A Little Perspective

So, my sister-in-law stopped by yesterday to drop off her kids for me to watch. In an effort to process the family drama I find myself locked into, my SIL and I were having a conversation about the emotions of my parents' move. It was actually a half-joking, light-hearted conversation, because my SIL is awesome and always makes me smile. Her quiet 6-year old son and not-so-quiet 4-year old daughter were at the table with us. Here is how it went:

Me, trying to effect an air of Anne of Green Gables Drama: You know, I was fine until Monday, but that day just threw me into The Depths of Despair for some reason. It's been a long week.

SIL: Yes, but it will get better.

Me to 6-year old: L, have you ever been to The Depths of Despair?

6-year old: No Aunt Kellie.

Me: That's good. I hope you never go there.

4-year old, brightly and excitedly: Aunt Kellie, I've been to The Depths of Despair!! It was at Sea World and we saw animals there! It was great!


Fast forward to dinner.

6-year old, with an air of wisdom and superiority over his little sister: Aunt Kellie, we never went to The Depths of Despair. We just saw Shamu.

4-year old, apologetically: Yes we did Aunt Kellie. There were animals there.

Fast forward to this morning:

SIL, to 4-year old: So O, I heard you've been to The Depths of Despair.

4-year old, slightly sleepy and snuggled deeply into my lap: MmHmm. I saw hippos there. Aunt Kellie, did you see hippos when you went to the Depths of Despair? I like hippos.


I hope I will always remember to look for the hippos in The Depths of Despair.

Goodbyes

Today, Sara left for a trip to see my sister for a week. It leaves me, from now till Saturday afternoon sometime, with that strangest of all circumstances-a truly empty house. I am fairly certain that this is the first time we've had everyone gone for more than one night. The others are gone to other camps and retreats. Today I am not waiting for anyone to come home, nor is there anyone to get out of bed or remind to eat breakfast. There are messes to clean up from the process of getting her out the door, but once they are cleaned up, they will not get dirty again for about 48 hours.

Another first was that at the airport today, after I helped her check her luggage, I did not get a gate pass but instead watched from behind the cordon as Sara got herself through security and down to her gate. She has flown by herself about 5 times since she was 12 or so, so she has complete confidence. It was great to see her be so poised and grown-up. I bobbed up and down on tippy-toes looking through the crowd for her golden hair and also for her signature fashion look right now-two different colored socks-to make sure she got through the scanner and picked up her bag. At one point, she looked back to see if I was still there, and it may have been in total irritation, but it made me weepy that she was even thinking of me. We had a good week this week with her brothers gone, full of shopping and fast-food lunches and dinners. We didn't have any arguments, and while I would have preferred to take long walks by the river in the afternoons, it was okay that we spent time together in her world. She started reading The Woman in White, and she likes it, so we had that to talk about. I think for a mom and a very strong-minded 15-year old, that's pretty good. It's enough for me right now. Maybe the thing she'll appreciate about me when she grows up is that I let her go and have her own adventures. We'll have time for other adventures as she becomes an adult and our relationship evolves. I look forward to that.

After I dropped Sara off, I went to say hi to my mom, who lives near the airport. I came face to face with the large, beautiful built in bookcases that had been my refuge during my high-school years. They were mostly empty. It was a shock to me. When I found out they were selling the house (it came up very quickly and unexpectedly) I made plans to get a whole series of photographs of the inside of my mom's house. I loved it when Cami did that at her Grandparents'. I missed my chance though. My sister and my sister-in-law brought the white tornado of order and efficiency and a lot of the house is already unrecognizable. I was at Girls' camp and I missed the last moments of the house as it was. I am left with a gray storm of hard-to-understand emotions at the sense of loss I'm feeling. I only lived there for 4 years, then a couple of summers, then I got married. My teen years were full of turmoil for various reasons, so I strain to even call up many happy memories of those years because I've blocked out as much of the conflict as I can. I guess they were important years nonetheless, and in spite of our family's imperfections, we hung on and still managed to stick together. Also, we have lived nearby for most of my marriage, so that house was the gathering place-the place of family and memories and it does feel like home. Now that my idea of preserving those memories has been taken away, I'll have to work to create the portrait I want in other ways. So, now I will go through hundreds and hundreds of photos and try to scan the ones that show the place as I remember it. In the end, maybe it will be even better, because it will show the people that were there. That's what a home is anyway. Not the stuff. The bookcases are only the background in this photo, not the important thing. That's what I have to remember.

The Harvest Begins in Earnest

My garden is amazing me this year. I've never had so much success. We had wonderful lettuce and spinach for several weeks. I'm frying up some chard tonight for dinner. I got my first tomato yesterday and I've been getting about two-three pounds of green beans per week for the last two weeks. My cucumbers are this wonderful long variety with very small seeds, sort of like the ones they call English or Hothouse cukes in the grocery store. I'm getting 5-10 of those per week. The squash is starting to come on strong and the volunteer pumpkin plant, while it may do the eggplants in, has a tiny pumpkin on it that we'll try to keep alive for the fall. I'm considering nipping off all the other blossoms and just letting the one that has started get really big. The kids think it is a watermelon, not a pumpkin, so I'll keep you posted. It is small enough right now that it really could be either. The blossoms indicate to me that it is a squash, not a melon, but we'll see. We have peppers coming on and a couple of tiny eggplants trying to hang on in the shade of the pumpkin plant, but since I'm the only one who likes eggplant, it wouldn't be the end of the world if we don't get a ton of eggplants. It appears I may have enough plum tomatoes to can a few jars, which was my goal.

I give gardening a go every year, but this year, there is a convergence: I seem to be at the right place in my life to give it the attention it needs, the soil I've been working on for 10 years seems to be rich and generous, and the weather has been right. There's a life lesson in that for sure. Sometimes you work and work and work on something and it never goes the way you really want it to, but your efforts aren't wasted. Suddenly the time is right and all the practice attempts, during which you may not have felt at all successful, combine to give you the experience you need for the big moment. I feel like that about this year's garden.

Therapeutic Shopping

Yesterday I had a hard morning. Family Stuff. My folks are selling their house of almost 30 years and the drama over all their things has already started. Oh. My. Goodness. I think it would be easier to burn it down except for the small detail of a very nice family who is expecting to move in around the beginning of September.

It was a really, really hard morning, so, Sara and I went shopping. I bought pens and smell-nice beauty products. Two of my favorite things. It was very convenient to have Office Depot and Ulta right next door to each other.

It was pre-meditated, intentional, therapeutic shopping, and it helped.
I feel better, I smell lovely, and I have a Flair pen in every color of the rainbow.
Today will be a good day.