Last night I learned that Barb, whose kids are finally out of the house, is thinking about getting a divorce. Her husband doesn't want to do anything, ever, and she's ready to live. She made the bargain, right? Have the kids, devote every lovin' second to them, and when they fly-be-free you get to fly-be-free. That's the deal, isn't it?
Many, many of my friends have kids. Almost none of them have teenagers. Many, many of my friends have Facebooks. Again, none of them actively live with teenagers.
When I moved back to where I grew up, I wasn't psyched with the potential to run into former childhood friends and classmates. It's not that I hated high school, I liked it well enough, I was one of the crowd, voted Best Sense of Humor and Munchiest (not pot related, it was a cute stab at my chunky frame and propensity to steal other people's food at snack break). Ahem.
Last Friday night, I had a function to attend. A fancy one.
So I picked out my best posh frock, scrounged for the diffuser attachment to my hairdryer (living under the towels in the hamper) and primped and buffed like I haven't done in a while. I looked good, really good.
Last weekend, the 5er and I played a little hide n' seek. Brilliantly, I hid on the stairs to the basement and shut the door. I seriously giggled at my smartitude. Not so brilliantly, I didn't realize that it would mean that I couldn't hear him yelling my name from upstairs. Likewise for the breaking-down-into-uncontrollable sobs when he couldn't find me and assumed I had just decided to leave the game, the house ... and him. Cue the cuddling and guilt-ridden cookie baking.
So imagine my horror when I realized at work today that no one was going to be home when the 5er got off the bus.
Fresh from the Buddy Walk this weekend, where our team raised over $2k for Down Syndrome Association of MN in the name of Jake's best buddy Aidan. I love the walk, everyone is so happy and friendly. There's no denying the challenges of a Down's kid, but there's also no denying special light they bring. Aidan would have high-fived every lovin' walker if his Mom would have let him, all 5,000.
Usually I also love the walk because it gives me a chance to catch up on the gossip of our shared friends. But this one left me drained as we traded news of miscarriages, 4ers diagnosed with genetic disorders, husbands with cancer, potential autistics and the like. I couldn't help but look at my healthy, tall, thick-haired boys and feel like I didn't deserve the lottery I'd won. And then I started to feel like maybe I haven't really won, that maybe I just haven't lost yet ... that something must be coming.
When those letters come home from school, those clean sheets of paper announcing a found case of lice in your school, how do you react?
Are you like me, thinking that of course your house is clean enough, of course your above average children would never be the ones with bug hair, taking note but not much else?
Here's the deal: I'm not a frivolous girl. I occasionally over-spend at Target (just one more pair of yoga pants won't break the bank) but tend to spend my cash wisely. Lovin' the deals at Marshall's, I might splurge on a great piece from Anthropologie now and again.
Food, we spend top dollar for. Heaven and earth opening up to swallow me might be the only way to put a halt to that.
And like every family, we budget and pinch and conserve where we can, putting more cash towards the kids and their sports/schools/dramatic productions than to luxury villas by the sea.
So when the hub told me that the car would be going in to get a few things fixed, I thought OK, no biggee. It turns out that beyond an oil change and fan blower adjustment, he had the cruise control fixed. To the tune of $700.
I watched the Sarah Palin speech last night. First of all, you should know that I am the voter they all court: an undecided independant who votes along personal lines, not party lines. I had a completely a-political upbringing as my mother is a Canadian citizen, she couldn't vote in American elections so she ignored them.
I've watched Obama and Biden, and found things that I like and dislike. Likewise with Palin and McCain.
