Off to the Wild Yonder...

Could I be in a better mood? Tomorrow morning I'm leaving for the beach, for our annual camping trip with friends and family.  And I mean, my whole family. It's been awhile since all three of my kids have been on this trip with us - sometimes, Casey hasn't made it, and, of course, Matt has missed a couple too.  But this year, not only are all three of them with us, each of them is bringing a friend, too, so we'll have a campsiteful.  The trailer, two tents, and enough food to survive the apocalypse. We're on our way.

Don't get me wrong, it's not the actual camping I'm psyched about. Camping is a lot of work. Particularly the getting ready part: the shopping and the cooking and the packing and the constant checking and re-checking of the master list, in an effort to not find yourself 50 miles from civilization with a 24-pack of hot dogs and no mustard.  But I shouldn't complain too much, at least we're not sleeping in a tent. I'm far too old to drag my body off the ground in the middle of the night, to trudge through the mud to pee, every hour on the hour.  Plus, I'm a major whiner about the cold and the wet, which is pretty standard for camping in the Pacific Northwest.  Give me my heated trailer and no one gets hurt.

In the end, though, I love it. I bitch and moan but I always have a great time. Once we get settled in, I love sitting around the fire, tucked into my Jim Forman parka, camp coffee in my mug; I love the kids running in and out of the campsite, enjoying a kind of freedom that exists in no other place or time.  I love my friends laughing, sharing memories of the past nine years we've taken this trip, catching up with those we only see this one time a year. I love curling up next to John at night in the most uncomfortable bed on earth, falling asleep to the sounds of everyone settling down for the night.

I'm pretty sure though, that this year, I'm really going to love having to cook and clean and set up and break down and keep track of...six kids.

Have a great weekend, everyone!

Post-It Note Tuesday

Letting Go...A Little

This afternoon, I took Matty up to his dad’s old house to pick up a few of his things. It hadn’t occurred to me, before today, how hard this has been on my kid.

The moment we arrived, me with my organized plan of action, because that’s what I do, his entire mood changed. He went from being his usual laid-back self to an agitated, irritable grouch, stomping around the house and closing himself in his old bedroom. When I tried to talk to him, he snapped at me that I was confusing him, that he didn’t know we had to go through all this stuff….

…suddenly I realized that I was asking my son to clean out his life.

Everything there - everything - is a reminder of his father and what happened. Every poster he has to take off the wall is a stab in that still open wound – the one you’d never know he had if I didn’t tell you. He’s so nonchalant about his loss, normally, that sometimes I even forget for a minute that he is still mourning.

But not today. Today it was all there; I could feel his anger and resentment, even if he wouldn’t openly share it with me. I tried to explain that things needed to get done in order to settle the estate – as gently as I could...but I could tell I was making everything worse.  Finally, I went out to the truck and called John for advice. He was right: leave him alone. Don’t make him do anything he’s not ready to do. Don’t worry about the grandfather and the money and all that crap. Just let him get his stereo and a teddy bear and let him leave.

So I went back in and told him we didn’t have to do anything at all today. And I left him to his own space for awhile. I sat in the truck with the rain pelting down on my windshield, the world outside blurred like melted crayons between sheets of wax paper. I stared into nowhere and listened to an old 80’s song I didn’t recognize, but the tone and the beat took me back to another time and place.

There was a time I loved his dad, even if I was 17 and desperate to be in love. Even if I fell in love with him for all the wrong reasons – the same reasons I came to hate him years later. There were times we laughed and dreamed together, times I felt like I would never love anyone as strongly or as surely as I loved him then.

Later, there were times I believed he was a good father. For all the things that made me insane, every once in awhile we would see eye to eye, or he would do something for Matt that made me grateful, even jealous sometimes. But mostly, it was so much anger and bitterness that I couldn’t find the good for all I tried.

And now he’s gone. I wished for this more times than I can bear to remember. He’s gone and he’s out of my hair and I can raise my kid the way I think he should be raised and the arguing is over and…and….

…my little boy just lost his dad.

I cried for the man who was the father of my son, and for the boy who will grow up without him. I allowed the anger to fade into sadness for awhile, and to tell Kenneth this:

You will miss so much. You will miss our son becoming a great man, and making you proud. I am grateful that your leaving brought him back to me, but when all is said and done, I wish you were here.

How on Earth Did We Survive Before???

Crazy.

My computer started to get sick last week, and like a small child, it got worse as each day went on. I tried to nurse it, to defrag and compact and reboot it, but nothing worked.  I got up early and spent hours trying to soothe it, make it better.

Alas, I lost. I gave in and took it to the doctor  fix-it guy and prepared to either hand over every cent to my name, or leave it there for burial and start shopping for a new one.

I got lucky, I think. My fix-it guy is awesome, which is why I go there. He just charged me what appears to be about a third of the standard cost to patch up my CPU and make it run like new (which is relatively equal to the cost of an entirely new machine, I'm pretty sure.) I mean, "new" is like six years old, so it's not exactly running at the speed of light, but it's better. 

I hope.  I haven't actually got it back yet, so I'm here at the public library in a really uncomfortable chair, with a weird monitor that is hard to look at, a keyboard that is going to give me carpal tunnel in just this short hour, and some smelly guy next to me.

Hence, this brief update and a promise to return soon.  Fingers crossed.

After all, we have Little League tournament Championships coming up this weekend and, being the current League Title holders, I might have some bragging writing to do.   Go Pirates!!!

New Place in Town

My buddy Jaired and his friend are starting up a new restaurant. They're only in first grade, but I think their menu is pretty impressive so far:

Reservations, anyone?

It's Okay - #2

This is my second shot at It's Okay. I stole this idea from Whispering Writer, over at Airing My Dirty Laundry, who stole it from Glamour Magazine. They have a section called "Hey, It’s Okay" - a list of a bunch of things to be okay about. I really like this, because I'm working so hard on trying to be OKAY with everything in my life/head/heart and to stop judging myself for everything I say/do/feel.

When your kid is pitching and his best friend slams a double off him, it's okay to stick your tongue out at his mom across the bleachers.

It's okay to eat sushi and teriyaki in the same day, even if both included tempura side dishes.

It's okay to enjoy teaching kids who want to be in school, and not so much, the ones who don't.

It's okay to sit on Expedia for an hour, planning trips you can't remotely afford, because hope is a really powerful thing.

It's okay to cheat on Sudoku if it's late at night and you won't be able to sleep unless you finish the puzzle.  Only one number, though.

It's okay to be insanely happy that your teenager chose to have dinner with the family, over his friends, even if it was a free dinner out.

I'm at a Loss for Words...almost!

A year or so ago, the folks at John's office gave us a gift certificate to a mountain spa resort about an hour and a half from here.  We kept it tacked to the bulletin board, not noticing that months after month, we found reason not to take two days out of our "busy" life to enjoy it.  On the spur of the moment (almost - it was only about five days in advance) we decided to go this weekend.

Normally, I would write a big, long, too-detailed account of our little getaway, but I thought I'd just tell you about it in pictures (with a caption or two.)

We pulled up to our new home Friday evening...

which really took our breath away as we entered.

The we thought we'd go find a good place to have dinner, and we found this. 

We had some amazing beef stew with homemade bread here, washed down with good beer and local wine.

 ~~~~~~~~ 

On Saturday we headed up to Mt. Rainier National Park, and saw a little of this

  

and some of these

 and hiked through this

to get to this old homestead built in the 1800s.

 We drove further up into the park, and the temperature started to drop. It was pretty cold by the time we got here...

then it was freezing by the time we reached this one...  

 ...see the snow?...

...and this is where the whining started...as in, we're not hiking up here, right?

At this point, we were starving, so we headed back down, out of the park, and stopped here for dinner.  Mmmm....veal picatta and cabernet !

 When we got back "home" we John built this...

and the crackling serenaded us (in harmony with the frogs and crickets outside)

while we sat in the jacuzzi

...for two hours....

 

at which point we were hungry again.

As I'm sure you can imagine, after all that, we were exhausted!

I hope your weekend was even half as good as mine!!

Why Teenagers Hate Us

I just got back from taking Matt to the airport for a redeye flight to Mississipi. This weekend, he will join his dad's extended family for another memorial service.

These past few weeks in our home have been good, but not really normal, if that makes any sense.  We have managed to get along with each other famously, as if we had never had issues before. But because of the grieving and the weirdness of his being back here so suddenly, we haven't really talked about anything. In fact, we talk very little. I am so hyper aware of not rocking the boat that I hardly say more than "How was your day?" and "I love you".  Still, it is calm, and good.

On our drive to SeaTac tonight, just Matt and me, we had a nice chat, though. He asked me to help him look into some pre-college work he can do. (He asked me for help!). We had to stop by his dad's house to pick up the urn - his dad's ashes - so that he could carry them on the plane.  For whatever insane reason, CFIL (cantankerous father-in-law) didn't want them shipped or mailed, so Matt had to carry them on the plane.  This was fine; we had them all sealed up properly for the airlines and TSA, and the box fit perfectly in an old backpack that Matt's dad used to carry around.

As we were leaving the house, I asked him if he was ok.  I mean, how weird is that, to be carrying your dad's ashes around in a wooden box in a backpack? I'm good, he said.

Then, walking through the airport, out of the blue, he says,

"This is weird."
"What's that?" I ask.
"Carrying this backpack.  With my dad in it. He used to carry this backpack around everywhere, all the time. I bet he never thought he'd be going to Mississippi riding in his own backpack."

I think my burst of laughter was appropriate, because he smiled. He was trying to be funny. I squeezed his hand and said,

"Yep, it's weird. But you still have your sense of humor.  Your dad would like that."

I stuck around while he was going through security, just to make sure he got through ok, with the box of ashes and all.  There are actually regulations for carrying human remains on an airplane, in case you didn't know.  I watched him take his shoes off and then he disappeared behind a pillar while getting all checked through.

The next thing I hear is some guy yelling,

"I said, PULL YOUR PANTS UP! I DON'T WANT TO SEE YOUR UNDERWEAR!"

I rush down to where I can see Matt from around the wall, and I realize the guy is yelling at him. 

Some idiot at TSA, is yelling at a teenager, at midnight, in the airport, carrying his dad's freakin' ashes in a box, to pull up his pants.

You have got to be fucking kidding me.

I thought I was going to come unglued. Had I not been afraid of being arrested for some other heinous crime, like standing up for my kid, I'd have blown a gasket all over the guy.

As it was, I just stood there and started to cry.  Another TSA guy came over to me and nicely handed me a screwdriver and told me that Matt had it in the backpack and he coudn't carry it on the plane. I wanted to stab his eyes out with it, but I just said, thanks.

Then I asked him if he was a supervisor. He could see I was crying, and he said he wasn't one, but he'd get me one if I needed him to.

"No," I said, sniffing, "it's just that that guy over there is yelling at my kid to pull his pants up. Is there some breach of security that his boxers are showing?"

"No, ma'am, no, it's just that it's not real appropriate for the airport."  (Evidently school, the general public and everywhere else on earth is ok)

"Yea," I said, starting to cry harder, "he's 17. He's carrying his dad's ashes in that backpack. Maybe that guy could lighten up a little."

The nice TSA man looked over at the asshole TSA man and nodded his head, and he looked like he might say he was sorry, but I walked away.

I cried all the way to my car; people must have thought I had just bid farewell to one of the many soldiers in the airport tonight.  I sat in my car and cried until all my makeup was gone and I thought I could drive home without a major accident.

I made it ok, and I realized that the tears weren't so much about the mean TSA man. I had my little breakdown because my kid was leaving. Again. Already. I can hardly bear saying goodbye every morning when he goes to school, and here is, leaving for four whole days, when I only just got him back.

I know he's coming back, I know I'm being silly and dramatic.

Still. 

The guy at TSA? 

No wonder teenagers hate us.

Post-It Note Tuesday

Shit. I Knew This Would Happen.

Can you hear that? That wind-like sound, getting louder and louder?

It's me.

Getting sucked into Facebook.

I tried to stay away, I really did.

I said it was too hard.

I said it was too time consuming.

I said I didn't care what 213 of my most intimate "friends" were doing at any given time of the day or night.

I said, when hell freezes over.

Damn, it's cold in here.

Take a Minute...

In the midst of our own personal traumas, sometimes it seems overwhelming to attend to the needs of others, too. Like, for instance, if your ex-husband dies and your estranged son comes home, you might not have the energy to comfort your good friend, whose baby niece is in the hospital with an undiagnosed blood disorder.  Or the friend whose son was killed in a car crash, or the one whose Dad finally gave in to the long months of cancer. 

We've been racking up the trauma over here in our circle of friends, I'll tell ya.  But not once have we been so consumed with our own pain that we haven't reached out to each other.  Maybe it's that misery loves company, maybe it's that we're grateful for the things we do have, maybe it's just that, underneath all the daily grind, we're all just really good people who care about each other, no matter what.

I read a post this morning that made me step back and remind myself that no matter what challenges are thrown our way, someone else can always use our love and support.

Check it out.

Here's my challenge to you today:

Find someone who needs a hug, and give it, with all your heart.

~ ~ ~ Happy Belated Easter, everyone ~ ~ ~

All three of my kids 
Easter, 2010

Although Easter Sunday itself was really quite nice, it's been a long, long week here. 

As a writer, I always aim to be articulate; on a good day I might strive for eloquent; on my game, I hope to be profound. Today, however, I'm just going for informative.

A week ago today, my ex-husband, Matthew's dad, died unexpectedly.  Apart from all the anger and turmoil and pain and confusion my son is feeling, he is suddenly without a father and is completely displaced from his home.  So, as would be normal in most other families, he has moved in with us again.  If you remember, this is as far from normal as our family could get.

I'd love to be able to say that I, too, am sad for the loss of this man, but I can't get there yet.  Too many years of garbage between being in love with him and today.  As you can imagine, we're all upside down, in our own ways. But I'm not grieving a loss so much as I'm in a state of weird, subdued panic/anxiety/hope.  Wish I could explain it better...as I said, I wasn't even hoping to be articulate.

A week ago, my son and I were barely speaking to each other.  He lived in another town and we had no contact at all for over 10 months.  Today, he is back in our house, eating at our table, getting up and going to school with Jack -  whether any of us was ready for this or not.  Talk about immersion learning.

So we're getting through this day by day.  It's been ok, I guess. He's grieving, of course, and probably still a little in shock, too, but felt ready to go back to school today.  He has a new, supportive group of friends.  He's been really, really nice to all of us since he got here. We've hugged and said "I love you" more than I can ever remember. It almost seemed normal, when the five of us sat down and played Uno after dinner last night.

It's not permanent, at least not yet.  It's logical, of course, that he moves back in and stays here, but I know from past experience that making that happen will be a bit like making mercury stay in the thermometer when the glass has been broken.  I'm not sure where else he'd go - the girlfriend's, a friend's, there's no telling. He can't go back to the house his dad lived in and he's in a position to keep it for himself, even if he will be 18 in just six months.  I'm sure we'll figure it out, as we navigate through these next few weeks getting our new life in order. I'm just hoping that whatever it is that we decide, it will be the right thing for all of us and not cause a whole new rift.

So I'm trying to balance hope with realism, and blessings with curses. I can't tell you how many times over the years I've wished his father dead, and now I'm the poster child for Careful What You Wish For. The nightmare of managing the estate in Matt's best interest (with the cantankerous ex-father in law) is already causing me angina, and it's hardly even started.  The logistics of moving him back into our home when we never expected - ever - that he would return, are a bit tricky. We no loner have a bedroom for him; we must create one out of Jack's playroom and figure out what to do with a boatload of stuff, old and new.  But then, I think, who cares? He's back! Which is great, right? It's what I wanted, right?

But it wasn't supposed to happen like this. Not out of the blue, not without preparation and healing and a plan, not because of some horrible tragedy, not because he has to.

It will all be ok, right? In the end, everything will work itself out. We will get through this like we've gotten through the past two years: trial and error, ups and downs, living and learning.  Today, I was just happy to get up and make breakfast for both my boys, and watch them walk to the bustop, like in the old days.

I'll take that, for now.

Jack finds an egg - the hiding places are getting a little more challenging these days...

Why is this ok, when usually, we don't eat off the floor?

My Easter present: Matt and Elle hanging out with us at home.

I Swear It's True

So this is what I get for not blogging/reading for long periods of time: I was nominated for an award and I didn't even know it!!!  Hello?!? That's my first one ever, and it's been sitting our there for  a month...my mother would be mortified at how late this thank-you note is:

Thanks to Little Ms. J for mentioning me in her Creative Blogger Award post.  She thinks I might have creative thoughts to offer in the challenge to give SIX LIES AND A TRUTH about myself. After you read them, all of you are supposed to guess which is the truth, and which are the things I creatively invented in my little head.

So here goes:

1.  I was suspended from a private school twice in the 8th grade, for smoking in the bathroom.

2.  I finished graduate school on the Dean's List, with a 3.9 GPA.

3.  My mom taught me to burp the alphabet forwards and backwards, Sometimes, we do it together at parties.  She taught Jack how to do it, too.

4.  I was arrested for disorderly conduct in my early 20s, while out partying with friends.  We were drunk (duh) and disturbing the peace. I spent the night in a jail in Santa Barbara and had to hock my moped to pay the fine.

5. I'm a closet Halo player, even though I outwardly hate computer games of any kind.

6. In 12th grade, I was impeached as President of the Pep Club because I was too bossy and too lazy. How can you be both?  

7. I balance my bank book in my head and am rarely ever wrong.

~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~

That wasn't as easy as I thought it would be. Seriously: you try it! I hereby nominate

Whispering Writer at Airing my Dirty Laundry

Joanne at I [Heart] Arugula

My new BF, Heidi, at Some Mad Hope

ED at Eternally Distracted, who, I'm certain, will find it nearly impossible to make up anything we won't believe.

Thanks again, Ms. J; I'm honored!

BOOK REVIEW

Some Kind of Normal
by Heidi Willis

I knew less than nothing about diabetes when I opened this book, and to be honest, didn't have much of an interest in learning. But I was immediately taken in by the story of Ashley, Babs Babcock's 12 year old daughter, who is slowly being eaten away by the disease. I became so entrenched in Babs' own desperate search for knowledge and understanding that I actually paid attention to all of the medical details, as if I might be able to help her myself.

From the moment this heart wrenching story opened, I fell in love with Babs, through the voice that Willis has given her. Willis has a tremendous gift of dialogue, and a way with dialect that I have seldom experienced. Babs is one of the most realistic literary voices I have ever read; there is no way to describe it but raw. And so human, it almost hurts. I often felt as though I were reading a dear friend's diary, instead of a novel. She puts up no pretenses, and apologizes for nothing, yet still manages to doubt herself more than she ever needs to.

The characters in Babs' life are remarkably true also; from Travis, her faith-bound husband, to Logan, her steadfast, yet wayward son, to Dr. Benton, her angel in disguise, Babs asks - no, demands - that we know them all as well as she does, and that we love them all with her same intensity. And she leads us to discover that the story isn't about diabetes at all, or about controversial research, or really even about faith. It's about the love a mother has for her children, and the strength we find within ourselves to get up every morning and hope again, when we're certain there's no hope left.

In moments of panic and desperation, Babs will make you laugh out loud with her honesty and absolute simplicity. But don't be fooled by her candid humor; you're going to need the Kleenex, too.

I love this book.

It wasn't one I would have chosen on my own, though. Heidi is friends with my friend Karma, and the last time they were together, Karma got me a signed copy. I started following Heidi's blog then, and we became cyber friends. Her book was still on my TBR list when I heard she was coming to visit, in RL! I thought, Crap! I better read that book! I don't want to be sitting there at the dinner table faking an intelligent conversation!

And I am so glad I did.

Jackyl and Hyde

As much as I love him to death, my kid's a walking contradiction.

On Monday, he got in trouble twice at school.  Once for coming in to finish a test and then not actually doing it, at all, but bothering all the kids around him instead. The second offense was to move his desk away from a girl he didn't want to sit next to.  Sounds innocent, even responsible, don't you think? Yea, me too. Then I heard the other side of the story - the teacher's - and I had to agree that scooting one's desk repeatedly and loudly during a quiz, and giggling while one does it, and drawing attention to oneself deliberately in the process, wasn't exactly responsible. Anyway, so there he was, busted again.

As a result, he has to stay after school tomorrow to finish the test. And, his consequence at home was that he was grounded until that test was done. Fair enough.

That was until I realized that he still hadn't found the $70 pair of Converse basketball shoes he lost a week ago. Crap! Now I have to impose the consequence for that, too!  So, figuring he's already grounded this week, I decided to have him work off some of the cost of the shoes, since he didn't seem to be making much of an effort to look for them.

When he got home from school today, I told him this, and I suggested that since he was dying to go outside, he could wash my car.  Good lord, you would have thought I'd said he should clean a septic tank barehanded.  He started crying and stomping. In between sobs, he'd spit out "I don't want to wash the car."

Everyone together, now, what was my response?

"I didn't ask you if you wanted to wash the car, I asked you to do it." Firm, yet calm.

But the meltdown continued until I left the house to find solace in the little nursery down the road.  After all, it was a gorgeous day and I could be outside planting, not in here, listening to this temper tantrum.

When I got home, the car was almost finished.  I was so proud! I thanked him, then gave him the rest of the Pay Off the Sneakers List: clean the cat box, take out the garbage, empty the dishwasher.

Waaaaah!!!!!  It starts up all over again. Throws himself on the couch. Sobs into my silk pillows, snot and all.  I ignore him; after how many years of this parenting thing, I'm finally learning the art of not escalating a situation.

Finally, he calms down.  He does all the chores. I even hear him singing at one point.  When he's all done, I let him go outside to shoot hoops for a bit.  Alone, of course.

I sat down for a few minutes to think about how I should handle this stuff in the future.  How am I going to help him become more responsible? Stop throwing fits when he has to do things he doesn't like? Oh my God! Is he going to end up a delinquent too??? Will he ever be able to accomplish anything ???

But just as my own tailspin began, the one where I take one bad moment in the present and transform it into an entire lifetime of bad behavior, I had to regroup and make dinner.

After all, we didn't want to be late to the Awards Ceremony at school.  You know, for Honors Society: where the members all maintain at least a 3.5 GPA, participate in a community project, act as leaders and role models for their peers and generally shine above the rest of the world  behave well and achieve great things.

And there he is.  The same kid who tore half his room up in protest of basic manual labor, who couldn't get his shit together in class and got himself a detention, showing us his Honors Society Certificate.

Go figure.  At the end of the day, he's a pilar of society.

Keepin' Busy

Ahhhh...lapsing again...just haven't had much to say lately. This doesn't excuse my not reading, though, so please don't ditch me if I haven't been over to your blog in awhile.  I got a little nudge from my friend Karma, who has a gazillion other things to read beside my blog (she's finishing her B.A.) but who dropped me an email asking why I hadn't written lately.

Actually, I've sort of been busy. I've been working, for God's sake. Like, at a paying job, outside my home.

Twice I've subbed. Two whole days so far.  Frankly, I'm exhausted.  Have you ever taught kindergarten?  See, you know what I mean.

But I've also been doing my Julie McCoy thing with Kim's Book Signing and having a blast with that.  I love saying "I have a meeting", like I'm going to a glass-walled conference room on the 30th floor of some swank building downtown, where someone will bring me coffee and croissants while I impress bigwigs with my Powerpoint skills.

In reality, I'm walking over to Kim's house, to sit with her and her staff - that would be her friend Jacqueline, her hub Josh, and me -  around her kitchen table, each of us with our own travel mug of homemade coffee, scribbling notes on lined notebook paper and mostly shooting the shit about her trip to Hawaii.  (I've not once asked to hook the projector up to her TV; they don't know what they're missing.)  Seriously, though, we have planned an awesome day and I can't wait! I love being friends with a Practically Famous Author.  

And I've also been carting Jack and all his buddies all over the place from basketball to baseball and back again, and cheering like a lunatic at all the games - even though I appear to be the only mom doing it so loudly. Whatev. They need support. Last week, they lost 51-24 and I had to drive home with three teary-eyed boys in the back seat. 

I love that my kid is an athlete, though.  I'm all about being the soccer mom (God I hate that word) and their biggest cheerleader.  I was not, in any way, shape, or form, an athlete as a kid. In highschool, I couldn't even make the cheerleading squad because I thought all you had to do was yell and smile. I didn't realize you couldn't be fat and completely out of shape.  Total discrimination, I say. But I digress. 

Because of this, I kind of taught myself was forced to hate athletes.  It was the only defense I had against feeling like a total slug. As I got older, though, not being into sports became one of my big Life Regrets, especially now, when I struggle every day with staying active and eating healthy.  So when I popped out this kid who lives and breathes physical activity of all kinds, I felt like I had an opportunity to get it right.

Wait.  That came out wrong. That just painted me as the Mother Who Lives Vicariously Through Her Son, which I so am not.  I'm not sure I could be, if I tried. I guess I'm just enjoying sports for the first time in my life, and not feeling like I have to hate them all because they're out there and I'm not.

How can I live vicariously through Jack's sports when half the time I have to ask him to explain what he's doing out there?

Me: Are you playing point guard today?"

Jack (with great patience) : "Nope, Mom, not today. Today I'm a quarterback.

If Only He Had a Pair of Stolen Nikes....

How I wish I were quick enough (and technologically savvy enough) to grab my new phone that takes really good pictures and capture Jack in the car yesterday. But, aside from the fact that I was driving, I didn't think quickly and the moment was gone.

First, let me share with you one of his most annoying habits: changing the radio station no more than a minute and a half through any given song. If I didn't already have ADD, this would give it to me.

So as we're driving home from wherever, he's switching back and forth between five or six stations that - mind you - are all playing the same songs, and the volume is up way louder than I would have it, if I were to be in control of Car Music. Which I'm not, because I try to be a nice mom, and I try to choose my battles carefully these days. Car Music is not on my list of Really Important Things I Need to Control. And, when it's a song I like, I crank the volume, so really, who am I to complain?

He's "singing" along - in quotes, because Jack only knows about five words to any song. I believe this is why he changes the station...his lyric bank is a little low and he doesn't want anyone to catch on.

Anyway, out of the corner of my eye, I see his head bopping like he's a Hilltop gangsta, and I turn to see if he's doing that fake driving thing, you know, with one hand on the imaginary wheel...? Like this:


Evidently, that's what you do when you listen to music these days. I think it's the new air guitar.

But he's not gangsta driving, because his left hand is covering his ear and I think there's something wrong because his head is bowed low, almost into his lap, and his right hand is flailing around near the window like he's having a seizure. I turn fully, to make sure he's ok, and that's when I wish I had the camera phone ready.

He's fine, I see. He appears to be completely engaged in mixing some kind of sick tunes on his imaginary turntable set-up, with his left hand covering the pretend earphone (better sound definition) and his right hand squeaking the invisible record back and forth to make that eee-eee-eee sound of a perfectly good vinyl LP being ruined.

Sort of like this:




Only, not.

Joannie Rochette

I would have stayed up all night just to see this.

And I thought I was done crying.

A Moment of Hope

It's been four days since this happened, but I haven't felt much like sharing it with anyone until now. I did tell MC, since I had my counseling appointment on Tuesday and the minute I got there, I couldn't really talk about anything else. Then, of course, as soon as I opened my mouth, I just sat there and cried the entire rest of the hour. I suppose MC's office is a really good place to be if I'm going to melt down like that.

I ran into Matt on Monday, outside the highschool. If you're new here, you can read this and this to catch up. I haven't seen him since Christmas, when he stopped by unexpectedly to deliver gifts to Jack (not to anyone else in the family, mind you). He just appeared on the doorstep (with his dad no less!) as if it were perfectly normal for them to pop in on Christmas Eve. They didn't stay, but the brief foyer gift exchange was awkward enough for the whole month.

On Monday afternoon, I was killing an hour between Jack's basketball and baseball practices, and thought I'd grab a snack at the market. As I passed the highschool, I saw Matt walking along the sidewalk, all by himself, an hour after school let out.

Seeing him, I was struck with a profound sadness...much different from the anger and resentment I have felt in the past year. I was sad that he was all alone - not even any Emo/Goth/Criminal friends walking with him, not a girl, not even a teacher. Or a cop. Just Matt, all by himself.

I wondered where he was going, and why he was there so late. I wondered how he was getting home these days, since he wrecked his car in November and his Dad lives a half hour from here. I wondered what I would say to him if he would let me, if .... and then I started bawling and had to pull into the parking lot of the grocery store to get it together.

MC and MC2, my therapy partners, and I are working on feeling things. I'm supposed to let myself cry when it hits. Up until now, I've been pretty good at fighting it, because I'm sort of afraid that if I start, I won't be able to stop. I'm afraid it will become a full on breakdown, and I just can't afford that right now. I've got another kid to take care of.

But I went ahead and felt for a few minutes. I felt sad and helpless and very much like a failure, although I'm not supposed to blame myself. It's not always that easy. I sat in my car and cried for a bit, then I took a deep breath and said a prayer for him, and me, and all the moms and kids out there who have lost each other.

When I pulled back onto the road, I was looking for him. I hadn't really seen his face the first time, and I just wanted to see his face. Suddenly, he was there, sitting at a table outside the Starbucks, and before I knew what I was doing, I pulled my car into the parking lot and walked up to him. Before I could talk myself out of it, and before I could devise a plan as to what the f*%# I thought I was going to say to him.

"Hey," was a decent start.

He took his earbuds out and said "Hey," back, which I thought was a groundbreaking next step.

And our conversation went like that, about one word at a time, for a minute or two. Then I asked him if I could sit, and he let me.

I asked him if I could buy him a cup of coffee, but he said no.

Oh, I forgot. You don't need me.

He was waiting for his train - the one that doesn't come until 4:40, two and a half hours after school lets out. The one he takes every day since he lost his car.

He asked me what I was doing, and I told him. Then, without thinking, I asked if he wanted to go watch the end of Jack's practice, and he agreed.

He agreed to be with me.

He still didn't want a drink, or a snack. I wanted so much to give him something, but I settled for the company, gladly.

We drove in an awkward semi-silence over to the middle school; I asked him weird, distant questions about the classes he was taking. It was better than nothing. At the gym, we stood ten feet apart and watched practice until it was over, and the excitement of his little brother discovering him there eased us up.

Jack introduced him to all his friends, who said things like, wow, you really are tall! and I laughed inside. I was too afraid to laugh out loud, to be a part of that relationship, the only one he hasn't severed, afraid I might ruin it for Jack. Still, I giggled as the 6th graders craned their little necks to see what 6'3" looks like.

When it was time to go, the little guys piled into the back seat and Matt sat up front with me, chatting with them. We drove him to the train station, where Jack got out and hugged him. They exchanged I love yous, then Matt leaned his head back into the car and said,

"Thanks for the ride."

"I love you," I said.

"I love you too."

Oh yes, he did.

And then he was gone. It wasn't all better. It wasn't anywhere near normal. But it was nice.

And I was back in my real life, driving 12 year olds all over tarnation, pretending that I didn't ache every day for the first born son I somehow lost and didn't know how to find.

Maybe it's just like that. One tiny little baby step at a time. One awkward meeting that feels like strangers talking at a bus stop.

One moment.

Four words.

Post It Note Tuesday