! I’m okay. And I’m going to eat well and exercise. And hopefully the silver lining will be that I’ll lose some weight in the next coming months.

Mario and I went to sleep pretty late Saturday night (the 8th). I didn’t feel like waking up the next morning and because I still had that strange feeling about going to Mario’s Grandpa’s property I wondered if I should wake Mario up at all and just forget the whole thing. But no. I knew if I did that he’d be upset. So I got up at 9am and woke him up at 9:30. Mom stayed with the kids and we were out the door with ammunition and weapons in tow by 10:30.

We took the scenic route in Mario’s truck and saw an array of birds, like cranes and parrots. It was such a nice day, sunny and breezy. All the way over there I questioned Mario and nagged about this being a bad idea. I clearly remember his words: “When I start to worry, then you can worry, okay?” Besides, his uncles would practice there all the time.

I was nervous, but I believed Mario and started to calm down. I took pictures of the beautiful scenery before me: Mario’s grandfather’s property is right on the Rio Grande River border with Mexico. The property’s on a cliff and you can see the river below and the brushy fields of Mexico just on the other side. There’s about 10-15 feet of space between the fence of the property and the edge of the cliff.

I actually got kind of excited watching Mario shoot his handgun at the paper target he placed on the large mound of dirt, or berm. I wanted to try. He reloaded it and let me try. It was an unexpected jolt, that first shot, so I closed my eyes and Mario corrected me and told me to aim as best as I could. So I did better. We took pictures of each other and then Mario started shooting with the AR-15. It looked so awesome. Mario reloaded and handed me the rifle. It felt sort of uncomfortable and I kept changing my mind because I thought I’d dislocate my shoulder or something if the gun kicked back too hard, but I did even better with the rifle than I did with the handgun. I even hit a few targets!

Mario was on his way to reload the Glock when we see a Sullivan City police cruiser drive up in the tiny space between the fence and the cliff. My heart sinks and I shoot a look at Mario that says, “TOLD YOU SO!” He hands me the Glock and I put it on the bed of the truck. Mario was already at the fence speaking to the officers by the time I got enough courage to walk over there myself. They asked if we knew it was illegal to be shooting there. Mario said, “No, sir, I didn’t.” The first cop, who was being really aggressive, told Mario, “Oh, c’mon! You know you can’t be shooting here.” He immediately gets on his phone and we turn our attention to the other cop. He was an old co-worker of Mario’s back from his hospital days. They started catching up and then he updates Mario on what’s going on and why they’re there. Turns out they got a call from someone reporting that people were shooting into the Rio Grande River, which is illegal. Then they heard that people were exchanging fire between Mexico and the U.S. Then they heard that someone had gotten shot in the arm and was being transported to a hospital in somewhere called Santander. It was all too much to take in. They didn’t have a straight story, but what alarmed me was that someone might possibly be hurt. We were just there to practice and all of a sudden one of us may have shot someone, more than likely ME because I missed a shot. Just one freaking shot.

When the cops had walked away I whispered to Mario, “Are you worried yet?” He squeezes my shoulder and says, “No, I’m not.” I asked him what they said before I got to the fence and he said they asked if we’d heard any screaming. I thought, “WHAT? How terrible!”

They told us they’d have to hold us there for questioning and filing statements; something I never thought I’d have to do in my life. My head was spinning. I just wanted to know if I did shoot someone. Border Patrol showed up with their own AR-15’s to “back-up” the cops because they, too, were told that there was an exchange of fire. By now I was bawling and all these thoughts were going through my head like, “How much will we be fined for shooting here illegally? Did I hurt someone? What if the bullet had gone just a few inches to the right or left–I could have killed someone! Will I go to jail? Will I see my kids again?”

The cops noticed I was inconsolable and the aggressive one softened up. The one that new Mario walked up to me and said, “Ma’am, don’t get that way. You didn’t do anything wrong. It was an accident. Don’t get sad.” But still, no matter what anyone said, I couldn’t help but feel a ball of guilt in my chest.

Border Patrol left because they figured out they had nothing to do there. Everyone was getting frustrated because stories were being criss-crossed here and there and they weren’t getting anywhere. The cops were communicating with someone on the other side of the river; shouting responses and gesturing with their hands. This was around the time Jorge, Jose and Isiah got there. I turned to Mario when I heard feet crunching on branches behind me and said, “Oh no.” The last thing I needed was to be made fun of or be scolded. Neither of which ever happened. Jorge saw me crying and said, “Don’t cry, you didn’t do anything wrong. It was an accident.” Mario was being great and held me and said everything he needed to say to keep me from hyperventilating and passing out. Mario called his mom during this time to let her know what was going on. She rushed over there between one of her meetings stayed with us for moral support. Jose crossed over the fence to see what was going on and talk with the cops. We couldn’t see what was going on over the cliff, but he said they’d been shouting and gesturing to a group of men on the other side; men who were supposedly working in the fields, which later raised questions because only two of the men had hoes and the fields hadn’t been worked on in 10 years. They’re still not sure if they’re the ones who called, because whoever called, called the Sullivan City police and it wasn’t a hospital or any type of institution. Jorge and Jose were convinced that these guys were ready to cross.

About half an hour later the Sheriffs show up. We give them our details and he asks Mario, “Is she your girlfriend? Wife?” and Mario says, “Wife. 9 years.” The sherriff chuckles and says,”Happy couple? You’ve got to be after 9 years! Only a happy couple would shoot together and not at each other!” LOL. We apologized for shooting in the property. The officer said, “Who said you couldn’t shot here?” and Mario replied, “Well, the cops from Sullivan did.” The sheriff shakes his head and says, “This isn’t part of the city. This is County. You have every right to shoot here as long as you’re following the rules — which you were by shooting at the berm — and as long as you’re not shooting into the river, across the river, or towards houses.” I shook my head and tell him, “I don’t understand how I can’t hit a bull’s eye on the paper target, but I shoot the only Mexican standing on the other side of the river.” I didn’t mean it to be funny at the time, but he laughed LOL.

So we weren’t going to be fined. Now it was a matter of finding out if this guy was okay. Sobbing, I asked the sheriff if they knew if “he” was okay; that we’d even take care of hospital bills, I just wanted to know if he was okay. He, like everyone else, tells me not to cry and that so far they couldn’t identify anyone and now they’re wondering if anyone got shot at all.

We were there another hour before they heard anything else. Mary had left to her other meeting and Jorge, Jose and Isiah stayed with us. I told them they should go; it was hot and we were going to be there a while and they shouldn’t have to suffer for my mistake. They said we’re family and we stick together. Aww :*). I’m so glad they were there. They helped us relax a little and they’d joke around and we even went to the fence of the ranch next door to feed mesquite tree greens to the goats. I kept thinking about Carmen’s babyshower and how I was going to miss it. I texted her to let her know I wouldn’t be making it.

Meanwhile, the sherriffs had been making calls to every hospital in the area in Mexico and nobody had any info on anyone who’d been shot in the arm, or taken in for being shot anywhere on their body. They also started questioning the path of the bullet; it was windy, which wouldn’t affect it’s direction too much, but the area where the man was supposedly shot and the area where we were standing and shooting on the property weren’t adding up. We got cards from the sherriffs in case we needed to speak to them and the older of the two men told me again that I hadn’t done anything wrong and we could continue to practice if we liked. The younger one even told us how to create a higher, less-penetrable berm.

They stayed with us till the crime scene investigator showed up a while later. He took our info, our statements, took pictures of the crime scene (my gosh, I never thought I’d be saying that either) which was just pictures of the berm, the targets, and the casings that were littered on the ground; all the while joking with us and trying to keep us calm. He also told us we weren’t doing anything wrong and that, so far, it didn’t seem like anyone did get shot. He said I would have had to be standing on the edge of the cliff, shooting down in order to have hit anyone on the other side. He said, “This guy would have had to be the unluckiest guy in the world to get hit with a stray, one-in-a-million bullet, and I doubt yours was the millionth one.”

So I felt much better after that. They held our weapons just in case someone who’d gotten shot came forward; then they’d have to run ballistics. It’s been two weeks and we haven’t gotten them back, so I’m assuming that no news is good news.

We all went to eat at El Pato after that. We were starving. Mario and I hadn’t even had breakfast that morning and it was now 4:30pm. Now we were alright and somewhat in the clear and everyone took the opportunity to joke around. Jorge started calling me Annie Oakley, and now everyone calls me that LOL. We get home and Andy and Noelia are on their way to visit and Andy’s dubbed me Killer! By the time we’d made it home both sides of the family had somehow gotten word about our fiasco and were calling to make sure we were alright. Word really travels fast!