December
2016 Christmas Letter
Dear
Family and Friends,
Herding
Morgans is a full-time job…It is kind of like herding cats – just with less
scratching and more whining…although sometimes there is scratching!
Let me
start with myself – the herder. I do
much of my herding in a Toyota Prius.
Bob (ever the minimalist) decided we should trade in our van to be
economical and get 2 hybrid cars. My
Prius may get 50 mpg, but I usually have children stuffed in the trunk and stacked
on top of each other in the seats. So
far, my record is 9 children in the Prius!
So….10 people (and usually a dog) in a 5-passenger car…just an average Morgan
herding day. I am also still herding the
crabby-old-lady cat, the crippled-retarded cat, and Charlie the dog who feigns
obedience until he sneaks out of the house and terrorizes the neighbors by
barking at them relentlessly (while pretending not to know us as we yell and
chase him). I baked cookies for one of
our neighbors a few months back and took it to their door. When they answered, they look bewildered as I
tried to explain that I lived several houses down the street and brought them a
treat. Their English is limited and they
were trying hard to comprehend who I was…when I said, “We have the naughty dog
that barks at your disabled mother when she walks past our house with her
walker.” Sudden recognition came upon
them as their eyes widened and they began making barking motions with their
hands and laughing at me. I took solace
in the fact that at least I wasn’t known for my naughty children…whom I keep on
a short leash – something I apparently need to employ with Charlie. I am working at the Live Oak Nazarene church
as of August this year. I love working
with all the friends I know from working there before, plus it is only 10
blocks from our house! Charlie often accompanies me to church and has been dubbed,
“Charlie the Church Dog.” He loves to go
to church and eat all the crumbs the children leave behind when they have
snacks. Who needs a vacuum, get a
Charlie.
Bob…we can
always count on Bob to hold to his Nazi-Granola-Tree-Hugging ways! He still believes Monday holidays are set
aside for re-arranging the garage, that you can never have enough fiber in your
diet, and pets are from Satan. Bob has
found great joy in his Toyota Prius. He
especially likes to brag about maintaining a higher mpg average than I do. At first, I thought he was just kidding, but
one day I had to drive his car and he thoroughly warned me not to mess up his
gas mileage. The rebel that I am, I took
that to mean that I MUST mess up his gas mileage!!!! I GUNNED that car all the way to Yuba City
and back and when I was done…I had shaved off 8 miles per gallon on his
average. It’s the little pleasures that
make life worth living. Bob was not
happy…he probably drove 25 mph all the way to Sacramento to make up for it! Bob has retired from the State Department of
Education and is now the director of Special Education at Visions Charter school
in Sac. We figure there will be no true
retirement for us, we need to be employed into our 90s when our youngest should
be graduating college!
Sam (19
years old) is taking college classes locally and looking forward to starting
college in Sacramento at William Jessup University in the fall. Sam is an after-school aide at a local
Elementary school during the school year and a lifeguard in the summer. Sam’s crabby-old-retarded-lady cat died a
year ago and last January he chose another cat to be his companion. We have decided that Sam is NOT a good judge
of cats and will never again be allowed to choose another animal as a pet. His new cat is also deficient in the
brain. She doesn’t know how to meow…she
trills. She is paranoid, bi-polar, and
to top it off…she was hit by a car. She
walks with a limp and doesn’t have control of her tail…it kind of moves in
spasms. We give her morphine when she
gains too much weight because it hurts her hip.
She lays on the floor, drugged out, swatting at imaginary flies with her
tail jerking around. I’m a little
concerned when Sam begins looking for a wife…I’m thinking arranged marriage is
a better option for him. On the other
hand, I am a little jealous of the cat…MY doctor WON’T prescribe me morphine
for weight gain (which over the holidays is problematic) – but the jokin’ cat
gains an ounce and she gets to live in La La Land!
Cooper
just turned 16. She has been taking
driving lessons at school. She turned 16 in October and has yet to take the
driving test to get her license. Let me
rephrase that…I, as a responsible parent, believe the nation to be at risk if
Cooper Morgan were to receive a driving license. It AIN’T GONNA HAPPEN (spoken like a true
Nebraskan). This summer we were on
vacation for a month and I thought letting Cooper have some drive time across Nevada
would be a splendid idea. Really…no
cliffs to drive off, very little traffic, it should have been the perfect
scenario for a student driver. The first
day we gave the wheel over to her, Bob felt the need to pray for our safety
before we began. This totally freaked Alex
out…Dad never prays out loud when anyone else drives!! When Bob finished the prayer, the first words
out of Alex’s mouth were, “We are all going to DIE!” Cooper took off and about 10 seconds later a
ground squirrel ran across the road. She
inadvertently pushed the accelerator to the floor (not the brake) and swerved
across the road while SCREAMING at the top of her lungs! On any other day, there would not have been a
car on that road until the afternoon mail was being delivered…but NO…there just
happened to be an unsuspecting driver coming toward us! His eyes were as big as saucers as he was
contemplating an exit into the desert sand, when Cooper swerved back to her
side of the road. At that point, Alex
reiterated, We ARE going to DIE! I think
he said that phrase every 5 minutes for the hour that we let her drive. We approached a small town and I asked Cooper
to pull over. She had clinched her
fingers around the steering wheel so hard, her hands were locked onto the
wheel! I got into the driver’s seat and
both she and I downed Ibuprophen and gave a sigh of relief (as did Alex). I didn’t let her drive again until we were
returning home 3 weeks later, which turned out to be just as hair-raising and
gave me night mares for weeks to come. I
only let her practice when I can sneak some of the cat’s medication to help my
nerves.
Alex (10
years old) can’t get enough sports! He
loves to play and watch sports. He is so
active! I love to watch Alex play sports
and during the baseball season I even got to announce at a couple of his
games. I am one of those parents
screaming from the sidelines, cheering all the players on and embarrassing my
children. For Bob, this is almost an
unbearable cross. Bob loves sports as
much as he loves pets. It is
excruciating to watch Bob try to watch Alex play! He has the look of constipation on his
face. Alex hasn’t figured out that his
dad doesn’t like sports yet. He smiles
from the field and waves at Bob. Bob has
a dazed look on his face…he is probably trying to calculate how to put more
fiber in his homemade granola instead of keeping up with the game. Alex definitely is a “daddy’s boy,” but Bob
wishes he was into diagraming sentences rather than sports…THEN, he would be
the fanatical parent cheering if that were the case. Alex’s clothes are always dirty and torn from
playing around outside. That kid goes
through a pair of sneakers every 2 months…the expensive kind! I bought him a cheap pair once…they lasted a
week…seriously! Alex’s shoes will
literally have holes in the bottom from all the running that he does. This summer I bought a net for him to
practice pitching into and set it up by our back fence. The first day, he threw the ball so hard it
hit the fence and broke 4 planks out! We
moved it to the street and he broke 2 more planks out of the neighbor’s fence
that were 20 feet behind the net! My
front window took a ball and has a lovely crack in it. Now that I think about it, I have always
wondered how my car’s windshield got broken?!
I also think there are a few dents in the hood and top of my car that
haven’t been explained either…hmmm.
Nathaniel
just turned 8 and wanted cheesecake for his birthday cake! What child wants that? Nathaniel plays sports only because Alex
does. He doesn’t want to be left
out. He actually is good at sports, but
doesn’t have the drive and passion that Alex does. He would rather play games on his
tablet! Alex wakes up and goes outside
to shoot baskets, while Nathaniel wakes up and wants to snuggle on the couch
with his Wii control. Nathaniel thinks
of Sam as his 2nd dad.
Nathaniel loves Sam and they BOTH love Legos…the two of them will play
for hours. I can’t tell you how sick I
am of finding Legos everywhere! And the
pieces get smaller and smaller with each kit!
Walking barefoot across the floor has nearly crippled me…why does that
stupid cat get all the good drugs!!!??? Stepping on Legos can seriously be used
as a military torture treatment to gain information from enemies! Water boarding would seem like a dunk in the
pool comparatively. Nathaniel has
another passion besides Legos…Whining. Nathaniel
has learned to whine from the best of them…Cooper and he has taken it to a new
level. If there was a competition, I’m sure Nathaniel would get a prize! He has mastered the art of whining so
proficiently that even an ordinary sentence can be made to sound like a Winning
Whine from Nathaniel. I thought if I
imitated him, he would hear what he sounds like and perhaps stop…NO…he just
whined because I imitated him and it hurt his feelings! Nathaniel tends to have his feeling hurt quite
often. His feelings are hurt if you look
at him, if you touch him, if you speak, if you breathe, if you blink… Everything hurts his feelings…and then he
whines. Nathaniel can be very funny and
loving…those are the times we cherish.
This summer my niece’s husband introduced us to the phrases, “Whiners
get Shiners” and “Snitches get Stiches”.
I started to say them to Nathaniel whenever he whined or was a tattle
tale. He just whined more. I think I need to find a local chapter of
Whiners Anonymous for him. We had been
hoping he would grow out of it, but I believe he is officially addicted.
I hope you
have a Christmas filled with Hope, Joy, Peace, and Love.
Merry
Christmas!
Marcy
Morgan
As well as:
Bob, Sam, Cooper, Alexander, Nathaniel, Charlie, Tasha and Bell.
The
pictures of the family were taken last summer in Wyoming at the Morgan family
reunion.
*Charlie’s pic is obviously when he is
begging for pizza (his favorite food) – he has those “puppy eyes” down to a
science!
*Tasha likes to lie in the baskets…don’t
try to make her get out…she will bite!
*Bell’s usual look of angry-annoyance…I
think she looks a lot like Toothless from the movie, “How to Train Your Dragon”…it’s
the ears, eyes, and shape of head.
