In which we celebrate eight years

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A few things I don't want to forget

Last week, upon starting her daily "besponsibilities", my daughter told me, "Just you wait, Mama, my room is gonna be as clean as a weasel!"
"You mean clean as a whistle?"
"No, as a WEASEL."
Not exactly the standard for cleanliness, but okay then.

::

Yesterday, the kids were doing that thing again where they unknowingly impersonate Garth and Kat, and my seven year old asked me to take a video of them singing. (He clearly doesn't understand the future implications of putting any such video into the hands of his parents. Thinking ahead to the teenage years, the words blackmail and extortion come to mind.)

Anyway, we were in the car, so I said no to the video. His response was, "Well, then, we're going to keep singing crazy things for hours and hours until you take a video."

"Buddy, are you threatening me?"

"Oh yeah, and we'll do it, too." (Insert maniacal laugh, followed by the breakout hit "I'm Melting Like a Popsicle--and a Snowman...and a Snowman").

::

Big brother says to little sister, regarding her progress in Spanish: "You're doing okay, but you really need to work on your pro-uh-ni-ation." (He meant pronunciation.) Oh, lo irónico!

::

The people who say that imitation is the sincerest form of flattery should've clarified exactly what's being imitated and by whom. My son has picked up on his parents' free-flowing use of sarcasm (What? Sarcasm is one of the love languages, right?), and is now throwing it regularly back in my face. He's even got the placement, intonation and timing down when he tosses in "Reeeeally?" and "Seriously..." Yes, this taste of my own medicine is quite delightful, thankyouverymuch.

::

I've been dragging the kids to the gym this summer a bit too frequently for their liking, and they are officially bored out of their minds in the childcare area. Yesterday, when I dropped them off, the boy asked how many miles I was doing, did a bit of math in his head, and then called as I left, "You better run a PR and get right back here to pick us up!"

Speaking of PRs, my friend Laura ran a pregnant PR on Sunday to win our age group. If you don't have one of those people in your life that pushes you to do whatever it is you do better, then you need to get one. Because nothing makes you want to run faster than getting beat (twice) by a pregnant lady. We've run a few long runs together (since her normal racing teammates are temporarily too fast for her), and I'm learning a ton from her as I try to ride her coat tails to hard-core-ness.

I don't write much here about running (who I am kidding? I don't write much here about anything.), so if you want to follow along with the running stuff, look for me on Daily Mile. It's a fun way to keep track of your progress and to connect with other runners, joggers, or slightly-faster-than-a-crawl-ers, whatever happens to be your happy pace.

::

My son has been looking for ways to earn money so he can build a theme park in the back yard. He just came up with a brilliant twist on the lemonade stand. He's going to go back to Nana's house, get her to teach him to sew, make like ten dress shirts--all different sizes--and sell them for $60 each. He figures he can get Nana to work for free, (and how much can the fabric and buttons really cost?), and he can pocket about $50 a shirt. That is, if he can keep distribution costs to a minimum with the road-side marketing approach. The wheels are always turning in his crazy brain. Nana, you've been forewarned.

The Entrepreneur and his Chief Production Officer

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That type of girl

I stopped at Ultra for the first time ever this morning to buy the one beauty product in my go-to lineup that you can't find at Target. It was a relatively painless experience, even with the two kids in tow.

If you'd been loitering in the parking lot just outside the store this morning, this is what you might have heard:

"Oh man, I can't believe you had the NERVE to go into that beauty store!" says the seven year old, with a half eaten PB&J hanging from his mouth.

I reply with an amused snicker and a question, "What's that s'posed to mean, Silly Goose?"

"I mean, I didn't think you're were that type of girl..."

I might have thrown my head back laughing. "That 'type of girl'?! What do you mean by that?"

"Well, just, I mean--I just didn't think you cared about beauty and that girly type of stuff."

And the most priceless part of all, little dude was certain he was giving his old mom a compliment. Because cool moms aren't the type of girl to buy fancy eyeliner. Cool moms climb trees and play along with imaginary plane rides.

In related news, there's a 747 in my hallway right now, complete with an emergency door.  And while I managed to stay put for the incredibly long and winding route to Monkey Land, don't think for a second I wasn't eying the aforementioned emergency door for the entirety of the flight. Because, yeah, I'm that type of girl.

 

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Just Write (Field Day Edition)

The most offensive thing happened this weekend when I came to pick my son up from class at church. He'd been shuffled along with the other babies his age to the third grade class, and they told him that starting this very week, he was a third grader. That's right. A third grader. Can you believe the gall? Telling outrageous lies like that to my innocent seven year old? Time is going freakin' fast enough as it is, so do me a favor, dear church lady, and give us emotionally unbalanced mothers a few extra months before you turn our infants into college graduates, mkay?

::

Today is field day for my second grader, and there is much ado about everything as we prepare for a lovely day of outdoor chaos. He just came downstairs with his special field day shirt on backwards, with the wording in the front. I tried to get him to fix it, but he was skeptical. I showed him how he had the tag in the front and reminded him that the tags are always supposed to be in the back. Still skeptical.

"They made these shirts in Florida, Mom, so they probably didn't know where the tags are supposed to go." My Virginian-born boy sounds more and more like a Yankee every day. 

::

Now field day is over and we're home again, home again, lickety split. My master plan for the day called for a trip to the gym to squeeze in a run, but the childcare folks at the gym didn't get my memo about extending the hours just for me, so I was forced to run at home in the dank, smelly, spider-infested dungeon that is my basement.

I'm transitioning into a new training approach in which I up my mileage and slow down the pace. This might prove to be more fun than I previously imagined, as I discovered today the combination of a slower, more "conversational" pace and a solitary setting (except for the spiders) allow (just hypothetically speaking) for a significant amount of lip-synching, singing, and run-dancing. And it just so happens my water bottle doubles quite nicely as a microphone. I think the spiders were taken aback at first, but they warmed up to me after four miles or so. I'll have 'em singing backup for me by the end of the week.

::

We have a half day of school tomorrow, and then BAM: Summer! Does it feel like Friday to anyone else? No? Just me? Well, whatever. Have a great weekend either way.

And since it really is Tuesday, and not actually Friday, it's the day we all Just Write.

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The Dance (Just Write)

I stretch out my hand, ask him to dance, the boy in the green button down shirt and khaki pants. He has on his "fancy shoes", the ones he asked me to buy so he could dress more like his daddy. I am half expecting him to decline again, to say he's too busy playing with his best buddy Max, or that he'd rather continue the search for wedding cake.

But he says yes, nods his buzzed head and flashes his crooked grin, his two front teeth no longer missing, but not quite halfway in.  I scrunch down a bit, feeling too tall in my strappy wedge heels, and he stands as high as his 48 inches and fancy shoes will allow. We dance like mismatched old timers, dipping our joined hands dramatically. I spin him in, then out, and back we go to making exaggerated motions with our outstretched arms. His intermittent giggling probably has something to do with the silly dancing faces I keep making while I mouth the words to "I've Had the Time of my Life."

And I can't stop smiling. My inner commentary begins: This is what it feels like to be completely happy. You must remember this forever. You have to write about this so you remember it forever. Do you know how lucky you are? Do you know how perfect this is?

Yes. Of course I know. I know it from the top of my frizzy, rained-out red hair to the red painted tips of my toes. I feel myself floating up, looking down in that weird filmmaker/ narrator way where I see the whole scene in my head, the scene where I am dancing with my son and having the time of my life. 

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On buzz cuts and unforgettable Maine

He'd been growing his hair--straight up--for six months. (See Exhibit A)

Exhibit A

When I took him to get it trimmed last night, he surprised me by announcing he wanted to buzz it again. "Are you sure?" I asked, trying to conceal my delight at the prospect of eliminating his ever-losing battle against bed head.

"Yeah," he explained as the stylist grabbed the clippers, "because I was looking at my old pictures, and I saw how I used to look, and well, it just reminds me of summer in Maine."

It took all of five minutes, and while we looked at the piles of hair on the floor, I asked him whether he felt four pounds lighter. "Oh no. Probably twenty pounds lighter. That's my guess."

"Well, I think it makes you look younger, more like my baby boy."

He swung upon the door and turned to hold it for me and his sister. "Yeah, I practically feel like I'm five again."

::

It doesn't take much, not for my boy, not for me, to be reminded of summer in Maine. The trigger might be a buzz cut, an old picture, or a cool breeze carrying the faintest scent of saltwater. If you ask me, it's unforgettable. But we hold on to plenty of pictures, just in case.

Linking up again with Momalom for 5 for 5. Today's topic: Pictures.

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On waking to endless morning hugs

He shuffled into the kitchen wearing wild morning hair on his head and a bewildered, wounded look on his face. I said good morning before I recognized his eyes were puffy not just from sleep but tears.

"Buddy, what's wrong?" I asked, pulling him in for a hug.

His shoulders started to shake and he sobbed, "I dreamed you left me all alone, and I was still just a kid."

He went on. "All I had for food was my lunchbox. And you took it away. And I asked for it back and you said no. And then I didn't have anything, and you made me go."

"And there were these clues to help me get home, but I was only four, and I didn't know how to read them..."

By now I'd picked up all fifty pounds of my seven year old, carried him to the couch as he wrapped every limb around me like a koala to a tree. "I'd never ever leave you, Buddy. Never. And I'll always take care of you. Always."

"It felt so real. It was so awful. I didn't know what to do. And I didn't understand why you made me go away all by myself." He started to cry again.

I squeezed him tighter. His little sister came closer, added herself to the morning embrace. "I dreamed that same one too, Mom, and it made me sooo sooo sad," she said. "And then I had another dream about a pirate chasing me, and that's why I didn't sleep in, and why I need extra extra morning hugs."

"Extra morning hugs!" I sang. "Step right up and get your extra morning hugs!"  This time his shoulders shook with a giggle.

We three held on tight until the sun came up, until the light of a real morning slowly replaced the dark of nightmares.

::

I intended only to write this out for my own memory sake, not to draw a conclusion or make a point. But it's hard not to draw a parallel when my son wakes up on Good Friday feeling forsaken, abandoned and alone. It of course reminds me of the nightmare Christ endured on the cross. And of the joy in that third morning when by His waking, we were offered a new reality--to escape the nightmare of defeat and despair, to awake in His enduring embrace (not just extra, but endless "morning hugs"), to live new in His limitless grace.

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In which I discover the magical cure for skinned knees {Just Write}

She runs ahead of me, hair waving like ribbons on a kite, flip-flops smacking the sidewalk, every limb moving in her watch-out-world way. I open my mouth to tell her again not to run in her flips, and oh for the love, girl, could you please be careful?

But I close my mouth, don't say a word. I could go hoarse calling her to caution while she hears only the wild in her heart. I'm trying to let go, to let her make mistakes while the stakes are still low. Not a second later, she is face down, flat on the ground.

I make that sound--the panicky breath-in-oh-no-poor-baby-are-you-okay sound--the one you're not supposed to make because it only makes things worse. I scoop her into my arms like an infant, cradling her shoulder and head with one arm while her skinned knees and shins dangle over my other arm.  She sees the blood and heightens her cry.

We have a short ride home, eight minutes and counting before we get the desperately needed princess bandaid. So I ask her, "Is there a song I could play for you, a song that would help you feel better?"

"The Me and Daddy song," she says in between gulps.

I find "Father and Daughter", turn it up. She still believes it's her own daddy singing--just to her--and I haven't the heart to tell her otherwise. One day she'll discover her father doesn't sing like Paul Simon, but not today.

The tears are gone before the chorus, but as soon as the song fades, I hear her welling up again.

"It still hurts, even worser!" she whimpers.

"You must need another song," I say. "What would you like to pick next?"

She doesn't hesitate. "I Was Made For Sunny Days."


I see in my rearview mirror her face still wet with tears, smiling wide. By the time we reach the driveway, we are singing.

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To my boy, on the eve of your Irish ancestry presentation (Just Write)

It's 11:11, and I just put the loaves in the oven. He went to bed begging to bring Irish soda bread to school tomorrow, to pass out to his class during his ancestry presentation. I told him no. Too crumbly. Too messy. Too delicate to transport in his backpack. And besides, I didn't have any buttermilk.

But then his teacher emailed back an hour ago, said he was welcome to bring even a crumbly messy treat. And I remembered how to make buttermilk with a bit of lemon juice. And then I thought of his face in the morning when he would discover the loaves, and well, I got straight to work.

Every day he grows further and further into unfamiliar territory, stretching beyond the ages I've imagined him to be, spelling words like "hygiene" and "posture" without help (though I still have to remind him to wash his hair when he showers). Sometimes I don't know what to make of it all, how this little man came to live here, and whatever happened to the baby boy who used to sleep in the crook of my arm.

I hope when he's a teenager, when perhaps he's feeling stifled or misunderstood or anxious or disconnected, I hope he remembers the morning when he was seven and in the second grade, the morning when he woke up to the sight and smell of soda bread, and to the feeling of being loved, always.

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The Dance

Her dusty brown ringlets had disappeared before the opening act, the outcome of our first experiment in gravity versus hair spray. She might as well learn early that gravity always wins.

She perched herself atop a red booster and craned her neck expectantly, eying the stage for the slightest sign of movement. She fingered the unfamiliar string of pearls  around her neck, smoothed the green and gold plaid skirt over her knees, admired her black velvet "high shoes". No matter all of it had been handed down, she owned every bit of her outfit.

"That side is fancy, and that side is fancy. All the sides are fancy. Even the sky is fancy." She said, pointing to the balconies on either side, the ceiling above.

When the organ faded lower and lower into the orchestra until disappearing entirely, when a voice from overhead boomed welcome, she grabbed my arm and scrambled to sit on her knees. The curtain rose.

We traveled with Clara to another world, my girl and I. She leaned forward, riveted, entranced, mouth agape. Her eyes never the left the stage.

Torn between two beautiful scenes, I divided my gaze between the dancers and my daughter. I watched her watching, her lips never quite closed, her eyes never still, dancing along. I saw in her face the promise of a childhood memory that will never be forgotten. This was my Christmas gift to her, the "big gift", and we will wrap it under the tree in a picture frame to help her remember this special day.

But really, this was her gift to me, an archetypal yet altogether original scene of mother and daughter, of ballet and beautiful dresses, a gift of moments perfectly stranded together. And I'll wear them around my neck as long as I live.
 ::

It's been a long time since I've had the chance to join Emily in Tuesdays Unwrapped. Sure, it's a Monday post, but as I'm only writing once a week (if that!) these days, I can stretch Monday into Tuesday, right?

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Dani + The Imaginaries (Five Minute Friday)

Dani has turned the stability ball (that was in the office for some inexplicable reason) into a bongo.

And she is singing a song. It goes:
I will push you down, but I will help you up. 
Oh yeah, I'm gonna be your friend, and you will be my friend, and I will just love you, no matter what you dooooo!
Do you want to be my sister, and I will be your sister, and then their will be seven kids just like my cuuuuh-zins, and my brother will be your bruuuuh-der, and you will love him so, so, soooooo much!

Second verse, drum no longer in play, stability ball back to being a rolling stage:
Oh yes, we will have so much fun together! I will swing all day long, and we will have lunch and dinner and never stop the plaaaying. I roll down the haaaallway on a giant ball, and my mom and dad don't miiiind!

Um, actually I do mind. So sorry to cut the song short, but there's no stability in stability balls when a four year old is at the helm. So applause, applause, beautiful song, now take a bow.

This post brought to you by Five Minute Friday where Lisa-Jo gives us a prompt and we give ourselves five minutes and then we give you whatever found its way from our brains to the page. Special thanks to today's special contributor, Ohio's rock n' (literally) rollin' singer-song-writer Dani + the Imaginaries.

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Quotables: The A'bent Edition

It's now a three-year old tradition, the reading of the Advent Book. For every day of advent, the book provides a new "door" to open, and behind the door, words that propel the Christmas story. So it seems a certain four year old girl in our family latched on to "reading a'bent" this year. I don't know that it was her spiritual curiosity at work so much as it was an early display of mild OCD, but let's settle somewhere in the middle.

Anyway. She essentially memorized the book. No longer was the argument about whose turn it was to open the next door. It was about who got to "read" next. When it wasn't trying my patience (C'mon kids! I need you in bed sometime before 2011!), it melted my heart a time or twenty to hear the story told by the sweet voices of my six and four year old.

Two paragraphs later, and I'm still in the back story? What can I say? I have a gift for dragging a cute story on forever.

So the fact that my daughter had the Christmas story essentially memorized made for some interesting imaginative play. Here is just a sampling of some of the lines I heard her assigning to her dolls.

Dani to Raggedy Ann: Your name was Baggedy Ann, but on de eightd day, I named you Jesus, da name da angel gabe to you bepore you were born.

Raggedy Ann: C'mon, Mary! We hab to go to Egypt cuz King Herod is makin' bad choices!
Sleeping Beauty: I comin', but I hab to pind Jesus pirst. Hurry! Help me pind him!
(It just goes to show you should never trust a Disney Princess with the Christ child. One minute he's safe and sound in the manger. Then the next thing you know, Sleeping Beauty gets put under a spell of some sort and Jesus is nowhere to be found.)

And now, I leave you with an excerpt from Christmas Eve.


Translation: The Holy One to be born to you will be God's son. Even your cousin Elizabeth will have a child in her old age. Nothing is impossible with God. "I am the Lord's servant", Mary answered. "May everything you have said come true." Then the angel left her.

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Love with Sprinkles on Top

I am always doing that which I cannot do, in order that I may learn how to do it.
-Pablo Picasso

Hence, I spent two hours making and piping pink buttercream frosting onto 48 chocolate cupcakes. Batter and baking are not words in my love language. And frosting and sprinkles are most definitely not my artistic medium of choice. But for her? Well, I think an old mom can learn a few new tricks.

This morning as I brushed her hair, she yelped (as is her usual custom) about how I was hurting her. I apologized, told her I didn't mean to hurt her, but it's hard to avoid when she slathers breakfast jam onto her scalp. She didn't skip a beat, "It's okay, Mommy. I love you soooo much, and nothing you eber do will change dat."

Ditto, big girl.

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She's Four. My Baby is Four.

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I Will Never Be Cured

The school nurse calls, and I come.

I pick my baby up from school, administer tylenol, tuck him in for a nap. He doesn't have a fever, but complains that his "brain hurts" and that his shoulders and legs "feel too tired to do anything." Normally, I'd be reticent to take him home from school in the absence of visible, credible symptoms.

But as it turns out, I feel the same way. My brain hurts. My arms and legs are too tired to do anything. Achy. Sleepy. In need of a quiet and still afternoon.

I tease Caed that he must have given his germs to Mommy, and I pretend to give them back. I say "Here! Here! Get these germs off of me!" He doesn't even crack a smile, just lays his head down on his pillow, motions for a hug.

"My poor baby," I say, squeezing his neck. I remember my Mom saying this to me, all those times I was sick enough to stay home from school, those mornings I'd spend watching game shows and looking forward to the sweet-tart flavored meds.

"Tonight we'll have breakfast dinner, and we can cuddle and watch a movie. How's that sound?" I ask.

He lets go of me and nods his head. "Good," he whispers.

"Good." I echo.

I kiss his warm forehead. He smiles and scrunches further into the sheets. "Good," I say again. "Good."

In these moments, at least one diagnosis is clear. Of this condition called Motherhood, of this symptom--heart walking forever outside my body--of all of this, I will never be cured.

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Six. As in Years.

He is six. And I don't mean months. I mean years and how is this even possible?
Last night we celebrated with a small gathering of extended family. It was everything he hoped for, and probably more. Ice cream (dirt) cake, stories and marshmallows by the campfire, and sleeping in the tent with the "boy cousins".
I think back to six years ago, the day he turned me into a mama, and I start to lose it. Words fail and my eyes go blurry trying to explain this miracle smiling back at me.

Happy 6th Birthday, little man.

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Cutiebatootie Goes To School

Guess who finally got to go to school?
Excited much?

Reportedly, her favorite part of school is snack time, with playground time taking the runner-up spot. I'm sure that deep down she really goes just for the academics. She's probably just pretending to like recess the best to blend in with the cool kids. You know, the ones with the Dora back-packs and the light up sneakers.

::

This morning I was combing her hair, and she handed me the two (mismatched) barrettes she wanted to wear. I clipped them into her fine strands, and she smiled in the mirror. "I look cutie as a tootie," she declared.

Oh yes you do, Darlin'. I might go as far to say you look cuter than a tooter.

Sigh. I love that girl.
(I also love that I now have two whole hours to myself three glorious days a week, but I'll save that for another post.)

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Nothing Like I Pictured

I sent the camera off with Dad, asked him to please take pictures. "It's your first father-son trip to see the Tribe play," I reminded him. "It's totally picture-worthy." (And blog-worthy. Don't forget blog-worthy. Because as much as I love the picture of that barn in the last post, Grandparents can't survive forever on my dear diary diatribes and my what-does-that-even-MEAN poetry attempts.)

So he obliged. He took four pictures, even though I would have taken forty (and not just of Fausto Carmona). But I digress.

Apparently, while Dani and I stayed home and read every last Lily book until she fell asleep I couldn't take it anymore, Caed was trying Cracker Jacks for the first time. At a ballgame. (Mythic moment, if you ask me.)

Then, to top it all off, the home team won. Commence the fireworks.

My boys came home beaming. Caed chattered in rapid fire glee, describing in great detail how the Indians beat the team that is higher up in the scores (first in division), and how the big hot dog ran right into the ketchup guy and mustard guy and made the mustard fall over, how his 3D glasses made the fireworks fall right onto his nose. And he leaned in close, lined his twinkling eyes right up to mine and then poked me right on the nose with his finger. "Like that!" he giggled.

I looked over at Larry, and there was no holding back his smile as he watched Caed carry on, now three hours beyond bedtime, about this big league game.

Never mind that the tickets were free or that the seats were fantastic.

The day I found out I was carrying a baby boy, I pictured moments like this. And now, here we are. Here they are, nothing like I pictured, right in front of me. Closer than fireworks with 3D glasses, crisper than air on an autumn evening, brighter than stadium lights in celebration sky.

Nothing like I pictured.
So, so very much better.

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Art History

Last night, the sun stopped by on her way to tomorrow, waving yellow ribboned fingers in friendly goodbye. They reached through the panes and over Dani's quilt, landing at last on the old wall with the newish paint and the freshly hung oil-on-canvas. We pulled this painting from a box just an hour earlier; and I was so relieved to see it, this eye-level beauty, the kind that makes even the most foreign places feel familiar.

So I took this picture of a painting of a picture.

Let me explain.

When Dani was 18 months, I took this picture of her at the beach.

Then I used it a year later in a post I wrote for Raising Maine. Mary Bullock, a stranger then and a friend now, commented, asking if she could use the picture as a basis for a painting. I said yes, as long as she would give me a chance to buy it when it was complete. And she said of course. And then she sold it to me for a song, even delivered it to my door. And so we met, first online, then in person. And now whenever I walk by her painting, I see her signature "Bullock" and remember how kind her eyes are, and how very well they match her art.

Anyway, I took a picture of this painting (of a picture) because I wanted to remember that moment last night. The one with the gold sunset on a pink wall in a room that could have been anywhere and still have felt like home. When we opened the box, Dani saw the painting and said, "Oh dat's my old picture for my room! Dat's me on da beach when I was a baby, right Mama?" And my chest tightened, overwhelmed at my fortune. I did not earn this. This little girl who loves me, this roof over our heads, sheltering the four of us and our sentimental collection of shells and art and photos and remember whens. These are gifts I did not see coming. These are gifts straight from heaven, undeserved.

And when I look at that picture, especially last night when I looked, I am taken back to the moment when I snapped the shot, to that day with mild sunburn and the most relaxing kind of exhaustion. When she was 18 months. And it's not that I'm not pining for that moment of years past. It's that I'm appreciating it, remembering how it felt to live it, loving that it is forever part of my history and of hers.

::

I need to say one more thing. Mary has been reading my blog almost from the beginning, leaving kind comments here and there. And while I rarely had a chance to reply to her comments or to follow up, I always, always, always appreciated what she had to say.

And the same goes for those of you, some who comment and encourage and engage so regularly, some who only can pop in to click "like" every so often. Either way, you need to know how much I appreciate it that you read (and sometimes comment), even though I rarely reciprocate or reply. I often feel selfish that I eat up your comments but don't take the time to offer a comment or reply back. But I've let go of the self-imposed expectation of engaging fully in this space. Because when I do (engage fully here), the space I live in, the people I live with, get less of me. And at this stage of life, I can't risk giving even the tiniest bit less to my real life people.

So, in short: I love that you read, comment and engage here. I'm not ignoring you (even though it might seem that way). I am very very grateful for you all--my "real life" friends and family, my kindred spirits met only in the ether (at least thus far!), my faithful readers and commenters. Thank you.

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Ohio Has...

Several weeks ago, on our way out of Maine, Caed asked, "So, I know Maine has lobsters and beaches and lighthouses. But what does Ohio have?"

I was tempted to answer "losing sports teams", but took the high road with an enthusiastic "we'll see when we get there!"

Well, we're here. And I admit, I'm starting to see.

1. Three months of apple picking season and farm stands on every other corner. (Did I mention we live in the country?)

2. We can get to Trader Joe's in 15 minutes. Cue the angels (in organic cotton woven robes).

3. Corn Sweet Corn. And we're talking fresh. As in picked-at-7-a.m., buy it at 9 a.m., tempted to eat it for lunch but the plan was to wait for dinner fresh.

4. Sushi. (Oh not really, not at ALL. Just seeing if you were paying attention).

5. Libraries that rock the proverbial party (albeit quietly). We've been to the library as many times in the past two weeks as we've been to Home Depot, which is somewhere in between too many freakin' times and infinity. Only instead of coming home (yet again!) with the wrong size plastic anchors or completely unusable--yet oh so energy efficient--light bulbs, we come home with another Ladybug Girl book, a new Jack & Annie book!, and Mamaphonic (a collection of essays my friend Elizabeth accurately predicted I would love.)

::

Today was Caed's first day of first grade, his first day in public school. I know that great teachers and fun school buses and sweet new friends aren't unique to Ohio. But they still count as something Ohio has, right?

And because I don't want to forget, I've compiled a comprehensive list of the information I extracted from Caed after his first day of school:

1. I made a friend from my class who is on the same bus as me, and we're going to sit together every time we go on the bus.

2. I only got one minute to eat my lunch.

3. I was only on the bus like one minute, and then BAM! I was home.

4. My friend--the same one from the bus--he sat next to me at lunch and he asked to try one of my red peppers. So I shared with him. He talks to me a lot.

5. (Upon being told that the hot lunches aren't free) Why do they expect kids to pay for lunches? Don't they know that kids don't carry around money?

6. For my one thing special about me, I told my teacher I was a lefty, and she went crazy. She said, "A lefty! A lefty! Everyone run!" But she was just being silly.

7. I played basketball at recess--it was all the older kids against me. And I won.

8. I think all the work today might have been kindergarten work. I didn't even see one compound word ALL day.

9. We got to do gym! Soccer AND basketball! But not that long really, cuz it took our teacher forever to get us organized-ed.

10. Remember in the Laura story (Little House) how the boys were giving the new teacher a hard time and not listening? Well, at my class, it was the opposite. All of us boys were quiet and shy. And the girls were the ones talking. And we boys were just looking at each other like (insert eyebrows raised facial expression).

::

Exactly four weeks ago, I pulled up in my haphazardly packed (to the hilt!) car, turned up the driveway toward the house we now call home. The propane tank, the one I forgot I'd have to take with me, lurched forward, smashing the bag of snacks and doing a number on the already brutalized dried flower arrangement. I wanted so badly then to just fast forward to a cleaned out car, and a cleaned up house (with a couch and a table and a bed that I didn't have to blow up). So here I am, four weeks later, and I know what Ohio has.

Ohio has apples turned into crisp,
backyards with more weeds than grass,
more tree frogs and crickets than you can shake a stick at,
and plenty of sticks to shake.
Ohio has summer and fall and the season in between
when you don't know whether
jeans will be too hot
or tees will be too cold.
Ohio has all of us, home for dinner,
all of us, waking up
under the same sky
and sometimes covers.
Ohio has infant Home,
Just four weeks old, but
growing like you wouldn't believe.
If this is four weeks, can you imagine four months?
And that's the crazy thing.
I totally can.

(Hooray! Longest post EVER is finally over.)

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