I made numerous mentions that my son’s 2nd grade year was hard on all of us, but I didn’t quite realize how hard it had been on me personally until I sat down today to assemble his work portfolio for evaluation and I started having unpleasant emotional flashbacks.
Silence, and a candle for all those people in your life you were once close to and now . . . for one reason or another, you’re not anymore.
I spent the better part of my life believing I was a terrible person before I realized I wasn’t a terrible person, just an unskilled one.
Today is a typical South Florida summer day. Out my window I can see that the sun is shining and the birds are combusting.
Ah, Mrs. Grundy, well over two hundred years old, and still just as spry as ever. Will she ever slow down?
When the student is ready, the teacher will appear.
When the student is not ready, distractions will appear.
– My personal addendum
Lala got me some beard conditioner for Father’s Day because there have been one too many “Ouch! Pokey!” complaints from the household of late, and I wanted to give some conditioner a shot. When she gave it to me I found myself looking mildly askance at the brand name, “Naked Prince.”
“I prefer princesses, given a choice . . .” I started to say, but Lala both cut me off and topped my intended joke.
“Especially for rubbing on your face,” she concluded for me as innocently as it’s possible to say something like that innocently.
“Looks like we’re going to be cooped up here again,” my son sighed this morning, and to be fair, it’s rained so much here over the last several days that I wouldn’t be terribly surprised to find out the house had grown gills, so I understood where he was coming from.
Even so, one of the continuing challenges of parenthood for me is not reacting poorly to “kid drama” like coming into the room and making bleak announcements like the one above, but this time I think I did okay.
“Another way to look at it is to view this as a chance to do anything we want to do inside the house,” I told my son. “For instance, I imagined it’d be pretty hard to play a game of Yahtzee while on a walk outside.”
He agreed. He didn’t want to play Yahtzee (which mildly disappointed me), but he agreed, and we both got on with our day.
Paraphrased from a text conversation between me and Lala:
Me: “Just dropped L’s Mother off for her appointment. Now to make the decision on how to spend my time for a bit.”
Lala: “You’ll find some place awesome. You have that knack.”
Me: (thinking) I don’t know if that’s really accurate.
Me: (Also thinking, but now after I’ve finished eating) That deep fried raspberry cheesecake with vanilla ice cream, whipped cream, and caramel drizzle really was pretty good.
This morning I found a dead moth in my coffee. While I am happy to report that this didn’t ruin my morning, I have decided to excuse myself from having to make any witty observations and/or pithy comments today.
