Skipping and choosing rhymes remembered

I’ve been feeling ill so to cheer myself up I decided to recall the nonsense I used to jump rope to. Please feel free to share some of your own.

Skipping tunes

I don’t recall any special moves for this one.

Sailor, sailor do your duty
Here comes Miss American beauty.
She wiggles; who wobbles; she does the splits.
She wears her dresses clear up to her hips.

This one began by jumping on one leg, then two, then touching a hand to the ground, and then two. I think it went on from there, but I don’t recall how.

Donald Duck was a one legged, one legged, one legged duck.
Donald Duck was a two legged, two legged, two legged duck.
Donald Duck was a three legged, three legged, three legged duck.
Donald Duck was a four legged, four legged, four legged duck.

Clapping games

HabMoo does not like it when I sing this one all the way through. But sometimes the need just strikes and I have to obey the call. (These lines probably don’t even really go together except in my head.)

My boyfriend’s name is Tony.
He comes from the land of Baloney.
With 23 toes and a pickle for a nose.
This is how my story goes.

One night while I was walking
I saw my boyfriend talking
to a cute little girl with a strawberry curl
and this is what he said, said, said.

I L-O-V-E love you.
I K-I-S-S kiss you.
I K-I-S-S kiss you on your
F-A-C-E face face face.

My mother sent me to the store.
She told me not to stay.
But I fell in love with the grocery boy
and stayed ’til Christmas day, day, day.

My mother wanted peaches;
my mother wanted pears;
my boyfriend wanted 50 cents
and kissed me on the stair, stairs, stairs.

I gave him back his peaches;
I gave  him back his pears;
I gave him back his 50 cents
and kicked him down the stairs, stairs, stairs.

Then there was this one where we competed to see what kind of crazy descriptions and accompanying hand gestures we could come up with.

Have you ever, ever, ever in your short legged life
Seen a short legged turtle and his short legged wife?
No I’ve never, ever, ever in my short legged life
Seen a short legged turtle and his short legged wife.

Have you ever, ever, ever in your snot nosed life
Seen a snot nosed turtle, and his snot nosed wife?
No I’ve never, ever, ever in my snot nosed life
Seen a snot nosed turtle, and his snot nosed wife.

… long-legged; google-eyed, greasy-hair, etc.

Counting rhymes

Engine, engine number nine
going down Chicago line.
If the train goes off the track?
Do you want your money back?
Y-E-S spells yes and you are not it.

Everyone always wanted their money back.

Bubble gum, bubble gum in a dish.
How many pieces do you wish?

Count out the number and that person is it, or if you don’t like that result, add “My  mother told me to pick the very best one. And you are not it.”

Veteran’s Day

My husband, father, brother, and uncles all served in the military. Yet it’s hard for me to identify much with Veteran’s Day. Hab Moo has the day off and that’s all the celebrating we’re doing. I don’t recall anyone in the family making a big deal of it. The holiday has always seemed like a day just for old men who missed their identity as soldiers.

It should amount to more. Serving in the military isn’t anything I’d want to do, but nations do need defensive and offensive capabilities. So I’m glad someone is willing to do it. Probably the best way to celebrate the day is to give quick, reliable and friendly service to all those so used to waiting around, and getting one set of direction to be replaced by a new set to be replaced again by yet another set of orders. And soldiers are always willing to accept a thank you for their service.

I’m having a hard time writing this post. I have conflicted feelings about the military. I hate the fact that it jerks my husband around. I hate the fact that they require him to be away from home so often. But I’m glad they have separation pay. And they are making my lack of full-time employment a lot easier on us. I like watching friends and family talk to Hab Moo about his experiences. It’s great that people buy him lunch every so often when he’s in uniform. But it’s still uncomfortable somehow.

I think I may have picked up some of my father’s messed up emotions about serving in WWII. He didn’t talk much about it, but when he was dying he talked about how he still resented not getting a promised promotion. I think he was proud of the work he did and he believed in what he was doing. He also lost companions, missed out on time with two kids and a wife, and endured a lot of physical discomfort. I think he just wanted to put it all behind him. I knew not to ask him much about his experiences.

Then my husband goes to war and we chat online every day and he suffers through sitting around and from a short-term lack of onion rings. I know that in other wars, some soldiers served their time away from the front lines and danger, but those stories never got told in books or film so it’s as if they didn’t exist. I feel like there’s no real story for soldiers today. The wars are too complicated or maybe the stories can’t be told until the conflicts are over or resolved somehow. Except for getting married two days before Hab Hoo left for his deployment, I don’t feel like we have any real story either.

I don’t even feel like the nation knows that their are men and women serving overseas. Maybe it’s because I’m in Minnesota, far from any large bases. I only know a small handful of others with loved ones serving. No one is growing a victory garden. Very few people are protesting. It’s like soldiers are custodians that are easily ignored. It’s not pleasant to think about the person who is going to clean the toilet you just used and it’s not pleasant to think of the person in Afghanistan trying to clean up that mess either.

The only times I’ve really seen veterans honored has been at pow-wows and rodeos. Then I have to fight back tears.

At all other times I’d rather not pay attention even though I know several people currently in Iraq or who have had at least one deployment. I’d rather talk with them about their cars than about their service. It’s awkward. If they weren’t in the shit then what is there to talk about. And if they were in the shit, then that’s too uncomfortable to talk about.

So I guess I’ll end by just saying that I do appreciate soldier’s service. And I appreciate what those left at home go through. I have no clue what it’s like to lose a loved one to a recent war or conflict, but I do grieve for such loses until the point I think about the soldiers I know and then I rush away from that grief.

I think I will refrain from apologizing for celebrating by doing nothing more than going to a Veteran’s Day sale. I mean that’s partially why we fight, right? To keep the American way of life and what’s more American than shopping at a chain store? Soldiers fight for those who are oblivious as well as for those who are actively engaged.

One more thing, though. I’m linking to an article written by a Gold Star Mother who challenges us all to pay more attention and take real action on this day: Veterans Day: Not for Sale. You should pay more attention to her than to this confused woman.

Today with Mom

Mom understands that today is today. That is about the extent of her current concept of time.

It began months ago—even before her recent heart attacks—when she called me at 12:30 at night. She was ready for her doctor’s appointment and wondered where I was. And why it was so dark outside. She asked others if they had noticed how dark it was that day.

This confusion progressed to the point where every time she got up from her bed, even if she had lain down only for a few minutes, she thought she should get dressed and have breakfast. This would be fine since breakfast is her favorite meal, if only people would give her cereal instead of insisting that she have soup, a sandwich or a casserole.

I don’t notice her fixatation on breakfast any longer. Perhaps getting out of bed is no longer any sort of cue.

She’s been very upset with my recent comments about how it’s going to keep getting colder outside. She thinks summer is coming. She told me she was sure that summer followed fall. She’s confused that her daughter and granddaughter aren’t busy putting in a garden. She knows that Thanksgiving and Christmas are coming soon, but not that those holidays arrive in winter. Today I asked her what the four seasons are and she could only name fall and summer, so I can see why winter is so frustrating for her.

She’s also convinced that her birthday is coming up and she’ll be either 92 or 93. She isn’t sure about the age. Her birthday is in April and she’ll be 89. But since she’s believed for several years that she’ll live to age 92, I never correct her unless we’re with a doctor who might need to know the truth. She’s quite pleased with herself for being 92 and I’m pleased for her, too. I hope she makes it to that age in my reality.

It’s been great for me that her sense of time is gone. Only a couple of weeks after I moved her into assisted living I asked her how she was getting along there. She acted surprised and reminded me that she’s been there for months. She will talk about things that happened there last year. Sometimes those things are happenings from 2 years ago or 10 years ago. So I have no guilt about the move because she adapted to the change immediately, if not before then.

She seems to know that she was born in Illinois and moved to Minnesota. She rarely remembers living in Florida, but often remembers living in Texas. She knows that she loved it there. She just can’t place it in any time frame. Usually she talks about things that happened during that time as having happened in Illinois which she left in 1973.

Distance is also confusing. The dining room and front door are downstairs in her mind even though her building is all on one floor. She knows that she once lived in Maple Plain. She still lives in Maple Plain but feels that she’s a long way away from her former home.

I’m thankful that she still puts her clothes on in proper order (as far as I know.)

What’s really strange is that she can’t remember my husband’s name most of the time, but she knows that he’s leaving soon to go to Georgia. Maybe she just thinks he’s always leaving. (That’s pretty much true. He seems to be training somewhere every year.)

All this confusion about time and space doesn’t seem to bother her much. I can’t imagine just accepting it or being able to function. It’s a terrifying concept for me, but it just seems puzzling for Mom.

My last observation from today’s visit is that while Mom is really an angel, her toenails would better suit a demon. I think I’m going to hire someone to trim them. Maybe a farrier.