last weekend and other musings

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I think I am starting to come out of my funk. I have decided to do something about my sugar intake and overall nutritional health. I think those things are important and I think I have been in denial about them both for a long time. I am also going to try and lose some weight which is not something I typically like to focus on because I am not sure it is that healthy mentally for me but I think I will be more comfortable not carrying around this extra 20 pounds.
We had a great weekend, although I was still a little cranky. Gary had his festival this weekend and all of the members of his old band were there. It was fun and it was really nice to see old friends. The kids had a great time, including Molly who was front and center dancing. Sadie discovered a huge hula hoop and hula hooped for three hours straight and Nora played with friends she just randomly made. Jonah was a little cranky until Gary started playing and then he got his guitar and played along with him on our blanket for his whole 90 minute set. It was sweet.
I realize how far our lives have come when I am at festivals like this. The amount of drinking and drugs is astonishing to me and although I was never a pot smoker to begin with I think I am more aware of it now. That part was a bummer.
We stayed in a nice hotel and then in the morning laid around all morning, ate breakfast in bed and watched the Three Stooges. That was my favorite part I think.
We went in to Amherst on the way home to show Molly UMASS Amherst and I think she liked it. She kept talking about how old everyone would be when she went to college and we figured out that Sadie would be 10 and Nora would be 7 and Jonah would be 5 and that kind of weired us all out. Then we talked about things she could major in and what dorm life would be like. Amazing how fast her young life has gone by.
We went to Amethysts Brook in Pelham for a long hike and we had a really wonderful time there. Sadie found this tree that was all hollowed out and she was able to climb up in to it and she thought that was really cool and Nora and Jonah had fun jumping in and out of the brook. I think Molly gets thoughtful at times like these and she was in her own little world. We were also tired at that point. Here are some pictures from the weekend.

Cranky homeschoolers

Today I had to go to the doctors for a couple things that I have been putting off for months now. We woke up late and Gary is away and I don't know the full moon has been looming over us all or something but man, we were all cranky. I made Jonah a nice warm bath which usually puts him in a great mood for the day, fed everyone bagels and ran out the door.
In the waiting room of the doctors there was a mother doting all over her two babies and a few other singles waiting. I was cranky and so were the girls. I don't know, we just could not get our groove today. One wanted me to read one book and then the other complained that I never read her books and the fight started (oh the fight!! can't we make it through this without the fight???)
So I told them that we were all cranky and that we should all kind of look over separate things and after the appt we would converge at the park and hopefully the outside and the sun would help us feel better. They seemed somewhat ok with this plan with only minimal wanking.
As I got called, three kids following me with long faces, I could hear the nurses in the nurse's station talking about homeschooling. I knew they were talking about me. Oh great, I thought, now not only do I have to be mom with kids but I have to do the whole homeschooling mom with kids thing too, ugh, not in the mood.
The nurse comes in a looks at all our long faces and says, "wow, it must be really hard homeschooling three kids."
Excuse me, did I invite this conversation? I am actually here about my Achilles tendon thanks.
I just smiled and said, "Actually no, it's not and I have four kids, one is not here currently."
I hated her.
I didn't mean to hate her, but I did.
She proceeded to tell me how she looks forward to the moment she boots her kids out the door everyday and all the benefits there are to school.
School, bah humbug, long faces, scowl.

I realized today that no matter what mood I am in, no matter what my children are saying or doing, it all comes down to their experience of homeschooling. If my children are having a long faces kind of day, homeschooling. If my children are reciting the presidents in order, homeschooling. If my children are struggling in a group of friends, homeschooling. If my children are excelling at sports, homeschooling.

Everybody has good and bad days, even us homeschoolers.
Just for the record we did go to the park and then had a sort of ok day. We were still kind of cranky. We had a cranky day. There's always tomorrow.
Tomorrow we are going to a music festival. My husband will be one of the feature performers, how cool is that. He took Molly to NYC this week for another big show he had opening for Collective Soul and my 15 year old was exposed to all sorts of cool things that if she had been sitting at a desk she would have missed. Here is her with some famous guy, I don't know who but she does:)

Newport!

Here is another unsettling day for me. Today was your standard run of the mill Tues. I work in the middle school most of the day and then come home at 2 and do the sports stuff with the kids. It was just like any other day but for some reason as it moved along there was an overcast sky moving in my direction and as the sun approached and as the wind actually really did die down this afternoon I felt Eeyore like gloom and doom. Where am I? What am I doing here? Where am I going to?
Molly has been reading this book and it embodies teenage angst and despair and I found myself reading passages from it today and relating. Why am I here doing this?
So I did all the right things, ate a great dinner, talked with family, read books to the girls, hugged Jonah a lot and then I went to the gym and ran for a long time and then I knew I was really back there, in that place, because not even the running, the passage of time with feet against pavement, the sweating, the pouring my soul out, not even that made me feel better. In fact I felt worse.
So now I am here trying to figure it all out.
I had a few bad words with John today. He was really bugging me and I was cranky to begin with. I think I called him judgmental or something.
Sadie was goofing with him before dinner and he had to have her stop because he was winded and I can't believe the things I take for granted, air in my lungs, the ability to see clearly. I'm so fixated on my weekend away and getting my hair done and John can't breathe. I can't believe it, really.
And the look on Sadie's face when he told her to stop made me want to die. It was like we had all forgotten and then had to remember, like the time Tom Flynn, this great love of mine in my early twenties broke up with me and I had to remember again every time I woke up in the morning.

Bumper Bowling

If only there were bumpers in life

We took the kids bumper bowling today with the homeschool group. They give us this great rate and we can bowl two strings of bumper bowling for $5 a kid. It’s great. I bowl everytime. I love bowling.

This bumper bowling got me thinking. If only life had bumpers. If life had bumpers, John would get diagnosed with a terminal illness and then bounce back with some super treatment, some miracle and we would all sigh from relief like we did when Nora threw that wild ball down the lane and it bounced back to be a strike. Big win for John, he lives, gets to go back to the post office and live out his days.

If life had bumpers Colleen would get diagnosed with autism and then suddenly bounce back, regain all language skills, move out, go to college, get married, have children.

If life had bumpers Gary would fall on his face through several years of gigs and the suddenly bounce back, get discovered, play in front of huge audiences and be recognized for his talent.

If life had bumpers I would stumble through life aimlessly falling all over myself from confusion and then suddenly know what it is I am supposed to be doing and do it. That would be cool, like the wild ball that Jonah threw that took about twenty minutes to get down the lane and then knocked nine balls down!

Nine balls!

Jonah didn’t care because he had of course moved on to the arcade part of the bowling alley and Nora was busy looking for food. Sadie bowled on like a champ and I watched on like this wild observer.

I wish I was more of a doer.

I wish I couldn’t relate to my teen clients, always dreaming of the next big thing, the bumper that will bounce me back to reality, to fun, to cool.

Tonight Gary is playing locally and I am here. I didn’t even try to get out to see him.

That concerns me.

A clean house

As a homeschooling unschooling mom I have been struggling for years now on letting go of the mess......... the mess that accrues through unfinished projects, the mess that accrues through well loved toys, the mess that accrues through lack of time and lack of energy and builds and builds in to this dusty heap depressing even the most motivated housecleaner.
I have several homeschooling friends and regular mom friends who would never dream of having anyone else come in to their home to clean it. I have felt this way for years, like if I can't manage my own home, what has my life become.
This winter was a long one. It was a winter where my home became my enemy. I no longer wanted to be in it because everywhere I looked I saw dust and stuff and yucky carpets and windows that were smudged and dark. I would find myself either leaving the house for an escape or losing my patience on those small people who call this place home and call me mother.
Gary and my best friend Ashley finally talked me in to hiring a housecleaner.
Thank God for them!!! The love me so much!
Today I came home to the cleanest house in town. It smelled clean and looked so fresh and organized. It made our day so much happier and my face so much sunnier. It gave me more time to be present with those that I love.
I know the ideal thing is to be able to let go of the mess, the go with the flow.
I think the ideal thing for me is to know myself really well and to go with that, be present with and appreciative of that unique person. I can't do it all and that's ok.

My husband Gary is a musician. This used to be a funny bone of contention. I wasn't supposed to marry a rock and roll guy. I was supposed to marry some sort of accountant or something, maybe a social worker like me. As I get older I appreciate his fun lifestyle a little more.
Gary played on Friday night and had a friend of ours, Chris sing back up vocals for him on a couple songs. This meant that some of our "adult world" friends came. It was really nice to hang out with all of my friends and weird and surreal to be intertwined with both groups of friends, the friends who I did crazy things with in my twenties and my "adult friends" who I am fairly certain did crazy things with their friends in their twenties too.
For some reason on Friday night it was not difficult to mesh my worlds and enjoy myself, maybe I am entering a more mature stage of life.