@ Home in the World

Summertime and the living is

A bit more difficult for working moms.

School ended two weeks ago the way it began - with two useless half days on a Wednesday and Thursday. Of course that means that Friday there was no school. Piper used a vacation day to cover the Wednesday half day and I swapped my work at home day for the Thursday and took the Friday off.

I really enjoy being there for the last day of school. All the parents and the students in the lower grades hang around to "cheer on" the fifth graders leaving the building for the last time. The school buses are decorated in balloons and streamers and the drivers honk their horns as they pull out. This year I noticed that they put kazoos and other noise makers on every seat and that the kids were contributing to the cacophony on the way out. God bless 'em!

My neighbor and I have a tradition of our own of taking the kids out to lunch on the last day. This year she insisted that we bring two other women along and they insisted that instead of going to Friendly's like we always do, we should go somewhere that served Margaritas. I can't remember the last time I had a drink at lunch time. Maybe never.

Now these two other women have boys in Pumpkin's class, but they also have either older children who can watch the younger ones or husbands who work alternate shifts (a cop, for instance), so even though this idea started out as a kickoff celebration for the kids, the only one that actually brought her kids was me. Add to that I was technically still on the clock at work, so I did not have as many margaritas (1) or as much fun as the other women did. But I could drive home, which proved to be important.

I spent the entire time thinking someone from work might be trying to get in touch with me - just my luck. Hardly anyone ever calls me unless there's an immediate deadline, so I don't know what I was so worried about. I wound up taking a couple of hours out of my Friday vacation day to make up the time I missed as lunch hour turned into three hours. I'm good like that.

Tigger has spent the following weeks at a nearby camp that he loves. I thought about sending Pumpkin to the same place, but ultimately felt that teenagers could not handle the wigged-out nuttiness that is my younger son when he is overtired and overstimulated. Also, a 5-year old drowned in a camp pool in this state last year and that news went straight to the deep, dark place in my heart usually reserved for paranoia about my own health.

Now, why don't I have those same fears for Tigger? The pool is the one place that he has almost always behaved himself. And he's an awesome swimmer. But yeah, I feel guilty about it.

In the meantime, the woman who so bravely babysat for my kids after school has left us.  It was only a matter of time. She has three kids of her own and after years of saying they were going to move to our town, they have pretty much decided to stay put in this housing market. It's not the end of the world. She was fabulous, her kids were around my kids' ages, but she was also doing double duty as a taxi service for my neighbor's kids who decided that it was okay to come hang out at my house when they were done with their homework. I'm more than happy to have to put an end to that practice. Not that they're not nice kids, but there were just too many people in my house when I wasn't there and inevitably the place was trashed when I got home E V E R Y  N I G H T.

P's former pre-school teacher will be taking over, but she can't start right away. So Piper and I have been juggling our schedules to try to make it work. I realize now that we are never going to have a proper vacation this year. Maybe not next year either. The number of days that Piper and I are actually home together with the boys is going to be pretty limited as well.

I wonder if this is the curse of working parenthood, or maybe just parenthood in general - that we never get the chance to feel settled. And then some days, I suppose we feel too settled.

Some days I hardly recognize that this is my life. And then yesterday a co-worker announced that she was pregnant, due in December. For the first time ever, I was irrationally excited for her.

Walking it off.

This was supposed to be Monday's post, but because I was seeing red over gas station radio and felt that something must be done, I'm posting it today instead.

I crossed a threshold with my project, and though it was not perfect, I passed it along to be reviewed by other members of my department end-of-day Friday and although there is much work still to be done, I feel as if a great weight has been lifted off my shoulders and that the remaining work will be much more manageable hereafter.

Although the winter weather has finally, finally broken and we are now actually having a spring, I was cooped up so much of last week, I didn't get to enjoy it. But Saturday morning, I got in the car and drove to the beach to do the walks I used to do. And Sunday morning before church, I got up and did the same thing. I have not done this walk for six months. I am so happy to be able to start again. The muscles in my legs are screaming at me, but I know that I have done good. 

And lost a pound.

Not that I'm counting.

On Saturday, I went straight from the beach to the office of a guy who has worked on my laptop and bought a new computer from him. We've need to replace our family desktop for a while now. It's been almost 10 years that we have used it and our Quicken no longer works on it.  Yes, I bought a generic no-name computer from a guy who builds them. I didn't hem and haw and deliberate and research for months. I just did it.  I've heard so many rotten things about Dell's service and Windows Vista that I really wanted the security of having a repairman close-by. Of course, I'm really hoping I won't need him much.

We also bought planters and flowers for our new patio. Tigger jumped right into the whole planting thing. I did one planter, he did the other, and then he took a whole flat of dianthus and planted them, well spaced, around the patio, all by himself. I think he's found a hobby.

The daffodils are blooming, many of the tulips are opening up, I see peonies pushing up out of the ground. It's going to rain for the next two days. Maybe we'll see more flowers after this.

Peepers!

Has this been the longest freakin' winter or what?

My heart sank when I woke up Friday morning to find it snowing, and sticking to the ground. Hello? Does "out like a lamb" even mean anything anymore?

Somewhere around mid-March I like to start the summer-winter clothing exchange. There's plenty of winter stuff to put away, but it's still too cold to use any of the lighter clothes. I'd really just like to get the snowsuits and boots put away because there is no real place to keep them on a daily basis and they are getting in the way of everything else in the mudroom.

There are some sunny places in town sporting crocuses. I planted a bunch last Fall and now I can't seem to find them. There are some green things coming up in the garden, mostly tulips, which will not bloom until late Spring. One of the Sunday morning news programs broadcast a shot of the blooming pink cherry trees in Washington DC, and I was momentarily visited with a desire to visit my sister. It didn't last. I do need some warmth, though. I'm tired of my winter coat.

Some scene in a movie Piper and I were watching this weekend evoked summer for us with that hum of insects at twilight. Boy, that brings me right back to childhood, and that feeling of endless freedom, bare feet, constant cookouts, and late bedtimes. Even as an adult, summer makes me feel more free.

I was beginning to despair of ever getting to that feeling again.

And then...

Piper poked at me while we were watching 60 Minutes last night. "Hear that?"

In the distance, I did hear that high-pitched almost whisting sound of the tree frogs out in the marsh. Peepers!

Finally, Spring has really begun!

Yay!

School started yesterday. Tigger, now a first grader, hopped on the bus like an old pro. We visited his class on Monday and met his teacher, got a handle on who was in the class, and where T would be sitting. T is in a multiage class for grades 1 and 2. There are some kids in his class that we know, some from church, which is a good thing, and some from random association with their parents. His class buddy (a second grader) is the older sibling of a kid T went to preschool with for a while.

In Pumpkin's class, we know a lot of people. Not that P knows them yet, but I know their parents and I'm generally pleased.  Fifteen years here, and I finally feel like I know people. Also, since P has the same awesome teacher that T did last year, I felt like an old hand myself, knowing where everything was and what the routines would be. The teacher came face to face with some of P's behavior issues during the two hour orientation yesterday; difficulty transitioning from one activity to the next, a hyperfocus on whatever he's doing (a defense mechanism, I've discovered), but overall, he did well, and the teacher didn't seemed fazed by any of it. She's been teaching for many years and has an additional Masters in Special Ed. I'm sure she's seen all sorts of things. This is a major reason why I would never consider homeschooling. With their years of experience, they go beyond what I can do in many areas, just as with our 1:1 parent to child ratio, we can go beyond what they can do in many areas. It works out.

I've worked with this school system in a few different capacities since before we had kids. I couldn't wait for the boys to be part of the community here. I know it's not going to be all roses, but already it's more nurturing than anything I had as a child.

P will have half days all this week - Friday and Monday off for the long weekend and then four days of full-day kindergarten before it becomes a regular thing. As much as I hate starting school before Labor Day, I have to admit it works out well for the Kindergartners.

A Child's Garden of Vegetables

Summer always makes me think of my grandparents. Most of my happiest memories involve playing on the beach in front of their house, getting called in before dinner, washing the sand off in their outdoor shower, helping to set the table, shuck the corn, or whatever else needed doing. With my cousins there, it was a chance to be in that big family I always wanted.

It's probably not a surprise that I have recreated little parts of the life that my grandparents gave me. The town I now live in reminds me quite a bit of the neighborhood where their house stood. The house we bought reminded me of my their house with all its varnished and shiny natural wood everywhere. From my grandmother, I inherited my love of words, crosswords, and Scrabble (I know more great Scrabble words than you do and I got them all from her). My grandfather taught me strange things; a love for The Sound of Music, Beethoven, how to skip rocks and set fires (safely).  He taught me importance of carrying a walking stick and how to grow vegetables.

My grandfather started a huge vegetable garden outside the kitchen window at my mother's house. Every year we had summer squash, tomatoes, green peppers, zucchini, broccoli, and swiss chard and lettuces. For reasons probably best explained by the fact that our garden was situated on a former dog run, we had what I can only describe as nuclear vegetables. Seriously. The broccoli and cauliflower had to be brought up in laundry tubs. There was bat-sized zucchini (isn't there always?), and nearly 100 gourds every year.  Good soil.

I began gardening again on the upper deck of our second apartment. Somewhere there is a picture of me with the first summer squash I grew as an adult. The act of growing something and cooking it, even from a container garden, was gratifying.

When we bought our house, the previous owners had already carved out a section of the back yard for a vegetable garden, so we used that for a little while. Eventually I decided that it was not big enough, did not get enough sun, and was too far away from the house, so Piper and I created a (slightly) raised bed garden under the kitchen window.

The Spring that Tigger was to come home to us, I planted peas on his birthday. He was still in Russia, but my hope was that he would be home in time to eat them. That summer, at age two, he would sit himself at the edge of the garden with a fist full of pea pods and eat them fresh and crunchy.

Last summer, we did not have a garden and I missed it. It bothered me to be buying the vegetables I normally grow. It was just one more thing that made living in a rented house while our home was being renovated all that more miserable. This year, while waiting for the landscapers to tear out the overgrown forsythia bushes and dig me a larger vegetable bed (they finally came a few weeks ago), I planted the vegetables out front. Instead of fancy perennials, we have squash, and eggplant, and herbs.  Piper was a bit worried about people walking by and taking our produce, but so far it hasn't happened.

This afternoon, I taught T how to twist a zucchini off the plant and watched P's delight as he snatched a ripe tomato from the vine and bit into it. There are five Italian tomato plants, enough for Piper to make sauce to freeze and use periodically through the winter. With the forsythia gone, I will spend the better part of the fall setting up an organic bed. We are going bigtime (without the laundry tubs).

We talk so much about what we want to give our kids that we didn't have growing up, but I want to give them something I did have - a love for working in the earth, the pride of taking something from the garden to the table, and the simple joy of watching things grow. 

Notes by the Fire

(Sunday, 10:30 pm)

Today was a near perfect summer day. The only thing missing was a trip to the beach. The temperature was in the 80s with an occasional breeze and no humidity.

Piper had two softball games this morning, the second of which was at the school so the boys could play on the playground. After the game (he's done for the season, yea!), we took the boys and their bicycles over to the high school track and let them ride around for a while.

Before we knew it. it was two o'clock.Time to get home for a late luch and a bit of puttering in the yard. On Saturday, I bought the boys some Nerf dart guns and they spent time running around outside with those. Tigger got invited to the neighbor's pool and the Pumpkin and I picked fresh blueberries from the bush in the backyard to make a pie.

Piper made eggplant parm for supper and it was eaten by both kids with a minimum of complaint. Having a blueberry pie to look forward to certainly helped. Pumpkin began saying that he was sleepy a the dinner table and was a breeze toput to bed.

The evening air cooled considerably so I collected wood for the fire pit and and we sat around the fire listening to the outdoor classical concert at the small performing arts center behind us.

The concert is over now and as I sit here waiting for the fire to go out, I decide that I simple must record the day. Who can recall the last time I got to just sit and look at the stars.

Sticky Note Thoughts

I think this might be the first in a series.

Tigger learned to ride his bike without training wheels yesterday. He had been fighting us on actually taking them off, but once we convinced him, he was fine. He still has trouble starting and stopping, but all in all it was a VERY successful morning.

It is 64 degrees and raining here. It feels a lot colder than it actually is. I feel v e r y  s l e e p y.

I began this post on Monday, but there are so many things flying around in my head that I just had to stop and pick it up again today.

If you are going to Blogher this weekend, enjoy, and have a drink for me. Even if it is only cranberry juice. Hopefully I'll be able to meet many of you next year. That's my goal.

I think I'm going to take a break this week and work on my site. I still have to fix the photo sitting unevenly in my header, look into some different ads try to expand my horizons. I'll be following the live bloggers looking for tips. Hey, I make computer-based tutorials for a living, how hard could it be for me to figure this stuff out?

Exercise

The walk begins with the sighting of a snowy egret fishing in the creek that feeds into the ocean. This early hour allows for a lot more nature at the beach than just the scavenging gulls who'll arrive later in droves seeking stray cheese curls and discarded sandwich corners. I've seen lots of egrets in my 15 years here, but usually from the car or the train. I've never been this close to one. So I stop before I've even started and watch the bird wading in the water, leading with its long neck and bill at every step.

Soon, another walker comes over the footbridge, and the startled bird takes off on long white wings.

On the first lap, the beach is quiet, the tide is low. I notice that the waterline is littered with small crab shells, so many that it causes me to wonder if there was some "event" the previous night that caused all this mass crab death.  That happens sometimes with fish. Hundreds of fish wash up on shore for no apparent reason. Always disturbing.

Low tide is also a time for sandpipers scurrying in and out of the water. I love watching these birds. In spite of their tiny steps, they move gracefully as a flock, turning together this way and that like a school of fish.

The shore side of the beach is lined with houses that appear atop a six-foot seawall. In front of every six or so buildings a staircase leads from the top of the seawall to the beach down below. These houses used to be mostly rustic summer rentals, but little by little they are being transformed into impressive vacation homes.

Signs of life at these houses are few. There are a one or two people out on their porches with a cup of coffee, enjoying the quiet. At the far end of the beach, in front of the hotel, there are several families out. Colorful umbrellas have sprouted, staking positions for the day. Small, brave children play in the waves. A father fishes and his two young sons carry nets, waiting.

By the second lap, the sun has begun to burn through the morning grey. My heart rate is up and I am beginning to feel the walk in my legs. A woman, fully dressed lies on the damp sand with no towel. She is chatting on a cell phone. I am puzzled, but pause to pet her adorable Westie who awaits the resumption of his own walk. Technically, dogs are not allowed in the beach in the summer, but before 10 AM and after 4 PM, there are always a few chasing sticks or ball, getting wet and sandy and having the time of their lives. I miss our black lab mix something fierce every time I see a dog on the beach.

I am so focused on finding tiny shells and sea glass in the sand beneath my feet that I don't always see the waves. But when I do look up I see the glittering ocean and the islands offshore, I take a moment to remember how lucky I am to live here. For as long as I can remember, the sound of the waves has calmed my racing mind. I'm on my third lap and I'm starting to feel it in my back.

By the fourth lap I am nearly knee deep in the waves. The Tevas on my feet act provide resistance in the water making me really push for that final half mile. The sun is truly out and more families are beginning to show up. It's time for me to head home - and write something.

Wild Life

There was a deer in the backyard this morning. Actually it was in the neighbor's yard (we're not fenced in here), but I spotted it when I was letting the dog in at the ungodly hour of 5:45 AM. She stayed around for quite a while, even after she saw me.

This is when I wish I had ordered the camera that I'm going to get with my  AMEX points, even though I am notoriously bad at catching these moments.

Like the time in Alaska when Piper and I were out hiking at 10:30 at night (remember it stays light in  Alaska in the Summer) when I spot a large hare standing at attention just off the trail. I start chatting inanely about the fact that it's the largest rabbit I think I've ever seen, when we turn a corner and are confronted by a grey lynx on the trail about ten feet ahead of us. We stare at it and it stares at us, and of course, we need a picture. Piper fumbles for the camera, which, no surprise, is at the bottom of the backpack. The cat's been standing there at least five minutes, but as soon as the camera is unearthed, the lynx takes off. The next day we speak to a Denali Park guide who tells us that in the 13 years he's been coming to Alaska to work in the summers, he's never seen a lynx. It is apparently quite rare to see them and a picture would have really been something.

There's something about a close encounter with wildlife that I find incredibly soothing. It's like being given a gift or sent a message that's open to interpretation, but is generally benign. These visits are as close as I ever expect to get to an encounter with God. Maybe that's why I can never get a picture.

About ten years ago, I was at a real low point in life - frustrating job, co-workers I didn't respect, flailing about for direction in life and career - it was bad. On an unseasonably warm day in February, Piper and I decided to take a walk and headed for a pier we had never been to. When we got there, we noticed a group of people clustered around talking. We got closer and realized they were looking at a Harbor seal lying in the parking lot. Of course, I thought the worst, but when I approached, I found her very much alive and peacefully sunning herself. She picked her head up and looked straight at me, my heart just melted. Harbor seals are actually quite common here, but this was the first I had ever seen one, and the closest I ever got.

I did not have my camera with me but we walked home and I drove back down with the camera hoping she'd still be in that spot. She wasn't, but had inched her way back down the boat ramp from which she had come and was splashing about in the harbor. I took a few pictures, but they never came out.

I found a new job in the midst of the Beanie Baby craze. On my desk at the new office, along with the other toys that we techno-types seem to collect, I put a harbor seal Beanie to remind me of those moments of peace.

It's All Good

The fifth graders paraded through the elementary school for the last time yesterday while the rest of the class cheered their accomplishments. Students said goodbye to their teachers and parents said goodbye to the retiring principal. Lockers and cubbies were cleared and ancient projects unearthed.The school buses were decorated in celebration of summer and departed with horn blasts and singing.

Several of the moms and their students headed downtown for lunch after the early dismissal. It was a beautiful afternoon. Friends and neighbors were out and about celebrating a brief departure from their scheduled lives.

T completed Kindergarten successfully, there was no suggestion of holding him back and he even won a schoolwide prize for the student who worked the hardest and came the farthest from where he started. He got the teacher I was hoping for and because he will be in a multiage classroom, he will have the same wonderful woman for two years.

The Pumpkin "graduates" from pre-school today. He'll wear a little cap and tassle and sit with the other five children who are going on to Kindergarten next year at a farewell party. On Monday, I met with a team at the elementary school who evaluated P in preparation for placing him in K next year. The testing turned up a lot of things that are related to his language delay (at this point they are calling it a delay and not a deficit). He will start Kindergarten with 30 minutes a week of language support outside the classroom. We'll see if that helps and we'll go from there.

I'm not sure if I could be any more satisfied with the way things are right now. After two years of agonizing and stressing and wondering if I had taken on too much, the kids are having some success and life is finally starting to look manageable again. It took us a long time to get to this point, but I think we are finally starting to settle into our roles as a family of four.