Homecoming week in review

Heading Home!

If you had asked me a week ago if six months was a long time, I would have affirmed yes, emphatically. But after just a few days of celebrating Dad’s return, six months seems like a blink. Life has resumed a sense of normalcy. There doesn’t seem to be much housework because two people are around to do it. We haven’t been in a rush to get places because there are two people to get the kids ready and drive. We have eaten well, because there are two people to fix dinner, clean up, and make sure all the homework is done before dinner starts.  And all the kids have been on their best behavior.

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In the decompression lectures in Kuwait, my husband was told he had changed and to expect changes at home. He seems pretty much the same to me – more relaxed than I expected and several pounds skinnier. I feel less talkative and more distracted than I would like to be. But being on vacation all week has also made me feel like a nicer person, although I catch myself in selfish indulgences like reading the paper during breakfast, and wanting to get on the computer after the kids are in bed. And since those same kids have been being so good, their dad hasn't had to see me turn into the screaming meanie I was for a good part of the last six months. They were reminiscing about the Bill Cosby Chocolate Cake skit the other morning because Dad let them have carrot cake for breakfast (even more nutritious!).  I can really identify with that image of the mother with her head splitting open (although honestly I'm glad they ate carrot cake for breakfast or I would've eaten it myself.)

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Since this is a vacation of sorts, we have done some fun things this week: On the first night Dad was home, we had cake and champagne. The next day we slept in and swam and shopped all the bazaar items Dad brought home. That night we took all the kids out to eat at Olive Garden. My husband wanted comfort food. The kids were well behaved and excited to order from a menu. However, I hope they don’t get the impression that Olive Garden is fine dining.

Some of the souvenir trinkets for kids and family, and me:

And my new Afghan rug:

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The next day we did more reunion activities: went fishing, took a walk, looked at photos. That evening, we had a fancier date: first to a live production of the Thacker Mountain radio show, and then to dinner. Thacker Mountain is Mississippi Public Broadcasting’s version of Lake Woebegon Days, and it’s usually recorded in Oxford, MS, literary hotbed of the south. But on Saturday they did a special recording at the little theater here on the coast. We were treated to the house band The Yalobushwhackers, a blues gospel singer, the folksy singersongwriter Caroline Herring who crooned about little boys growing up and Walter Anderson, a reading from New Orleans author Tom Piazza’s new book about Katrina, and the blues group Homemade Jamz Blues Band, which is made up of three siblings, ages 12, 16, and 18 on homemade instruments plus their dad on harmonica. They were phenomenal. We finally had a taste of southern culture in its most distinctive form.

Then we had a taste of local cuisine at a nearby restaurant. Fearing not for contamination by oil, we savored the crab cake appetizer. For an entree, I had shrimp and grits, but the taste was obscured by the heavy cream sauce and the well-made martini that preceded it.

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Sunday’s Mass was marked by the best behavior all year by the kids as Dad resumed his role as spiritual head of the family. They were rewarded with a boat ride on the rental pontoon from MWR. They didn’t catch enough fish in the bay to provide more than a couple bites, so we had to make do with steak and potatoes for dinner, a man’s meal. 

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Eating wasn't all we did this past week.  I won't tell all the highlights, but one other memorable afternoon was spent visiting the Walter Anderson museum and the Shearwater Pottery gallery begun by his brother Peter Anderson. Always love strolling through an art museum, even a tiny one. I’d never heard of Walter Anderson before moving here, but his artwork is striking and appealing. Part of the appeal may be his life story and his family’s place in the community. He was apparently rather eccentric and singularly single-minded, evidenced by the way he left his family for weeks to live in rough shelters on the barrier islands where he drew and painted. He created an amazing painting on the walls of his room, showing the stages of a day as well as of creation.
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This is beginning to sound like an ad for coming to see the Gulf Coast.  I'm trying to entice our family members down for a visit.  Swamp boat tours are in our future as we host a goodsized passel of relations next week.

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Photo of a welcoming sign on the base that my first grader painted. A perfect representation of how we feel.