Pulling on the reins

You know how old movies used to show calendar pages fluttering off into the wind to indicate the passing of time?  That's the way our days feel around here.  We are working on college applications again - round two.  I am seriously thinking about soliciting my services as an essay commentator for college apps. I have great ideas. I wish my son would use them. 

Instead of doing homework, my sophomore likes to play with clay.

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We are also enjoying sports, swimming, entertaining, and talking about Halloween costumes. I felt like a failure as a mom when my fourth grader thought All Saints Day was the day after Halloween because the church wanted to have something holy after Halloween. Wrong way around there.  I tried to explain, but she turned off her ears. And she absorbed even less of my explanation of All Souls' Day after a viewing of the Book of Life movie.  Day of the Dead skulls and brightly colored flowers just seem to be an extension of Halloween decor (of which she thinks we need more, more, more) to her.

Go Tritons! They are playing the "Torreys," which are a kind of pine tree.
The high school mascot is a tiki guy. Kind of fun mascot suit.  

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I also wonder if my mom license will be suspended for the fat lip Baby sprouted after she fell off my bed. I didn't see the accident, but I think she hit her lip on my bed rail. Or smacked it on the floor. However she did it, her lip was purple and swollen for days. We went to the dentist and have been told to watch it for infection. One of her front teeth is loose and may have to be pulled. And it is jammed into her gum, which means her adult tooth may have been bruised and could wind up discolored.  A stroke against vanity. 

That's one fat lip.

Hello, Blue Angels!

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In other news, we went to the zoo! A life long dream of mine has been to visit the San Diego zoo because when I was little it had all the cool animals. And it still does: pandas, polar bears, orangutans, hippos, koalas. But I think a lot of other zoos have caught up in quality.   We were all walked out after completing the entire tour of the zoo.

This is the way I feel on school mornings

Or maybe I feel like this resting meerkat.

Or maybe like this relaxed orangutan. 

My camera skills are lacking, but really I identify with this mother wrestling her baby bonobo.

Here I am with all the monkeys.

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Shortly after this event I was talking with another mom of 3 or 4 at a scouting event. We were laughingly comparing stories of injuries, when I realized I better stop sharing soon, because she was running out of misadventures, and I was just just getting started with tales of stitches, sprains, and casts. 

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Our youngest son is just beginning Boy Scouts.  He never was a cub scout, but his three older brothers are all Eagle Scouts.  My husband balked at doing cub scouts because of all the crafts and popcorn sales, but he's agreed to stay involved with scouting as our sixth grader is old enough to begin.  He doesn't have a lot of enthusiasm for it right now, although he is making some friends in the troop.  This troop does a lot of activities (last weekend archery, this weekend a twelve mile trek, camping the following weekend), but it seems we have some event or other nearly every weekend, and this troop must not do very much fundraising because the fees for these things are much higher than elsewhere. Is it just California? Is it living in an area of affluence?  Even the public school field trips and church youth group socials seem to cost twice as much as elsewhere.  It feels like there's a hole in my wallet where all the money is running out.

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This is a hallway at the high school. It says
"Somewhere something incredible is waiting to be known."

I complain, but the truth is we have plenty and job security.  I wonder sometimes how we kept to a budget when my husband's salary was a third of what it is now. Of course we had fewer kids and smaller kids and fewer expectations. Providentially things continue to work out - one thing may cost more, but we are driving much less and saving on gas, so we spend less on something else.

Soon enough this stage of life - of feeding, housing, clothing and entertaining teenagers - is going to come to an end.  One more will fly the nest next fall. Of course, Baby will just be beginning her pre-teen years when the next youngest turns 18.  How will we fill the time? How will we make use of all the blessings we have been given?  One of the characters in Lodge's book I mentioned in the last post turns to hedonism in his middle age; another wants to be a missionary or social worker. Ironically, they happen to be married to each other.  I can certainly see this happening in our marriage -  my husband will be ready to enjoy the fruits of his labor himself instead of always passing them to the kids, while I feel more drawn to asceticism.  But admiring asceticism and practicing it are two different things, and unless I continue to shore up my faith and to practice acts of self-sacrifice now (no more snitching Halloween candy!), I'll never be able to make do with less.

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Today I celebrate my success in making do with less was refusing to buy a cute little tufted chair at a garage sale that was only $1.  I was really tempted - that's like free! We have an old chair that is ready to retire.  But this little find had white jacquard upholstery - it was only lightly soiled, but enough so that it would have bothered me until I spent $100 to have it reupholstered or slipcovered, and it wasn't that cute or sturdy. So I left it at the garage sale for someone else to find. (Although I admit I bought a potted plumeria for $5, which was also a bargain because of its size. And, following Maria Kondo's advice, it will bring me joy by reminding me of Guam and adding some color to our little yard.)

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Now it's time to move into clean-up mode. We have about 50 teen-aged boys coming over for supper after football practice.  It's a tradition of this team to have team dinners that night before home games. I don't have to cook - other mom's are bringing pans of pasta, salad, bread, and brownies. But I do need to make sure I have clean bathrooms and the dishes are put away.  And that we have enough chairs. Just read Elizabeth Foss's article about hospitality, and so I'm not feeling stressed about cleaning up. Plus our guests are teen-aged boys.  They are used to stinky bathrooms, and perhaps even prefer them it seems to me.  To underscore Foss's point, I think our most successful efforts at hospitality are the spontaneous ones, where I don't worry about menus or flowers or cleaning cupboards and showers because I don't have time to fret, plan, or bark at the kids.  And to be honest, I regret some opportunities for hospitality that we have missed out on at our last duty station because I was too tired or too self-conscious about having a small house to invite someone over. 

I wish more neighbors would stop by for tea while I was in my pajamas like she mentions, although they'd have to catch me early to find me still in PJ's... 

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