Six Hundred Facial Tissues Later

My Dear Friends,

Here we are, six hundred tissues later… Last month was brutal I do not think there was a single day when all of us were healthy. Drippy noses, hoarse voices, coughs, fevers, enlarged lymph nodes, sore throat that woke you (me) up in the middle of the night when you (I) tried to swallow saliva, we have been through it all and I want warm weather, sun, and all of my kids in school.

Surprisingly our life here has made some tracks and follows them. Slawek goes to work, I look for work but no work is looking for me. Kids go to school pending health conditions.

As I stated at the beginning we were sick, the worst was with Helena, you know she is my  ultimate queen of middle ear infection. Sometimes she can go through it without any significant symptoms, so this time I was trying to take her symptoms easy. She had some runny nose and was a little warm-ish so I kept her at home, but since she did not improve much after a couple of days I took her to a doctor (that is another track/path I created with all my visits there) and she said that Helena is coming up with right ear infection. We have waited with antibiotics and she only took some sirup that helps with circulation in the middle ear and works as mucus thinner. Still, Helenka was not better and she ended up with antibiotic, she got the first dose and next morning she woke up with bloody discharge from he ear. Well, now I knew that in such emergency you go to the specialist emergency room. So, we did,  and another cultural shock – the laryngologist did vacuum  cleaning in her ear. I must say I was surprised because when Michał had ear infection with rupture of the membrane Foxboro practice did not send us to a specialist. In this Polish case I was seeing a specialist three times in two weeks period. Another path was done by me. Helena got better and all of the kids are attending school.

Did I tell you that Wrocław is probably the warmest part of Poland? Well, it is. Now that I am only 8-9 hours drive away from my home town I can compare how much of the difference it makes in the climate. When I have nice and warm days my folks in Lublin have about 4-5 degrees cooler weather. So, so far we have seen snowdrops in bloom and tons of crocuses yellow and violet-purple. One of the things I like in Wrocław are those crocused lawns. They look so beautiful they lift up my mood. I smile whenever I see them, and I see them a lot, my little friends. I bet my friends in California already forgotten about tulips, right? Here they are just sprouting from the soil. I love Spring’s first blooms.

Another news, I am a lucky winner in local shopping center sweepstakes. I won a pillow that, according to customer service, was worth 80 PLN. I was surprised and puzzled when I got that call. I was very intrigued what will that pillow look like, 80 PLN is about half I spend on my grocery trip to the store and my basket is quite full then. So, what kind of pillow it was? Of-course life is very simple, the pillow is rather usual, no gold threads or embellishments, just pastel blue and ivory stripes about 16×16 inches, zippered, polyester fabric. But hey, a prize is a prize. I am so happy to be a winner. I am looking forward for a bigger prize, though. The grand prize is 10,000.00 PLN and a trip with a stylist to Italy to help you blow that money on clothes, probably. So, keep your fingers crossed for me since I have never been in Italy and my wardrobe could use some style.

Slawek and I have started looking at houses, whenever one of us finds one the other finds faults in it and our mission continuous.

Well, Easter Holiday is coming and we will make another cross-country trip to see our family. I wonder how big is my grand-nephew?

Happy Easter and Spring to all of you. Stay healthy, until another time.