Sometimes, life just stinks...

It's been a tough couple days here in the life of the Catholic Librarian. Well, for me, it's simply been vicarious emotional worry and anxiety, but for my sister's family it's been much, much worse. On Monday night, an accident caused a fire to start on the outside of their house, and it quickly wrecked structural devastation. Most importantly, everybody is ok, including their cats. Unfortunately, their house is not. It's going to have to be gutted, which is going to take a considerable amount of time and money. Thank goodness, they have good homeowners insurance, and that will cover everything. But in the mean time, they have few salvageable possessions. They'll be displaced from their home for at least 6 months, and they have 2 small boys. It's been an emotional couple of days.

Thankfully, once word got out, they've been the recipients of much generosity and love. Everyone has been busy worker bees assemblying donations of toys, clothes, toiletries, and other necessities. My parents are headed there this weekend (my sister and her family live about a 5 hour drive from us) so that will help. I'm hoping to go visit them in their temporary house next month sometime. We'll get them through this one day at a time.

So, that's been on my mind, which accounts for the lack of blog posts and Twitter/Facebook updates for the past day. I'm hanging in there.

Also on Monday, I had to take Henry for his 4 year well child checkup. Mike was teaching, so I had to man the job myself, and I knew it was going to involve shots. Henry is very good about receiving shots; on the other hand, I am not. I just hate for my baby to have to experience pain.

When Henry asked me if it would hurt, I ws honest with him and told him yes, but that it would just be for a second; and in return, he wouldn't get sick with these terrible diseases that shots help us not to get. When the moment came, I hugged him in my arms while the nurse prepared his arm:

"Mommy, what's she doing? Is it going to hur...OW! OW, MOMMY!" *accusing little index finger pointed right at the nurse* "Mommy, that lady HURT-TED ME!!"

Regardless of how irrational it is, in that moment, you just want to slap the nurse, grab your baby, and race from the room. Sometimes, life is just like that.