Steve Fredette
2007 was not our best year, though it certainly began with high hopes.
January was nice as we returned from the holidays and went to Boston to spend Arisia with Jackie's friend Pete. It was an awfully fun weekend!
The year began with us being very busy marketing and meeting with clients for our business, with huge plans for our garden and literally hundreds of seedlings planted all over the house with many moved into our new hoophouse, the fun of a new project: building the ultimate kitchen cabinet and a deep interest in all the special features on the full Lord of the Rings trilogy.
Then we had a wonderful Easter visit from Steve's sister Monique, his Aunt Elaine and our nephews, Alex and Joey. Alex and Joey really liked Uncle Steve's drums. We had a blast watching the boys nearly trip over the eggs as they were a bit young to understand why we had eggs all over the lawn!
In May, we decided that since the business wasn't taking off, Steve would go back to truck driving while Jackie took a few months to finish up with current customers and getting the garden in.
Before we put this plan into action, Jackie began having heartburn off-and-on for about a week. Since she hadn't had heartburn since pregnant 24 years ago, Steve worried and insisted we go to the emergency room where they did an EKG, blood work, and patted us on the head and sent us on our way with some antacids.
A few nights later, there was a lot of pain and vomitting throughout the night and this time when we returned to the ER, they transported Jackie to another hospital for an emergency angioplasty. They were unable to clear the blockage, so a bypass was scheduled for the first week of June.
Steve stayed home with Jackie the first few months afterwards as she was unable to even get in-and-out of bed, let alone shower, get up-and-down stairs, and do things like grocery shopping and cook for herself. Then he returned to driving at Transport America.
Things were quite tough for a while as we were pretty broke and now had a bunch of medications to pay for without insurance. We managed to keep body and soul together via savings and a lot of help from friends and family, especially Ron and Monique who lent us a credit card, our landlord who lent us a vehicle and told us not to worry about the rent for a while, and a distant relative of Steve's who died and left us a small inheritance with which we were able to pay everyone back.
There was much sad news in the months following Jackie's heart attack. Steve's best friend Bill's mother had a heart attack as did Jackie's best friend Pete's mother. Unfortunately, both died.
About the time that Steve went back on the road, a neighbor's bull decided he was very fond of our yard. He beat up our garden cart and tore a fender off our pickup! Luckily, he never threatened us personally, but it was pretty intimidating having him around and we were pretty relieved when he was sold.
In August, Cynthia's new beau Todd brought her up from Texas for a visit. The amusing highlight of the visit was when Steve teased to Cindy that she "was a bitch just like her mother," which left her speechless while Todd nearly choked to death trying not to laugh!
Good news: Jackie's brother Lenny got married this year. Our new sister-in-law is named Stella and she has a teenage son named Eric. A baby is due in February!
The remainder of the year, Jackie has spent researching endocrinology and cardiology and Steve has listened to her talk about it at great length. New web pages will be up on some of these topics shortly. And there have been lots of doctor visits and lab work and such during the recovery process as well.
Jackie also went on the road for a visit with Steve for a week and will likely take another mini-vacation with him in early 2008.
The cats are all fine - they're still serial murderers who leave the remains of their mayhem all over the house. We love them anyways, though some days it's harder to remember why than others!
We hope all of you had a better year than we did and look forward to a better one next year!
Love,
Steve & Jackie