Did you think the house ate us?

Red, with a hat on.

Well, it almost did. After two full weeks of chipping, filling, sanding, and painting and painting and painting and re-painting the trim since the original color really did look like baby-puke, believe me, I’ve seen baby puke recently, the bedroom is finally finished! When Stephan got home from work we trekked out to the garage and brought in the dressers. That was made especially exciting since it was pitch dark, and the yard is full of pot holes.

Next is the bathroom paint, which should go fairly quickly, if we both agree that purple is the way to go in that room.

Stephan has been working his butt off, almost literally. Last week his only day off was Thursday, and now this week his only day off is Wednesday. That’s a touch schedule for anyone, but he works from 5:30am to 7:30pm or later. Recently he’s admitted that there isn’t time for him to eat anything during the day. I’m having an IV put in him tomorrow so he can just take straight glucose into his bloodstream. He still does like the job, and especially the people, but he’s tired, and overworked, and tired.

I had a great day on Saturday at a Spirit of Women event. It’s a group sponsored by the hospital that educates women about their health, and has a ton of fun. I met a few dozen women, got 23 of them on the chair, and gave away a 60-minute massage as a door prize. Everyone was so kind and friendly, as if we’d known each other for years. AND I got to hear a lot of town gossip. I’m really excited to start taking clients. I got a phone call this morning that my LLC paperwork is ready to be signed- that’s exciting too! We still don’t have internet access at home, which is a lot less exciting, but they say sometime next week the guy will be over to hook it up.

The dogs are good. Besa is green on her right side, from deciding to lean against the wall and slide down it to get comfortable. And just today I saw that Red has orange wiskers. I can only imagine.

Trivia: (kind of) What are the answers to the following: “Never marry a parts man because________.” “Never marry a nurse because ____________.” “Never marry a teacher because ______________.”

The Farm

It's true that a large part of Montana smells like cows and farms. Most of the people we meet here are involved in some way in the farming or ranching business. Our visit to Cindy and Larry's farm on Saturday was amazing. We met a herding dog, which wasn't really trained, he just knew how to help seperate and herd them. We saw, of course, the new calves and their heiffer moms (heiffer means a cow who is giving birth for the first time). There were peacocks roaming around, chickens walking to and fro, and about two dozen barn cats (that we didn't see but just heard about). Oh, and the horses. There were horses there that are actually used to herd cattle. Larry is really a cowboy. He rides "Red" his horse around to check on the cows. Some people have lambs, which, I'm told, usually have twins. It's where the phrase, "the third lamb" comes from. You know that phrase, don't you? No? I didn't either.

Of course there were the turkeys from the other day- we see antelope all the time as well as deer. I haven't yet seen any squirrels. I don't know if we have them here. We do have rattle snakes apparently, and they tell me to just make sure I don't stick my hands where I can't see, and wear shoes every time I go outside.

Larry offered to show Stephan how to break horses, since he has a few that need breaking. I'm nervous about that, but Stephan can't wait. Life on the farm promises to be really interesting. More photos will be on their way, I'm sure!

Trivia: How many seconds do we have to hold the lever down on our toilet before it flushes?

Early Thanksgiving

I did take this photo, out the back door of our house.

I took a long drive into Miles City yesterday to pick up more things that you can't find in Baker: tofu, internet router, cordless phones, chili powder, etc. It was neat to make the drive by myself. I really enjoyed the scenery, the quiet. On the way back I saw, seriously, about two dozen wild turkeys crossing the road. Like, big turkeys. Like, the ones you normally find naked at the Jewel. But these had feathers, and were slowly making their way across highway 12. I wanted to get my camera, but I knew they'd be gone by the time I got it out.

So yeah, we have turkeys here.

Stephan and I talked again about how he likes his job. He told me the great thing is the variety. He can have the spontaneaty of an emergency, then see the patient through their hospital care, and see them discharged. He said he's seen people heal from amazing things, pull through when he thought they were done. He's learning about every medical disapline, from very creative and brilliant health care practitioners.

He's tired, of course, from waking up at 4:30am three days in a row, and working until 6pm... or 9pm, whichever. There's very little sitting down now that he's the floor nurse. In fact, he often doesn't get to eat lunch (or supper as they call it here) until after 3pm. And even then, he eats standing up, or filling out paperwork. There's lots of paperwork in his job. They don't have computerized charting here (I don't know what that means really).

Check out the Flickr site for photos of the house, the ranch experience, and the dogs.

In Plevna, which is in Montana, where there are no phones and nothing grows

Here is the outhouse. I'm in a rush today to get out to Miles City to get a router so I can get internet in the house. Whew! Well, my cell phone doesn't work at all in the house, and Stephan's is pretty good, but he left it at the hospital last night. I promise to upload the new cow photos tomorrow. Tonight and tomorrow look like more painting, more moving furniture, and more cleaning!

As I saw on another website as an expression of happiness: woot.

Busy Weekend

Sorry that I left you hanging! We were so busy it was hard to fit in updates.

Friday: Off to the hospital to watch the fax machine and wait for the last piece of paper to send off his application for the NELRP scholarship. Bringing the final package with all the documentation and the Montana license number to the post office I was giddy. All that work and worry, and all of the sudden it was out of my hands. What a miracle. We later made a list of miracles that happened to help us along the way here. It's a very long list. Travis and Stephanie won the "Best Friends of the Week" award when we received Lou-2-Go Chicago Pizza in the mail! I was so excited I wanted to thaw them right away, but we decided to be patient and wait for them to defrost in the fridge... Off to the house to continue the plaster wall repair. It was a long day, with cabinet varnishing thrown in for good measure. Dinner at the Plevna Bar, and more work!

Saturday:Started at Cindy and Larry's farm where I fed a bottle to a newborn calf. I held a 3-month old baby boy for a while, while Stephan learned how to break a horse from Larry. I'm sure we'll be back there soon to learn more about life on the farm. Look for photos soon. More home repair, and our first dinner in our home, the wonderful pizza from the Harrisons!! We left that night to spend one more night at the Prince's.

Sunday:Packed up the rest of our stuff out of the Baker garage, painted the bedroom, and put together our IKEA bed. It was much easier this the second time. We slept there last night, and Stephan got up to work at 4:30 this morning. I'm putting together some promotional materials today, and finishing up some trim painting this afternoon. We don't have internet access at the Plevna house yet, so please be patient with updates for the next few days.

Since prayers and good thoughts worked so well for us the last few weeks, we'd like to ask people to turn their thoughts to our friends and family members who are having a hard time right now.

The Hero's Journey

(I did not take this photo)

I read Joseph Campbell's "Hero with a Thousand Faces" last summer, and it really made an impression on me. It helped to know that inherent in every epic journey is a moment when you doubt yourself, your plan, and your decisions. Everything can be going along just fine when, out of nowhere, you start wondering what on Earth you're doing.

When that happened to me this afternoon I got in the car and just started driving. Josh Groban was playing on the CD player (because the only radio station in town plays AC/DC 24 hours a day, and I just wasn't in the mood). Stephan was at work, so I adventured down Rt. 7 to Medicine Rocks again. The sun was just starting to set and I thought I would like to see what the sunset is like out there. Here's what I learned: Montana is an amazing place for a lighting designer to live.

I rounded up a hill and, as "Jesu, Joy of Man's Desiring" started to play, the sun hit me full in the face. Everything around me was in shadow, silhouetted against I sky that, I swear, was lit on fire. It was as though the biggest campfire in the world was raging just over the next hill, and all I could see of it was one lick of bright flame. All around me were the oddly shaped monoliths of rock, towering over the little dirt drive. I could see the valley below for about 20 miles. The clouds were red-hot, and the steel blue of the sky just barely managed to keep them from bursting into flames.

Have I made the right decisions? Not always. But deciding to share my life with someone, moving to Montana, adopting two dogs, and following my wildest dreams... definitely on my list of good ones.

Stephan's First Day...

As a nurse by himself on the floor! Since the Montana license came through yesterday, he was able to go out on his own today with no supervision. Here's what he has to say about his first official day as a nurse....

Ouch! I wish the words were coming to me, but after a whirlwind 14 hours, I'm fried. I had 8 patients today...all day. For some reason, two got parked in the ER. Luckily, no other ERs came in today...cuz we only got two beds in the ER. Anyways, everyone was very helpful and I was only about a step behind all day. I made some mistakes, but in the immortal words of my dear old dad..."not bad for a rookie." I got lots to learn, and I look forward to the day when the learning curve isn't quite so steep, but I've found a good place to learn with good people. The variety of patients and conditions is a challenge too. Today I helped take care of a person w/heart palpitations, another suffering from seizures, two people w/emphysema, one patient w/terminal MS, one w/a bum gall bladder, and a patient w/possible brain swelling. Needless to say, I'm looking up a lot of drugs, asking a lot of questions, and wearing out the soles of my shoes.
I gotta get to bed so I can try again tomorrow.

There are other funny stories he's not telling you because he only types with two fingers and we don't have all night. We got the Illinois license in the mail this morning, and are slowly making progress on the scholarship application. It's something I didn't even imagine would be a possibility this time last week. We're sending thank you cards to the people at both the Montana and Illinois licensing boards who helped get this all done. We don't live in our house yet- maybe this weekend!