Going Swimming, Deep Thoughts and Then She Spoke.
August 15, 2015
I’ve been working late every night this week, and it’s the second week of August. By the time I got home it was 6:45. I’d promised my daughter a trip to Nantasket Beach tonight.
She probably would have been happier if we’d ordered a pizza and watched back to back episodes of Law and Order.
It was 7 pm when we loaded the car with a couple towels, clean underwear, and a gym bag with shampoo and swim goggles. Katy had a bottle of water. I was sipping on a cup of coffee I found on the kitchen table left over from this morning.
It was hot today, but it’s already the middle of August. By the time we got to the beach, it was 7:30. There was still sunlight, but a storm just left and another one’s coming in tomorrow. The water was cold.
I’m from New Jersey. It took me 5 years before I’d put my head in the water when we visited the Cape. Ten years before I’d even consider swimming in the waves, even on the bay side. It’s only been in the past few years that if I’m at the beach, and there’s not snow on the ground, or snow expected, I swim.
Katy went out with me. She danced around in the water. She scolded me. She laughed at me.
She told me stories about camp and some cooking channel on youtube and showed off some design on her fingernails.
And then Katy told me she’d had enough. She smiled sweetly, swam back to the shore, dried off and repainted her toenails.
I threw my body into the water, it was pretty damn cold, and I swam. I swam hard and fast. I could feel my muscles pull, my shoulders lift and my palms reach and stretch. I swam hard.
It felt good. The waves were soft, they’d lift me up and swing me, while I swam, and let me down. I never lost rhythm.
It’s taken me years and years and years to figure out that even though the water is cold, if I stay in long enough, and move fast enough, I get used to it. And it feels good.
The water, the swim, my hands, my toes, my heart, the sand, it all feels good, if I give it time.
This is something i started to learn later in life. I can get used to anything.
In the summer, in the water, this has served me well.
While I swam tonight, I wondered. What else have I gotten used to?
I’ve been inside this life a long time, I made hard choices and what felt like some bad decisions.
I think everything’s turned out all right.
But maybe I just got comfortable in my surroundings.
I look at Katy on the shore. She’s hard to spot. I don’t have my contacts on, and I swam far away, and even farther back to find her.
I fall out of the water when I’m sure it’s her.
She waits for me. She wraps me in a towel. She helps me find the keys and tells me that coming to Nantasket was a fantastic idea. Even if the water was too cold and my phone is almost out of power and what are we going to do about dinner.
“But, Mom, truly, really, really glad you made me come with you.“
I’ll never get used to my daughter telling me my ideas are fantastic.
If I’m gotten used to other things, if I’ve grown complacent and there is room for improvement in my life, I am capable of making whatever changes I need to make.
I swam three quarters of a mile in 65 degree water, tide coming in, and my daughter thinks I’m smart. Or at least capable of a good idea.
There’s still hope.
MY Job At Quincy College
August 15, 2015
It’s been a Long Week in my life.
Hours at work have been intense, I work for Quincy College and a large part of my job is working to help potential students become students.
This involves many conversations, involving almost every single candidate. There are conversations with the student, some parents chime in. I have Financial Aid on speed dial – “He hasn’t turned in his Financial Aid information form? Really?”
Admissions- “Are you sure you haven’t gotten her transcript? Can I put her thru to you?” Followed closely by the Registrar’s Office, the Business Office, the Deans, the Advisors- at the end of the week, I’ve talked a lot.
Occasionally I sit down with someone and they tell me about what their plans are, about which classes they’ll be taking, even about what they want to be when they grow up.
When a student leans forward, and starts to talk to me, I lean back and listen.
I don’t answer the phone. I ignore my son’s texts. I stop wondering what they will be serving upstairs for Karen’s Birthday or Michael’s going away.
I need this time with these people- kids, baby boomers, grandparents, unwed mothers, recovering addicts, struggling sons, international students from Nepal, Bulgaria, France, Haiti.
I need time with the people that come to me for help, I need to hear their stories so that I can remember why helping them is the best job I’ve ever had.
Life is Short, Vacations are Shorter.
August 10, 2015
It’s the Sunday night after vacation. The suitcases are empty, but I cant find the toothpaste. My daughter is almost ready for camp tomorrow but she is missing a favorite swim suit. Or is it a shoe?
Katy told me twenty minutes ago. She hasn’t noticed that since she turned nine I started tuning about her frantic announcements in regards to items of clothing and footwear. She has lots and lots and lots of everything. We are the recipients of hand-me-downs from four different families.
So if something is missing, it’s probably lost under a pile of stuff that certainly contains either the missing item or a replacement.
I’m going thru the motions of getting ready to return to work, but I’m weighted down with the- I’m not ready for the real world how did the week go by so fast and I don’t think I even got a tan Blues.
We just got home from Cape Cod. We make the trip every year with a family friend and his daughter.
The first few days are always slow. Long days at the pool, with brief trips across the street to the ocean during low tide. The girls looked for crabs. I pretended that swimming back and forth in the bay was exercise. Then I started looking for crabs too.
The girls ordered milkshakes for lunch and a half an hour later, chicken nuggets. We played Marco Polo even though there a lot of other people in the pool, ages ranging from 2 years old to 82 with no interest at all in playing Marco Polo.
We went to town and wandered down Commercial Street until a restaurant looked good.
We had all the time in the world then, only two days in. Sleeping in was a luxury we could afford, and we agreed to decide about whale watches and bike trips and boogie boarding tomorrow or the day after.
Then comes the day after, and while I sipped my first cup of coffee, negotiations began over bike trails or boat rides. We made dinner reservations after doing research. We planned naps, lunches and had a long conversation about whether or not we’d need to buy more sun block before the end of the week. Both of us seemed aware that we were now in the middle of the week and that our decisions carried weight.
When I said no to the whale watch, I had to recognize that this year, unless something really really strange happened and a whale decided to stop by MacMillan Pier in downtown Provincetown, I’m not going to see any whales. Up close, anyway. I thought about it for a while and it was a decision I could live with. (Sorry, James.)
By Thursday and Friday, we’d settled into a breakfast ritual. The girls knew each others card games. I remembered to hang the towels up where they belong and James remembered that I liked to watch Jon Stewart reruns before sleep. We had become a temporary family that is well aware it’s almost time to say goodbye.
Thursday morning, the girls went boogie boarding, I sat on the sand and watched. They didn’t complain about the wind. I didn’t mind just watching them, wobble, and fall, ride along on their bellies, climb back up, tip one over, crouch like surfers and stand straight like super models. I don’t usually watch. But I took one look at the long, heavy board, and at the wind on the waves and I laid down a towel.
On the last night, we went to our first drag show and were entertained by a beautiful cast of characters played by the one and only Electra. (I am now the proud owner of a tote bag, signed by Electra herself.)
James let my daughter pick out our last restaurant for dinner, where we ordered top shelf liquor and appetizers so fresh they weren’t even listed on the menu. The girls got two more tattoos. We stopped by our favorite tee shirt shops and I was introduced to a few gallery owners.
We took a pedi cab back to the car.
Right now, I feel decades away pedi cabs and whales and mudslides and sunblock. My daughter is mad at me because I didn’t help her find whatever it was she was looking for. I’m going back to work tomorrow at 8 am and I’d really like a day off to go thru my vacation photos.
By 9:15 tomorrow morning, it will be like I never went on vacation at all.
Life is short. I get that. I gave up smoking and I’m working on carbohydrates and considering giving up sugar and I do like yoga. I’m happy and willing to make changes in my life so that I will live a little bit longer.
Life is short, but it’s long enough to give us time to get used to the fact that it’s going to end. It’s also long enough that I think sometimes it gets boring, or horrible things happen, or quite often, you don’t even get a warning before check-out.
I’m going to have to call in sick tomorrow. I’ve got some pictures to put on the cloud and some Facebook friends to make.(I hope they remember me as more than a tourist? I hope they are the kind of people that want to have many, many Facebook friends, even if they are tourists.)
Maybe next year I need to go on a spectacularly bad vacation. Or take two weeks off. Or just enjoy long weekends spread out all year long.
Maybe what I need to do is re read the words I just wrote and think them thru for a moment.
I just got home from a beautiful vacation with some of my favorite people.
Life is short, vacations are shorter.
In light of that indisputable fact, I guess I’ll continue to take notes along the way.
A day at the lake
July 19, 2015
Today, I hurled myself into the world like a shark who had recently watched a Woody Allen movie.
I woke up late, last night’s pajama bottoms became this morning’s yoga pants. While looking for a shirt, I gulped a half cup of two day old coffee. I brought the other half with me when I headed over to support a dear friend teaching her first strength training class.
I thought I could lurk in the background, play with playlist, squat a few times and be done with it. I was there for support.
I rowed, curled, lunged, squatted, pulled and pushed. Can I tell you what a fabulous job she did? She made me do all that- on half a cup of coffee.
Home. I had made plans to head out to Ponkapoag pond with my friend, her three kids, my daughter, my son and two of his friends.
There was only time for a quick conversation about who likes mayonnaise, who wished I’d bought salami instead of ham, who thought cookies for lunch was a really good idea, and who thought we didn’t have enough worms or marshmallows.
When it was announced it was time to load up the car, everyone under the age of forty had an urgent need to use the bathroom.
There was fishing equipment, snacks, drinks, lunch, swimsuits, goggles, reading material, three cans of insect repellent, jackets, extra fishing equipment, worms, marshmallows, in case the fish don’t like the worms, and changes of clothes in case someone fell into the lake before putting on their swimsuit.
In other words, no time for coffee. So I hopped in car. Last nights pajamas and this mornings yoga pants became today’s hiking shorts.
We made it by noon. Everyone was hungry from watching my friend and me pack the car.
An hour at the grocery store, 10 minutes discussion, 15 minutes of prep, everything was consumed in about 5 minutes. Truth, Katy and I were done in 2. My friend took her son to the lake to swim. I told the leftovers for a hike in the bogs.
When we got back to the dock, I was tired and hot. My son and his friends were fishing about 20 yards away. I was happy to settle in a beach chair and listen to the boys while they fished. Colin is fourteen. when I catch a glimpse of him, I usually ask him why I never see him any more. To which he responds-
“I have a life. I have friends. You’re my mom.”
It was easy to listen to them; no one had told them that fishing is a sport of quiet and meditation.
They were laughing, and yelling, and telling stupid stories that seemed to have no beginning or ending.
I was enjoying them but I was sharing the dock with one woman doing a water color, two little girls braiding each others hair, and a gentleman trying to nap under a large book.
I walked over and said- “Boys, you have to keep it down.”
Colin looked up at me, and smiled.
“Mom, I have to run something by you,” he smiled again.
“Colin, I don’t think you should tell her.”
“I have to tell her. She’s not stupid, you know. We have to bring them in the car.”
I beamed for minute. My son told one of his friends that I’m not stupid.
Then I caught it-
“Colin, what are you talking about? Who are you bringing to the car and why doesn’t your friend want me to know?
“Mom, be quiet. You are embarrassing me. Everyone is looking at us!”
This statement from a boy who made fart sounds with his hands so loud they woke up the gentleman sleeping under the really big book.
Long story short, and it is a very, very long story that I don’t think I will ever truly understand, my son and his friends had kept six of the fish they’d caught. These fish were swimming around in a very large bucket. The boys wanted to transport them from Ponkapoag Lake to a pond in the cemetery where we live.
While we negotiated, Colin kept looking in the bucket. At one point, he bent over, frowned. He scooped up a fish and brought it over to the lake where he bent over and placed it gently in the water.
“We don’t want to hurt them, Mom. We just need to bring a couple to Dead Man’s Pond. It’s only a few minutes down the road.”
We were at Ponkapoag, a Wildlife Preserve. I’m pretty certain that it would be universally frowned on to take some of the fish living in Ponkapoag Pond to another pond, just because my fourteen year old son and his two friends thought it was a really, really good idea.
My son was excited.
These days he gets excited about rap music, staying out until 11:30, Arizona Iced Tea, football practice, and being told he can order anything off the menu.
We negotiated. I agreed to let them take two fish., They promised to never, ever take any more animals, including but not limited to snakes, really cool insects or a wandering goat, away from their home, wherever their home is. Even if the animal asks politely and the visit is only temporary.
When we got to the graveyard, all three boys hopped out of the car. They walked as fast as they could to the edge of the pond, carrying the bucket between the three of them. They lifted the fish, and placed them in the water, one at a time. They all leaned over the water. Thirty seconds later, Colin turned around and gave me a thumbs up. The fish had survived the journey.
I took a picture when they weren’t looking. From behind, leaning over the pond, they look like they are about ten years old, looking for frogs, trying to catch a snake, daring each other to go for a swim.
Colin went over to his friends house afterwards. He got home about 11:30. His shoulders were down. I asked him what they’d done with the rest of their night.
“Just hung out, mom. Nothing much going on.”
It’s a Saturday night. Colin and Steve are at the age where they know that Saturday nights are supposed to be wild and crazy, on Instagram and Snapchat it looks like everyone is having an amazing time being wild and crazy.
Colin and Steve were watching tv in the basement.
In Woody Allen’s movie, Annie Hall, Alvy Singer told Annie that relationships are like sharks, if they don’t keep moving, they die.
That may be true about relationships, though I don’t think I’d ask Woody Allen for advice about love.
But people aren’t like sharks.
it’s important to sit still sometimes, eavesdrop on your teenagers, catch a fish, read a book, watch television with a friend.
It’s important to be okay with sitting still, but that takes time to figure out.
This is why I don’t get much sleep.
June 19, 2015
Tonight, when I was going to the gym with Colin, while listening to “Shut up and Dance with Me,” I got a little carried away. Since it is virtually impossible to dance in the car while driving with your son in the passenger seat, I conducted the music, with just one hand, since the other one was busy steering the car.
Colin told me there is no chance the Pops will call on me if Mr. Lockhart needs a little time off. He said he wasn’t sure if I had developed a serious twitch or I was demonstrating how to stir pudding. I like pudding, though I didn’t know there was a lot of stirring involved in it’s consumption, especially since I buy it in the single serve packets at the market.
While walking the dog, Katy and I played graduation. I had to smile at her, hand her her diploma, (a rolled up takeout menu that’s been in the backseat since we bought the car,) and shake her hand.
My handshake was limp, my expression was off when I handed her the diploma/stained menu and I had lipstick on my teeth.
I’m not going to make it as a principal, or in any other position that calls for me to regularly bestow awards and degrees, unless I can do the bestowing by mail or that Skype thing catches on.
Katy said we could practice all night, and there really wasn’t any point. She told me to pay attention tomorrow to what Mrs. Kincannon does, but I don’t think she has much hope I’ll improve by the time she graduates high school.
I’ve told Colin and Katy many, many times that every night before I go to sleep, I lay in bed and think of ways to torment them.
I better get to work. I set the bar pretty high today.
The Times, They Are…
June 18, 2015
June has been a pretty major month for us.
I finished my degree at Quincy College, a degree I’ve been working on for the past four years.
I left my job at the South Shore YMCA. The Y is one my favorite places in the whole world, and I consider the people of the Health and Well-Being Department family. But I needed to make space in my life, for my full-time job at the college and my kids.
My daughter is graduating on Friday from 5th grade. We are saying goodbye to Collicot Elementary School. There will be no more field trips or cafeteria duty. I won’t be walking her to school next year, or even picking her up from the school bus. She is making her own plans, I’m no longer negotiating play dates and or making delicate inquiries to other parents about whether or not she’s old enough to come home to an empty house. (She’s been coming home to an empty house from time to time for over a year now but I didn’t admit it to almost anyone.)
My son has completed his freshman year of high school. I know that doesn’t sound like an ending, he has three more years to go.
In the beginning of this year, he’d tell me what he had for lunch almost every night, he was excited about the salad bar and the after school options and playing football under the lights.
Now, he won’t tell me what he had for lunch, or maybe I stopped asking. He doesn’t get excited unless he’s mad at me. Then he’s very excited.
Since I’m done with my classes and only working one job, I’ve had a little spare time.
I started cleaning.
It’s spring, I was busy all winter- it was time to put the house in order.
I emptied drawers. I sorted thru clothes. I swept underneath the couch.
I found the Nerf ball we used for games of catch at Andrews Park. I dusted and polished every single one of Katy’s sculptures. I found Cheerios under everything; they quit eating Cheerios a year ago. There were stickers from the dentist and bottles of bubbles from birthday party gift bags.
And there were photographs, some of them curled, more than a few incredibly embarrassing, and all of them more than a year old. These days, memories are stored on the cellphone or on the cloud.
All this cleaning and sorting- I felt like an archaeologist or a nosy neighbor.
I didn’t remember what Colin’s voice sounded like before it changed. I can’t believe Katy ever got excited about Dora Explorer light up sandals.
I spent a lot of time in the past two weeks, (and yes, it’s been two weeks, I’m not kidding when I said the house needed a lot of cleaning,) mourning and moaning about how I missed the two kids in the pictures, And that being a parent means having to say goodbye on an almost daily basis to the people you love to make room for the latest version of the same people, slightly taller and surly.
Some nights, I would look at my children across the table and wish I was sitting across from the people in the snapshots I’d been mooning over.
Today, there was no time for cleaning, or dinner, or a walk with Sophia the Most Patient of Puppies. I had to take Colin to basketball, attend a committee meeting, help Katy find a dress for graduation, walk the dog, and then, at ten pm pick Colin up from the Y.
Colin had had an even longer day than I did. He spent all day studying for finals and finishing projects in school. After school, he played a basketball doubleheader, before heading over to the Y for an hour and a half weight lifting to get ready for football in September.
As soon as we got home, he started his homework.
I went on the computer to check emails and to search for a recipe that will use up the two pounds of ground turkey in the refrigerator that probably went bad yesterday. I was looking for a recipe that called for a lot of garlic.
All of the sudden, Colin yelled. He was sitting on the sofa, pulling papers out of his backpack. looking for a Science packet due tomorrow. He’d been working on it for weeks. It wasn’t there.
I went to him.
He was crying. Tears didn’t fall down like rain, they fell down like torrential rain, one of those Florida downpours that make creeks overflow and cars float.
I found went thru his books and found the packet inside a sleeve.
I showed it to him, helped him take off his sneakers and sent him to upstairs to sleep
I brought him up a glass of ice water and wiped his face with a clean shirt I found at the end of the bed. He rolled over, but kept talking. He told me about how he dropped a weight on his foot at the gym. He told me what he wants for his birthday. He told me thanks.
I put pillowcases on his pillows and kissed him goodnight.
I don’t know why I’ve been grieving. I have two amazing kids, right here with me, sleeping under the same roof.
Yes, their voices are different, their friends are different, and they certainly feel differently about me than they did a few years ago.
Pining over lopsided bowls and faded snapshots is a waste of time.
I might miss something.
I can do that later after they’ve left.
For now, I’m going to pay attention to right now.
Because right now is wonderful.
Maybe by Breakfast
May 2, 2015
Tonight was my daughter’s fifth grade dance. After careful negotiations, I was allowed to serve as chaperone.
I was the cotton candy ice scooper.
When the 5 gallon canister was empty, I had a chance to linger on the sidelines. I would have been dismissed, but I was the ride home.
I talked to some of the other moms, but mostly we looked toward the dance floor and smiled and nodded and sighed. We moms would shift our weight from one foot to the other in time to the music. We would flutter around the floor with phones and cameras aimed at the action or picking up half empty water bottles and forgotten cookies. We juggled and stowed coats, sweaters, pictures, snacks, and ipods.
And we watched.
The kids were fireflies and shooting stars. I know it sounds like I’ve been listening to too much Katy Perry, but they were. I couldn’t even get a decent snapshot, Katy raced from one end of the dance floor, to the water fountain, to her friend with the long hair, back up to the stage. She was a laughing blur that knew all the dance moves, even from songs that came out before she was born. Her friends, all the kids, moved with grace and confidence and joy. They took photos of each other, without pausing to rearrange themselves, or find a smile or a pout. They held and shot and moved on to the next thing, a snack or a dance or another photograph.
Tonight was a beautiful blur, and I wonder if any of the pictures we all so diligently snapped will capture any of it.
And now it’s almost ten, and Katy’s brushing her teeth upstairs and I’ve got the Macarena stuck in my head.
Good night, Kaitlin.
Please be my little girl again by breakfast.
Just until it’s time for lunch.
My husband never sees the kids. So when he pulled in the driveway at 7 pm, and announced we were going out for fro yo, it was a Big Deal.
Of course, I had to finish writing a letter for work.
And Katy wanted to pick out an outfit for tomorrow. Because tomorrow is Monday. And it’s important to pick out Monday’s outfit in advance.
Colin needed to find the right pair of sneakers. The forty pairs of shoes in the bottom of his closet were not the right shoes for fro yo consumption with the fam.
We left the house by 8. We took the dog. Sophie the Best Dog Ever doesn’t really like rides in the car. None of us are good at sharing dessert. But since was such a unique situation, (I mean he’s never, ever at the house at 7 pm, ever) there was no precedent. Sheldon wanted her to ride in the trunk. One step away from a Republican, I’m afraid.
Sophie rode in the back seat. She sat in the middle so that she was able to devote equal attention to Colin and Kaitlin while they licked and nibbled and spooned and dripped. Out of the corner of my eye, I watched her watch them ignoring her.
She didn’t even get to lick the cups.
So we took her to Andrews Park. It was 830 on a Sunday, one dog peeing on the baseball field, one dog owner on a smartphone.
Colin ran out first, Sophie followed. Katy, in hot pursuit behind Sophie. Katy back to the car for a sweatshirt. And to tell her mom to get out of the car. Now.
I followed Katy, and Sophie, and Colin.
I thought we’d play some kind of catch, or walk around the field arguing about who had to the dishes when they got home, or even just look up at the sky, agree that none of us can recognize a constellation and go home.
Colin had unlocked the gate to the play ground. Katy was twirling around on a swing, one of those big swings, with a reclining seat for a chair. When I asked her to push me, she hopped off. She pushed me. She pushed, heaved, twirled, I was spinning around, rocking from side to side, swinging up, crashing down, laughing and nauseous. There was no time to look at the stars.
I pushed Katy on the swings as hard as I could. I wasn’t able to make her twirl, swing,crash and rock all at the same time. Katy will be a better mom than I am. I hope she’ll take me to the park again.
Colin had taken Sophie to the jungle gym. When I walked over, he was perched at the top of the slide, Sophie seated on his lap, paws up, tail wagging. It wasn’t their first time.
And then we decided it was time to go. We got back to the car, realized Sophie had taken a detour, and Colin had left the leash on the monkey bars, and that none of us wanted to help find either, but we did.
I didn’t write down the last time Katy asked to hold my hand while crossing the street. I didn’t take a picture the last time Colin opened a present he thought was from Santa Clause.
Tonight, I went to the playground with Colin, Katy, Sophie and Sheldon.
I can’t tell you what the stars looked like, or if they’ve filled up the sandbox yet.
But I can tell you that tonight I found out Katy is incredibly strong, and Colin is still the magical boy who can convince Sophie the Scared to sit on his lap and slide all the way to the bottom.
Then get her to do it again.
The Day After Winter
April 19, 2015
Sunday April morning in New England, I am at Houghton’s Pond, in Canton, Massachusetts.
Even though only it’s fifty degrees, (in reality it’s maybe fifty degrees in direct sun, probably more like forty if you actually checked on a thermometer, I don’t have that app on my phone yet,) people wear shorts, or tank tops, or flip flops.
Everywhere I look, there are shivering shoulders and chalk white thighs, pale feet, curled toes, owned by faces pointed upwards towards the sun.
While I take Sophie the Sun Starved round the water, I find myself squinting. I’m not used to all this light. I get warm fast, and tie my sweatshirt around my shoulders.
On the way home, I will pick up lawn bags, bulbs, dirt, stuff to feed the dirt, maybe a book about what to do with the bulbs and dirt, and I will celebrate the way Home Depot intended.
Or at least until I’ve gotten the yard cleared of Sophie’s leftovers, mysterious shards of plastic, and sweet musty piles of leaves. There is no snow left in our back yard.
I can handle the leftovers.
Yesterday it was explained to me that I am actually insane for insisting someone eat scrambled eggs and toast for dinner instead of frosted flakes.
Today, when I picked up the other one from after
school at 4:30- she reminded me about a band concert this evening, except I’d never heard about the concert in the first place.
After we established that- yes, there was going to be concert that every other family with a band loving child in Milton knew about, and my daughter really, really wanted to attend, the possibility was again mentioned that perhaps I’m losing my mind, because of course she would have mentioned it, I mean , Mooooom– (Mom, I have to wear black pants, a white button down shirt, and it has to be clean, mom, like real people’s clean, and I need socks, I forgot about the socks, and shoes, black shoes, and they have to be… )
All explained to me one hour before she was due at the high school to practice.
It was a lovely concert. I was introduced to the band director, had the chance to see some good friends. So many of the kids on the stage I’ve had the pleasure of being in the audience for- either a Celebration of Spring Chorale, or Holiday concert, or Easter Egg Hunt or Isn’t Our Town the Best Town in the Whole World Parade or The Annual Mother’s Day March for Peace .*
The music was unexpected, for me anyway. The different bands performed the works of modern composers. I heard hope, terror, joy, grief, got a glimpse of spring, with just the right touch of “Let it Go”. (I think it’s going to years and years before the fans of that song take the advice spelled out in the chorus.)
The two people the closest to me have told me that I am completely insane and totally losing my mind.
Either one of those two statements might have really pissed me off, except- well, they reached this consensus a long time ago, and somehow I still remember to pick someone up for practice and sign someone else’s test and I’m the only one that ever remembers to feed the dog.
And somehow, I don’t point these points out to them on an hourly basis.
But I am really happy listening to the band, I even plan to tape the recital. I love cheering for the team, whatever the season. “Go Team” is ok, as long as I don’t use any names. Or at least not his name.
It’s been a good day.
And tomorrow, there is nothing on my calendar. No one needs a ride. No one needs anything baked, or bought, or delivered or signed.
Tomorrow’s going to be great.
*At the annual Mother’s Day March for Peace, moms aren’t the audience, we are organizers and leaders, some of us sharing and spilling grief, some of us are there to listen, a lot of us sing. And while we march, everyone keeps an eye on the children, who tag along behind, or limp beside, sweaty sticky palms inside someone’s slightly bigger palm, or race ahead, carrying signs, calling to friends, not looking for us at all, (because they know we are somewhere). Pretty similar to all of the other special days, I guess, except our name is in the title. And for the record, dad’s are welcome.
julierichmond 