some people scare me

don't get me wrong, i love my job. hanging out with kids all day can be really fun and rewarding. but sometimes dealing with their parents is a downright nightmare. yesterday i cleaned this little boy's teeth, who was 6 years old. he had 3 cavities in 3 baby teeth, which were obvious on his xrays. the teeth would not fall out until he was around 11 years old. and his mother was adamant about NOT getting fillings in them and just leaving them. in her mind since they would fall out anyways it was a waste of money. she flat out asked me what would happen if she did just that. with the picture of this huge cavity staring at her in the face, i explained that over the next 5 years, the cavity will continue to get larger, move into the nerve of the tooth, cause an abscess infection, thus causing a tooth ache for her child and the tooth would most likely need to be pulled. then he would probably need a space maintainer so there would be room for his adult tooth to eventually come in, all of this costing much much more than a simple filling. after explaining this she had the balls to tell the front desk that i was ridiculous and just trying to scare her so she would spend the money. and she thought is was great that she waited till november to schedule this appointment and said "we'll see how big it is then" like a smart ass. how ignorant can you be?? i know this is terrible, but i hope that he gets an abscess just so she can feel like the loser she really is. i would hate for her son to go through that but all of her self righteous bull crap was completely uncalled for. people are so stupid.

bob marley inspiration gets me through my run

(the road of life is rocky and you may stumble too...)

climbing my hill of self esteem

wanting to give up, give in

to my own guilt

i hear your voice in my ears

(don't let them change ya, OH! or even rearrange ya! oh no!)

my heart pounding in my chest

i cant seem to catch my breath

but i keep running with your words,

they keep me from myself,

keep me from giving in

(could you be - could you be loved and be loved?)

late night rambling when i should be in bed...

i definitely had fun with sandy, eric and maegan. but the visit was much too short. caleb is adorable and definitely a johnson kid to say the least. he of course did not think twice about warming up to his "aunt em" and he was super excited about the porche for some reason, perhaps he thought it was a gigantic matchbox car. i will be spending more time with that kid and cannot wait to see him grow.

i cant believe another summer is almost over. we have the long labor day weekend and i am sure it will fly by. its our last weekend in the apartment and i will miss it for sure. i am getting anxious for the fall. i like the fall. i love the weather, the colors and knowing the holidays are coming. but i really don't like the following months after, but lets not talk about that....

it is now time for me to really start planning the wedding again. i put it on the wayside since we bought the house and had the million other weddings this year. plus when i started having dreams that my guest list was over 300 because mom kept adding to it, or when i was all dressed up in a dress and there was no one to take me to the wedding, or the best one where there was magically no caterer for the 300 + people. yeah, when i started having those dreams i figured it wouldn't hurt to stop thinking about it for a while. well, that break is over. so, on with the plans, and bring on the nightmares. luckily none of them involved billy and the fact i am marrying him, i think that's a good sign....

a half hour + an eliptical + iron maiden = 1 sweaty emily

holy crap i am sweating my arse off right now and it feels AWESOME....

i am totally "gearing" out right now and getting pumped for tomorrow. sandy is home for one night and eric, meagan and little caleb are here too!!! caleb is eric and meagan's little guy and he was born a year ago on my birthday, may 11th. i have yet to meet this little mini me of eric's and i cannot wait to see him!!

remembering a friend

when the summer heat dies down

and fall begins to settle in

the cool, crisp air always

brings me to you, friend

smiling that smile, that smile no one
else could posses
and singing random songs
i miss that the most
i must confess

you knew your demons well,
knew the weight of your affliction
knew it was a matter of time when
it was all lost to your addiction

i know you are somewhere better,
somewhere where you are free
free of that ball and chain
you told me so
all in a dream

so now i will just remember you
as a friend with a smile of which
no one else will ever posses
and i will smile for your memory
for it will never digress

i come to the garden alone, while the dew is still on the roses.....

unfortunately this weekend was cut short. we arrived in clayton friday afternoon, ready to take on anything the weekend gave us. then i got sick with billy's bug that he had last week. so we drove home today. but we did stop by mom's to raid the garden. while i was picking my green tomatoes for fried green tomatoes, billy was playing photographer....

billy found a birds nest with a baby in it in a maple mom and george had planted. he took some pics of it, that did not really come out well. but this was obviously the momma bird because she was going crazy. she kept flying by with food in her mouth for the baby, as the baby is screaming because it was hungry, but i guess because we were near by she was not wanting to go to the nest.... the karpel community garden.....they have EVERYTHING, red onions, purple onions, beets, hot peppers, green peppers, cucumbers, squash, pumpkins, asparagus, tomatoes, potatoes, carrots, it goes on and on. and even things that they didn't plant, such as a lone sunflower...hmmmm....

the watchdog of the garden, willie
the gardener, george!

the harvest!! green tomatoes, cherry tomatoes, new potatoes and peaches (obviously not from the garden)

seriously, mom and george should set up a vegetable stand and rake in some profit!!!!

weekend update with dan akroyd and jane curtain......

finally the work week is over and we have a four day weekend to enjoy. the weather does not look very promising but we will find ways to still have fun, i am sure. saturday night joe's band is playing in clayton and i am looking forward to that since i have not seen them all summer. they are a definite wedding band top choice. well, the only choice.
this weekend is all about no plans for me. to just do whatever floats our way. more fun seems to be had when you don't plan on having any fun in the first place. that seems to be the motto of the summer. we will see. i just need to remember to pack the camera!!!

abracadabra, i'm gonna reach out and grab ya!

so i made it to the parkway today and walked for roughly 30 minutes, which is a good start. it was nice there, it is right on onondaga lake. and there was a storm on the other side so it made for a good view. i find myself looking at things with taking a picture in mind. a flock(?) of geese flew right over my head, and i thought what a great picture. or the ultimate was saturday. i was in mom's garden and a blue heron (my ultimate photo wish) flew right over me and it was the closest EVER. but i had forgotten my camera in syracuse! DRAT!!

as i feel my arse widen..........

this was a very blah weekend. billy was really sick and slept for probably 3 days collectively. i was even able to make him take vitamins, which is a victory in itself since he won't take anything for anything. i spent the majority of the weekend sitting on my but going back and forth from the internet to the computer. although we did walk 2 blocks and got coffee this morning. i feel like i am in a rut. i can envision myself all up and running marathons, or maybe even just walking. but DOING it seems to be difficult. i did get on my dusty elliptical yesterday. i feel very uninspired. but just a few minutes ago i read this little story in my oprah mag (yes i LIKE oprah)

"Not to Look Away"
By Marie Howe
"Ten minutes into my friend Jason's funeral, the rabbi's cell phone started ringing. Jason would have told that joke a thousand times. But his body lay in the coffin, and now we tell the joke. Is this what a story can do? Emerge from the most painful event and transform it into something else, too? So sad. So funny. Both. And life is there, for a moment, almost adequately represented. I'm looking for the gate, Jason used to say when he was in pain. I can't find the gate, but I'm looking. What was this gate my friend Jason was looking for? Maybe he wanted to find the door in the room of suffering, so that he might walk through it into another story. If my being in pain would relieve someone else, Jason said, then I would bear it gladly. I want to be present, he used to say. That's all we can be, he would say, present—and kind. How difficult it is to be present. A few weeks ago, in one of those drooling late-night states trolling through the e-mails, exhausted, depleted, clicking through the Internet, I clicked on a line on the AOL home page that promised to show me Angelina Jolie's split leather pants. Before the page materialized, I turned the computer off and put my head in my hands. And in the sudden quiet of the dark apartment—the blue screen extinguished, the radiator hissing, my 8-year-old sleeping—I noticed death and life sitting quietly beside me, waiting for my attention. Jason's death and my own. Oh who wouldn't want to look away? The cell phone rings, another American Idol is belting it out, the war is on, and the glittering Web sparkles like the Milky Way in a box—promising that if I keep clicking and clicking, I might finally get to what I long for, to the message, the rug, the T-shirt. I will move beyond suffering and beyond time, beyond the limits of my money and my story and life. But that place? It's not there—it's virtual—it's nowhere. The days and nights of my life walk by, arm in arm with time, and the gate to the new story stands just outside the circle of my attention. Sometimes I lie here, Jason said, and walk through the old house of my childhood, through all the rooms, and look out all the windows. This might be the most difficult task for us in postmodern life: not to look away from what is actually happening. To put down the iPod and the e-mail and the phone. To look long enough so that we can look through it—like a window. Jason looked up one day last week and said, This is unendurable. Then he said, I like that black sweater. How do we learn this kind of attention? A lot of his friends were with Jason during his life and the last three years of his illness. Everyone has stories. Lucie told us this one. She picked up Jason from the hospital and drove all night to get to Provincetown; he wanted to go there for maybe the last time. Walking slowly through the fog on the beach in the very early morning she said, We will always remember this day. And Jason, who was pretty well practiced by then, said, I am remembering it now.
Marie Howe lives in New York City. She has published three books of poems: The Good Thief, What The Living Do, and, most recently, The Kingdom of Ordinary Time. "

it was really ironic due to the fact that while halfway through, my aol email alert went off, as if i was going to miss something. lately i feel that my life is being ran by technology. if i could just stay away from this awful computer for at least an hour a night and do something productive with myself then i think i am off to a better quality of life than what i am at now. this will start tomorrow....(famous last words)

my dreams are my memories

my dreams are my memories

of days from the past

they arise so vividly

but never seem to last

i dream about those places

of where i now cannot go

and the people whose

faces will never again show

my dreams are a vacation

to the destinations that are lost

from changing tides and passing time

these memories are forever embossed

just a little note.....

for all you locals that actually read this - if you are interested in checking out my photography items that i am selling stop into coldwell banker and see my mom or aunt sally and have a look. or it will also be at the clipper this weekend. any feedback is awesome.

some straggler pictures from the wedding

since i did not bring my camera to sarah's wedding i have been getting pictures from other people. these 3 are from carly. the first two are from about 5 minutes before the big ceremony and the last one is from about 3 hours after. i think the difference is quite clear!