Seafood Headache?

As I entered Publix on Tuesday, I was hit with the stench of seafood. Raw seafood...ugh...then a massive headache gripped my head. That lasted for quite a while, most of the day, in fact.

I have tasted shrimp, calamari, crab, lobster, and many other seafood dishes and cared for none of them. I refuse to try oysters! I allowed my father to feed oysters to my younger daughter, but I had to leave the kitchen. The sight and smell were overwhelming.

My father loved to feed my babies. He would get a child dressed in Sunday clothes and feed the child with no bib. After years of my loudly complaining to him, he finally would tell me to get the kid undressed so he could feed the baby. A loved the oysters.

Considering my aversion to seafood and the horrid headache, I now wonder if I have an allergy to seafood. That will be a question for my allergist when I visit him next month.

But, in the meantime, does a seafood allergy manifest itself in a headache from the smell of seafood?

Okay, as soon as I hit "PUBLISH," I called my allergist. "Yes, indeed it can." So, I am being tested for seafood next appointment.

Do you have a seafood allergy that presents as a headache?

Daddy

I look like him.

Ooops, I meant to post this Sunday!

I watched him create with his hands all my life. I watched him build our house--twice. He could use nothing and make something useful and valuable to our family. It seems like anything we needed, he could make. Any repairs to the house or car were done by him. Of course, he did use new materials, but it seemed he got deals or bartered for so many items.


Plus, others sought to buy what he made. He was a contractor who had work lined up for months because he took pride in his work. Wallpaper hanging was his business, but sheet rock work came along with that.

Whatever he did, he recounted to my mother in excruciating detail how he did what he did and why he did not do another thing. Often, he explained what he tried that did not work. Of course, I probably heard about 90% of these conversations since there were no electronic time wasters in our lives. He finally relented and purchased a TV when I was eight. Three days later, he took it back because he could not read while it was on. Too much racket." When I was fourteen, for some reason he did buy another. At any rate, it was not on much when he was around. So, when I was not reading, I was soaking up problem-solving skills. Mostly, I learned that problems could be solved.

He made many toys for us. We still have some of them to this day. I loved to go out and watch him make anything in the yard or in his shop. I still love to watch anything being made by hand.

Every night after he ate dinner, he took an hour or less nap and went out to his workshop and worked for several hours. He had an indefatigable spirit that only faded as he developed the later stages of cancer. Even through the emphysema that preceded the cancer, he did not slow down.

He often helped people who could not afford to have work done--plumbing, roofing. Usually, these were older women who had little means to pay for work. He stopped to help strangers on the road all the time. Those were less dangerous times back then.

He had no time for TV. When he stayed indoors, he read voraciously. He read everyday for at least an hour. Heaven help the person who interrupted him.

I learned some very good habits from him.  I learned some very bad habits to avoid along the way. And, I did avoid those habits.

Your turn
Were you priviliged to watch your father work around the house or in his shop? Or, is there anything about your father that stands out?
  

 

My Father's Birthday

In his mid twenties

My father was a great influence in creating my parsimonious, creative nature. I watched him create things all my life. He took me to the site where he was building our house with the help of family.

 Mama packed me my own little lunch. I was so proud to go alone with Daddy "to work." I promised to mind.

The very first time I went, Daddy told me exactly where to sit and play and brought me blocks of wood, small ones from the ends of 2x4s. I ventured close to the house to get blocks of wood, dropping from the roof as some guy cut them and let them drop.

I knew enough at four not to go when the blocks were falling. But, I did not mind and sit in one place. I knew what I was doing! I ran over, bent to gather the pieces of wood. The guy hammering on the side of the house finished hammering and let the hammer drop by his side as he held it....right onto the top of my head.

I must have screamed for an hour. Daddy came running. All the guys came running. Neighbor women came running. I never got to go back again.

He made toys, swings, furniture, doll furniture, trunks for my sister, mother and me. He repaired anything that needed to be repaired. He could figure out almost anything with substitutions. He lived through the Depression, so it was a way of life, a way of survival when there was no money. However, the generations before and after worked with their hands. I have a cousin who is some sort of engineer that works with glass in buildings, not the windows, but structural parts make of glass. That is not exactly hands-on work, I suppose. Others have been brick masons, cabinet-makers. Often, they went beyond the apprentice bit and got degrees in their field.

Oh, it was through his love of words, crossword puzzles, and reading constantly that I learned to love words.  I don't just love words, I love the itty bitty parts of words. Phonemes are like atoms....the smallest part of a word that still has meaning. That is how crazy in love with words I am...lol. Yes, I should have finished the degree in Linguistics.

He was far, far, far from being a perfect or even good father, but he gave me words and creativity. Oh, yeah, I was the only brunette born into a family of platinum blond siblings.

Daddy was born in 1915, died in 1990 at the age of 75, and would have been have been 96 today.