Bad Day

How is it that we, as a family, found ourselves at 10:30 on a Tuesday night standing in our hot tub, screaming in fear, and violently splashing out all of the water?

It all started with Josiah. When he returned to school after serving his day of suspension (see THE FIGHT), he received quite a bit of homework, which he stuck in his backpack to do later, and boarded the school bus to go straight to his last track meet of the season. Everything was fine.

Since Drake was not in track, he came home immediately after school, and I knew right away that something was wrong. When I asked what it was, he crumpled into a chair and explained that the girlfriend who had broken up with him the day before was already dating someone else. He took it hard.

While I was still attempting to cheer him up, Makenna walked in the front door with tears streaming down her face. She had discovered that the boyfriend who had recently broken up with her had asked another girl to the prom. Things weren't going so good.

Being a mom, I decided that the best way to cheer them up would be to make a really great supper. However, while all the ingredients were still spread across the counter, Mike called saying he was having the worst work day ever, had to work late, and couldn't take Josiah to his drum lesson. I had to stop what I was doing, drive to the track meet, pick up Josiah and take him across town to his lesson. This was beginning to get stressful.

When the drum lesson was over, Josiah discovered that he had left his backpack full of homework due the next day at the track meet. I drove my Jeep as if it were a rocket, but by the time we got there, the track meet was over. We searched the stands, the field, all around the building, but couldn't find it. We hunted down a custodian and persuaded him to use his key and let us search the lost and found, the office and the locker room, but it was nowhere inside the building.

On the way home we remembered that we had checked out a math text book, so he could at least do his math work, but, sadly, the rest of his homework would have to be late. Things were getting worse.

When I returned home at 9:00, I found an emotional Makenna and a depressed Drake preparing to build a fire in our chiminea on the back deck and feed it with items that reminded them of their ex's. I quickly melted some cheese on chips and called it nachos. Lord help us.

Mike walked in the door at 10:15 and received a very emotional update on the situation. It was decided that the hot tub was what was needed, and everyone except Josiah, who was still doing algebra, finally began to unwind in the hot water as we watched the fire Makenna and Drake had stoked into a beautiful inferno. Finally, Josiah finished his math and decided to join us, even though it was well after bedtime.

As he lowered himself into the soothing water, he needed a little more room, so he moved the large hot tub lid a few inches to his left. When he did that, the opposite corner of the lid bumped against the chiminea. We all watched in horror as the chiminea fell over, cracked into pieces, rolled and spilled hot coals, flaming t-shirts, and firey teddy bears onto the wooden deck. In unison we all stood up, screamed, and began splashing the soothing water across the deck in attempt to put out the fire.

It was a bad day.

Text Dangers

I am not above sending flirty text messages to my husband. He likes it. I have learned, though, that it is imperative when engaging in this activity to delete the racier messages before the children decide to read them. I don't want to talk about it.

Although Mike was gone long before I woke up yesterday, my first thoughts of the day were of him because I had slept in his shirt, and it smelled like his cologne. I texted him a sweet message saying, "I smell like you." It seemed innocent enough, so I didn't bother deleting it. 

Mike is a contractor, so many of our texts are about plumbing, renovation, lumber, or other such exciting subjects.

The problem with deleting some conversations, is that the order of texts left on the phone can cause a very confusing, and even alarming sequence, of sentences.

I have only recently become aware of this problem. Makenna shoved my phone at me and said, "You and Dad are weird."

Confused, because, clearly, we are very normal, I scrolled through my recent texts to see if I could identify the problem.

Me: Where are you?
Mike: On top of the old toilet.
Me: I smell like you.
Mike: You're sweet.

Makenna might have a point.

Losing

My poor nephew, Garrison, has three sisters. My boys consider that to be a fate worse than extreme torture.

Every year my husband takes my two boys on a trip near Canada to camp, fish, and moon each other. It's important. This year they invited Garrison and his dad to go along. Garrison couldn't have been happier if you had told him that one day he would rule the world.

But, then a major problem came along and crushed Garrison's dream. His baseball team is scheduled to play in a tournament that weekend. No camping, no fishing, no mooning. All because of baseball.

But, Garrison has figured out a way around all of this.

"I'm gonna play my best and give it my all, but you need to pray that my team really sucks and we lose most of our games. Then we won't go to the tournament!"

Now he calls with regular updates on the losing status of his team. If they lost, we all cheer. If they won, we frown and grumble.  He can count on us.

His team lost twice this week. He's happy.

Boys

My son began life pretty small. You wouldn't know that by looking at him now. When he was in seventh grade he slept every moment he could, and those were the only moments he wasn't eating. By the time he started eighth grade he was basically a grown man.

Because he looks like a conquering Viking, he gets recruited for any and all sports. He does them all, and he is pretty good. That is why it surprised me when he told me, "You know something? I really hate sports." This was a complete surprise to me since he had never said anything like that before.

"You do?" I asked.
"Yeah. I hate wearing all the gear. It is hot and itchy," he explained.
"That makes sense." He has always hated sweating.
"And I really don't enjoy sports in general."
"Well, then, I suppose you don't want to play football next year, huh?"
"Oh yeah. I totally want to play."
"You do?"
"Of course I do."
"But you just said you hate it."
"Yeah, but I still want to play."

My husband sat next to him nodding at me like this all made perfect sense. I might never understand the male race.

Parents can be nuts

My parents are selling everything they own. Literally. I helped them get ready for their sale this week, and they actually marked everything for sale. When I tell people they are selling everything, the follow up question is usually, “Are they selling their leather furniture?”

“Yes. Everything.”

“Are they selling their go-cart?”

“Yes. Everything.”

“Are they selling their yard tools?”

“Yes.”

“Are they selling their unused shampoo?”

“Yes. I marked it ten cents.”

“So, they are really selling everything, huh?”

Yes, they really are. The next question is why. Why would people who have worked hard, retired, accumulated a beautiful house, lovely garden and every yard tool you could dream of, just sell it all? Did they lose the house? No. Are they buying an RV? No. Are they moving? No.

They have a good reason. They are tired. Tired of maintaining a demanding house. Tired of filling their sunny afternoons with painting soffits and cleaning gutters. Tired of a mortgage payment.

They decided to rent out their house for one year, keep only the necessary items that will fit in their car, and aimlessly travel the nation. They got online and signed up to volunteer at several charities. They told distant relatives to expect a visit.

They decided to try this nomad lifestyle for a year and see how it goes. If they like it, they will just keep on doing it when the year is up. If not, they will move back into their house – nothing lost. Except all their worldly possessions. But they decided that losing all their worldly possessions really isn’t a bad thing.  In fact, they are almost giddy with their freedom.

They are my heroes.  

Chicago photo competition

We walked around Chicago today, and when I say we walked around, I mean to the point that our legs now barely work. Then it got pretty cold. We kept walking. Then it got cloudy. We kept walking. Then it rained. We kept walking. 

We saw stuff. We ate stuff. We saw stuff that we ate. 

The kids challenged each other to a photo competition. The goal was to take pictures as we toured and vote on them when we returned to the hotel. The winner got five dollars because we are crazy generous like that. 

Here are the pictures.

Since we typically don't buy the kids the best quality in cell phone technology, they might not be stellar, but I was impressed.

Now I have to go melt into my bed and never move again.

Mother's Day Meltdown

I believe that parents should be able to subscribe to a service that alerts you to a crisis before you walk blindly into a potential meltdown. Unfortunately, this service has not yet been created.

It all started with a card lovingly and carefully crafted by my daughter, Emery. She hid it in the bathroom so I wouldn't see it before the proper time.

My husband, Mike, and I decided to run to the store. It seemed like a simple decision. What we didn't know was that while we were gone Emery's card got a little wet, which smeared the writing. Makenna, being the helpful older sister, tried to take care of the problem by tracing over the words. Emery thought that the tracing utterly ruined the card, so she ripped it into little pieces and threw it away.

Two seconds later, we returned home happy and unaware of the crisis unfolding in the kitchen. When we walked through the front door Mike noticed that everyone except Josiah was in the kitchen, so he called out, "Josiah, come to the kitchen. It's time to give Mom her cards."

To our astonishment, Emery instantly burst into full fledged weeping at this announcement, grabbed Mike's hand and pulled him out the back door. To keep me out of earshot, Makenna grabbed my hand and pulled me upstairs. When Josiah entered the kitchen ten seconds later, it was to a lone Drake who shrugged his shoulders and said, "I don't know how to explain what just happened in here."

We did cards later. They were all lovely.

Oh, Emery!

Feelings are such fragile things. Some people's feelings are like fine crystal - scary and easily broken. If you want to hang out with my family, your feelings should more closely resemble Tupperware.

My ten year old daughter, Emery, is so beautiful and sweet that I am sometimes tempted to fold her up and put her in my pocket just to keep her with me at all times. You would think that every word out of her mouth would be kind and loving. You don't expect to suffer from her brutal honesty.

It is a tricky thing to teach children about feelings. We tell them to never lie, but then expect them to act as if they love the sweater Grandma sent for Christmas. We expect them to overlook our occasional meltdowns without saying things like, "Oh, I get it. You're a good Mommy and a bad Mommy." Not that such a thing happened six years ago.

Emery loves to answer the phone, and we love to let her. She is our telemarketer screener. She will patiently listen to a longwinded sales pitch and then say something like, "I'm just a kid, and I don't know what you are talking about," before quickly hanging up. It works great.

So when I heard her answer the phone and say, "I don't know who you are or what you are saying," I wasn't too worried.

"Another telemarketer?" I asked.
"No," she answered. "It was a friend from school."
"What! Why did you say you didn't know her?" I gasped.
"Well, since we are going to Grandma's, I just said that so I wouldn't hurt her feelings by telling her I couldn't play."

We have a lot of work to do.

Dirty Dog

As you know, I let my guard down one day and ended up with a puppy. It is dangerous to have a moment of weakness. Although training a puppy wasn't my original plan for this spring, I find it impossible not to love a puppy. Especially this one. He has silver fur and ice blue eyes, so his appearance is pretty stunning.




But what I love most about him is that he is hilarious. He tries very hard to be exactly where I am, which has caused more than one ungraceful tripping incident. So as not to lose direct line of sight, he looks at me constantly, which leads to all sorts of clumsiness. He has been seen falling off of the deck, tripping over his huge paws and ending up in somersaults, and falling into the pool. He has fallen into the pool three times. The water is 40 degrees. He has fallen into the hot tub twice. The water is 103 degrees. I didn't mind the hot tub, but pulling him out of the pool was not enjoyable. And sometimes, he tries to eat his own paw.


He loves to be outside until he finds out he is out there alone. Then he will bark to let me know he wants in. He gives me three seconds to comply with his request before he begins throwing his body against the glass of the door. He doesn't understand glass. He thinks if he gets up enough speed he should be able to walk right through. He backs up, runs straight at the door, and slams himself violently against the annoying invisible barrier.

I left him outside for four minutes one day. In that time he managed to dig up my flower garden more thoroughly than a rototiller ever could. Then, covered with mud, he barked to be let in. I decided not to comply. It took 30 seconds of his violent thrashing to change my mind and allow the dirty dog access to our nice, clean house. This is what he did to my door in those 30 seconds. He is lucky he is so cute.