I am somewhat chagrined with my daughter. She scheduled a hair appointment for herself for tomorrow morning at 9:00. In Macomb! That doesn't really work into my summer schedule. Here's how my summer schedule works:
6:30 or whenever I wake up a little I move from the bedroom to the couch out of courtesy to Jeff, who goes to bed a little after 7:00 and needs to sleep uninterrupted for several hours.
6:45 I go back to sleep for however long I want.
9:00, 9:30, 10:00, 10:30 Basically I get up whenever I want to get up.
11-ish lunch, which might just be a can of pork and beans. It's summer vacation.
11:30-ish work outside
3:00 shower and go to rehearsal.
9:00 home from rehearsal. Do some laundry. Read. Watch TV. Take the laptop to the hammock. Go see Damaris. Go get groceries. Whatever.
1:30 or 2:00 go to sleep.
This is my perfect schedule. I don't mind getting 8 hours of sleep, but it doesn't usually happen. If it does happen, I prefer the 8 hours between 2 and 10 a.m. Sadly, those hours conflict with my real job from August through May. June and July, though. . . man, those are my months. Those are the hours my body would pick, but the grown-ups in charge did not consult my personal clock when scheduling school.
It's not just the leisurely sleep patterns and decidedly white trash lunch menu. There's so much more than that. It's the sunshine and freckles and bare, dirty feet. It's the bare arms, open windows, and light nights. It's remembering that some rocks are more painful to walk on than others, but grass always feels nice. It's the astonishment over the size of my elm tree as I observe it from my hammock. It's the perfect-for-hanging-swings arrangement of branches in that elm tree. It's the welcoming, wrapping comfort of my hammock when I let it support me after I exhaust myself in the yard.
And there are the sounds of our 11. Laughter carries on summer air, and my niece and nephew laugh frequently. I can hear them, from their yard to mine. Summer is the sound of my mom, announcing her arrival to my yard with her customary "WOOHOO!" It's the sound of the disc swing clattering against the tree after Madeline jumps off and the slap of a ball into a glove as Nolan perfects his game. It's the sound of a voice from high above the yard, testing out the treehouse. And from across the street and across the yards, it is the scream of my dad's planer, a major part of his profitable and therapeutic puttering.
It is the conversations and jokes with Coop, the only one of my three who voluntarily helps in the yard. Even if he is, say, covered in the blisters from wild parsnip, he'll sit where I work and keep me company. It's his opinion and interest that aren't always so apparent. It's the camaraderie that has developed between us this past year. The barbs and jokes, the ridicule and requisite swearing that is ours alone. It's getting to know my son in the quiet shade of an oak and an elm.
It's the backyard battle wounds of a summer well spent. Right now I have a raw place below my right ankle bone, a blister on the inside of my ankle, and several cuts on that same foot. The cuts are the result of stupidity--running the weed eater and wearing shorts at the same time. Finally, today, I got my right foot almost completely clean. I've been working on it since Saturday when I ran the tiller in Crocs. The effect on my right foot was the opposite of a power washer. More of a power soiler, really. Since Saturday I've added to the ground-in grime with daily work. Of course I scrub my feet daily and try to get them clean. It just wasn't working out. Scrolling up the disaster that is me, I have scrapes on my arms from branches falling on me right after I cut them down. I should have a companion scrape on my face, but that branch didn't leave a mark. On both upper arms I have small round bruises. If I were a toddler you'd call DCFS. The only thing that abused me was a surly pair of lopping shears. I'm sore, but not in a bad way. Only in an "It's-summer-and-I-earned-it-way."
Naturally I have other marks of my time spent. The freckle count is up. The hair is lightening to blond instead of grey for a summertime reprieve. I have a collection of vanilla-scented items near my hammock to scare off the bugs, designated hammock pillows, and a stack of books I will read soon. The stress that ended my school year is soaking out of me as this season soaks in. My nose is red and my arms are turning brown. Summer is rubbing up against my life, and I hope it doesn't stop anytime soon.
June 20, 2008
June 12, 2008
On the Horizon
I turned 38 yesterday. For reasons past understanding or at least explaining, this birthday bothered me more than any other birthday. I can honestly say that, because no other birthday has bothered me at all.
People who know me would probably say I'm fairly optimistic, although that optimism is somewhat tarnished at this point. Those who know me the best would say that sometimes I'm optimistic, I almost always GET to optimistic eventually, and that I have lately become a complete bitch on the path to optimistic. I preface this entry with the optimistic bullshit so that you don't believe that I always think the way I've thought this week.
Yesterday, the predominate feeling was that I'm halfway to dead and have so many things left undone. So many things I haven't even broached, much less finished. In an effort to slap myself out of my pity party, I thought of all the things I HAVE done. I have terrific kids and have been blessed with a family I would trade for no other. I've chiseled a few true friends from the boulder of people I know. I have a job I like and hobbies I enjoy and get better at all the time. I have a hammock and someone on my block has wireless internet. Seriously, what do I want? A rewind button would be nice.
My sister once told me she never thought I was unsure of myself--I seemed to her to always know what to do. Hah! I spend much of my life bluffing, although I am more confident every day. That probably comes with age, dammit. The confidence and backbone may be the only positives. Well, not giving a shit is fun, but the mouth that comes with not giving a shit is going to get me in trouble sometime soon.
I've lost some time, and I've wasted more time than I've lived. Beyond that, I seem to be coming undone. I am physically sore this week. I've been working in my yard and am wretchedly out of shape, so I could say that's the reason for my pain and let it go. Maybe I slept wrong. If I'm going to be honest with myself and with you, though, I need to face the fact that the reason my right shoulder, hip, leg, ribs, and knee hurt is because I fell down walking around the left-field fence at my niece's softball game Sunday. I didn't trip and there was no hole. This tumble can only be blamed on gravity. Some of you may have had tumbles like this. There I was, walking along, trying to decide which hot pink shirt was Madeline when suddenly the horizon cartwheeled past my eyes, teased me with a fence I thought I could catch, battered my right side, and spit in my face as I landed. That freakin' horizon attacked me in such a way that I was dirty on all sides. Probably even the inside, but I didn't check. Mostly, I tried to regain my vertical status so that the concerned witnesses would all know I was fine. Fine? I have ball field in my cleavage! Wanna see? It looks like the Grand Canyon from outer space. Fine? Hah!
Maybe it wasn't gravity. It may have been the eyesight. My eyes seem, for some unfathomable reason, to be pissed off pranksters. I know I used to be able to focus. I remember focusing. I can't do it anymore, at least not on a regular basis, but I know I could not so long ago. So maybe my eyes made me fall. They've made me do some other shit lately, that's for sure. They make me take off my glasses and do owl moves with my head to read stuff on the backs of boxes. Crap. I'm not to the "my arms aren't long enough" stage, but that stage is on the horizon. Probably the same horizon that assaulted me at the ball game.
As for the physical appearance, I seem to have taken on a slightly sunkissed but mostly rode hard and put away wet look. It's nothing like a youthful glow--don't let the word wet trick you. I think being put away wet leads to some sort of fungal growth. Also, those years of sunkissed have added up to a sick connect the dots with wrinkles and what are either large freckles or age spots. I'd like to say freckles, but I'm starting to notice a trend.
I'm sorry--I have to go. I just sneezed hard. When I sneezed, I peed my pants and my left boob shot out the arm hole of my tank top. And yes, I am wearing a bra, dammit.
People who know me would probably say I'm fairly optimistic, although that optimism is somewhat tarnished at this point. Those who know me the best would say that sometimes I'm optimistic, I almost always GET to optimistic eventually, and that I have lately become a complete bitch on the path to optimistic. I preface this entry with the optimistic bullshit so that you don't believe that I always think the way I've thought this week.
Yesterday, the predominate feeling was that I'm halfway to dead and have so many things left undone. So many things I haven't even broached, much less finished. In an effort to slap myself out of my pity party, I thought of all the things I HAVE done. I have terrific kids and have been blessed with a family I would trade for no other. I've chiseled a few true friends from the boulder of people I know. I have a job I like and hobbies I enjoy and get better at all the time. I have a hammock and someone on my block has wireless internet. Seriously, what do I want? A rewind button would be nice.
My sister once told me she never thought I was unsure of myself--I seemed to her to always know what to do. Hah! I spend much of my life bluffing, although I am more confident every day. That probably comes with age, dammit. The confidence and backbone may be the only positives. Well, not giving a shit is fun, but the mouth that comes with not giving a shit is going to get me in trouble sometime soon.
I've lost some time, and I've wasted more time than I've lived. Beyond that, I seem to be coming undone. I am physically sore this week. I've been working in my yard and am wretchedly out of shape, so I could say that's the reason for my pain and let it go. Maybe I slept wrong. If I'm going to be honest with myself and with you, though, I need to face the fact that the reason my right shoulder, hip, leg, ribs, and knee hurt is because I fell down walking around the left-field fence at my niece's softball game Sunday. I didn't trip and there was no hole. This tumble can only be blamed on gravity. Some of you may have had tumbles like this. There I was, walking along, trying to decide which hot pink shirt was Madeline when suddenly the horizon cartwheeled past my eyes, teased me with a fence I thought I could catch, battered my right side, and spit in my face as I landed. That freakin' horizon attacked me in such a way that I was dirty on all sides. Probably even the inside, but I didn't check. Mostly, I tried to regain my vertical status so that the concerned witnesses would all know I was fine. Fine? I have ball field in my cleavage! Wanna see? It looks like the Grand Canyon from outer space. Fine? Hah!
Maybe it wasn't gravity. It may have been the eyesight. My eyes seem, for some unfathomable reason, to be pissed off pranksters. I know I used to be able to focus. I remember focusing. I can't do it anymore, at least not on a regular basis, but I know I could not so long ago. So maybe my eyes made me fall. They've made me do some other shit lately, that's for sure. They make me take off my glasses and do owl moves with my head to read stuff on the backs of boxes. Crap. I'm not to the "my arms aren't long enough" stage, but that stage is on the horizon. Probably the same horizon that assaulted me at the ball game.
As for the physical appearance, I seem to have taken on a slightly sunkissed but mostly rode hard and put away wet look. It's nothing like a youthful glow--don't let the word wet trick you. I think being put away wet leads to some sort of fungal growth. Also, those years of sunkissed have added up to a sick connect the dots with wrinkles and what are either large freckles or age spots. I'd like to say freckles, but I'm starting to notice a trend.
I'm sorry--I have to go. I just sneezed hard. When I sneezed, I peed my pants and my left boob shot out the arm hole of my tank top. And yes, I am wearing a bra, dammit.
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