I’ve been unable to post the last week or so because of summer. Summer is lovely, and I always have the fantasy that it will mean leisurely times catching up with friends and family, doing all the things we don’t have time for during the hectic part of the year. Oh, how silly I am…delusional even. The summer seems more jam packed than the rest of the year, with everyone trying to cram in all the travel, nights out, playdates, sporting events and concerts that we don’t have time to do the other nine months on the calendar. But now, the temperatures are dropping (sort of) and t.v. networks have started pushing the premieres of the fall shows – a true sign that summer is over!
On the first day back to school, I think I was more giddy than my kids – for their return to class, my newly regained freedom from having to hear them complain when they weren’t atcamptravelinggoingtoamusementparkshavingsleepoversandplaydates, “We’re bored, what should we do?” If I heard that refrain one more time last week, someone was going to have to call social services on me. Not really, but almost!
There are a number of things that I love about back-to-school time. I’ve listed them below in no particular order.
The kids are out of the house. Even if I’m not at home, neither are they.
I can hear myself think again.
I don’t have to constantly entertain anyone.
The funny back-to-school ads on t.v. Check out Target’s Denim ad or the Staples’ kid with a mime college ID.
The fact that my older daughter now has to wear a uniform – goodbye morning clothing fights!
Going back-to-school shopping with my other daughter who’s still young enough to take my advice when picking out clothes and still likes wearing pink and ribbons.
Seeing the parents of my children’s friends who I really enjoy talking to but never seem to be able to find the time to socialize with outside of school drop off, pick up and the occasional school social event.
The excitement of attending a new school.
The excitement of returning to an old one.
The bittersweet feeling that comes from watching your little kid go off to junior high school.
Not a soul to complain that they are bored and asking what they should do. Now I can say, “…homework, reading and piano practice.” When they asked me that during the summer, I started giving them a rag and some cleanser and telling them to go clean the bathroom shower. Maybe that’s why my kids are happy about going back-to-school as well.
Showing posts with label Summer. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Summer. Show all posts
Saturday, September 10, 2011
Friday, September 10, 2010
The End of Things
I don’t like endings. My mother always said you should look at an ending as an opportunity for a new beginning. She was frequently optimistic like that. I am not. I face newness with hesitation. I hate for things to end, not only because of the sadness of the loss, but because of the uncertainty that lies ahead. Summer is ending, kids are going back to school – new teacher, new classroom of friends, new set of parents, new academic challenges. This is my daughter’s last year in elementary school. That phase of her life is ending and in addition to heading into middle school and all the associated anxiety that goes along with that process – deciding where to go, which program best suits her, which school is good, affordable and geographically desirable and won’t require us to camp out overnight on the street to get her a permit to attend (seriously, it’s an option) – what will truly be ending is her time as a little girl. She’ll be diving head first into tweendom, complete with changing hormones and that teenage cockiness and confidence which can only come with a considerable lack of knowledge about how things really work. Although she’s not even a tween yet, I can see sparks of it already. From her eyeing my spot in the driver’s seat and envisioning herself there, to her new and growing love of phone, text and email, to the look of her face and body which no longer resemble the baby faced toddler who used to bounce on the sofa and sing along with Blues Clues.
I always get somewhat wistful around this time of year. I don’t like to see summer end, I never have. I don’t really relish endings of any kind. Once I get into a groove, I like it there. It is comfortable and secure and routine. That works for me. But endings mean change and that’s something I’ve never been fond of.
Endings in all possible variations are tough, and yet as mom said, they are really beginnings. Endings bring change. The changes may not feel desirable or even possible at first, but often, in retrospect, we realize that the changes were not only for the best, but that they were required to take us forward to the next step, to show us that we can cope and stand up and meet any challenge that change may bring. Seasons, school years, jobs, marriages, childhoods, relationships, lives – they all start and often end too soon and never in the way we planned or even expected.
There have been so many endings around me lately, not only my own, but for my friends and family. Sometimes I wonder how we’re all coping with the chaos caused by those changes. Then I started noticing how a friend who was dealt a terrible blow in her life, an ending that I can barely imagine dealing with, was moving on. In the face of an awful situation, she was okay, she was helping her children be okay, she was using the change to motivate her to step out of where she had been in life, where in fact she had felt stuck, and move on. I asked her how she continued to go to bed in the morning and get up at night. She smiled and joked, “…with lots of medications and a glass of merlot.” But stimulants aside, she said that despite what had happened, the ending which had turned her life upside down, she was oddly optimistic. She saw the ending as a beginning.
I always get somewhat wistful around this time of year. I don’t like to see summer end, I never have. I don’t really relish endings of any kind. Once I get into a groove, I like it there. It is comfortable and secure and routine. That works for me. But endings mean change and that’s something I’ve never been fond of.
Endings in all possible variations are tough, and yet as mom said, they are really beginnings. Endings bring change. The changes may not feel desirable or even possible at first, but often, in retrospect, we realize that the changes were not only for the best, but that they were required to take us forward to the next step, to show us that we can cope and stand up and meet any challenge that change may bring. Seasons, school years, jobs, marriages, childhoods, relationships, lives – they all start and often end too soon and never in the way we planned or even expected.
There have been so many endings around me lately, not only my own, but for my friends and family. Sometimes I wonder how we’re all coping with the chaos caused by those changes. Then I started noticing how a friend who was dealt a terrible blow in her life, an ending that I can barely imagine dealing with, was moving on. In the face of an awful situation, she was okay, she was helping her children be okay, she was using the change to motivate her to step out of where she had been in life, where in fact she had felt stuck, and move on. I asked her how she continued to go to bed in the morning and get up at night. She smiled and joked, “…with lots of medications and a glass of merlot.” But stimulants aside, she said that despite what had happened, the ending which had turned her life upside down, she was oddly optimistic. She saw the ending as a beginning.
Friday, May 7, 2010
28 Days
They are ending school a week early this year because of the budget crisis. Instead of getting out on June 24th at 12:30pm as they were supposed to do, LAUSD is shutting its doors a week early to save cash. It’s a sad situation and the cutbacks extend much farther than just shortening the school year, but that’s a rant…I mean blog for another time. The only upside is that there are now only 28 days left in the school year. I’m not sure who is more excited about that, me or my daughters.
It means only 28 more lunches to pack at the ungodly hour of 5:30a.m. when I can barely tell the difference between mayo and sour cream and yes, once I did spread the sour cream on the sandwiches and had to throw out two piece of bread before I realized what I was doing. It means only 28 more mornings that will start with the phrase, “But the other girls are wearing it,” only to be followed by tears and door slamming. It means only 28 more breakfasts where my oldest refuses to eat any protein unless threatened and my youngest devours several slices of bacon and asks for more while ignoring the pancake on her plate.
It means only 14 more days of driving carpool and racing out of the house to get to our neighbors’ house in time to grab their kids and make the mad dash to school. It means only 28 more days of fighting for limited parking on the streets around the school and cursing under my breath that they’ve done away with school buses for all but a select few. It means only 28 more days of rushing from drop off to work and hoping that the traffic gods are in my favor and that my coffee doesn’t spill out of my non-spill cup on the way – as it has many times before – and staining my work clothes which always feel like I’m playing dress up in anyway.
It means only 28 more days of picking up after school and listening to the reports of school yard drama that are always much more tame than advertised to be. It means only 28 more days of wrangling homework and music practice and making sure it all gets done before t.v. time and David getting home. It means only 28 days more until I can sleep in…at least for the summer. The countdown begins…Oh yeah, and I bet the kids are excited about it, too.
It means only 28 more lunches to pack at the ungodly hour of 5:30a.m. when I can barely tell the difference between mayo and sour cream and yes, once I did spread the sour cream on the sandwiches and had to throw out two piece of bread before I realized what I was doing. It means only 28 more mornings that will start with the phrase, “But the other girls are wearing it,” only to be followed by tears and door slamming. It means only 28 more breakfasts where my oldest refuses to eat any protein unless threatened and my youngest devours several slices of bacon and asks for more while ignoring the pancake on her plate.
It means only 14 more days of driving carpool and racing out of the house to get to our neighbors’ house in time to grab their kids and make the mad dash to school. It means only 28 more days of fighting for limited parking on the streets around the school and cursing under my breath that they’ve done away with school buses for all but a select few. It means only 28 more days of rushing from drop off to work and hoping that the traffic gods are in my favor and that my coffee doesn’t spill out of my non-spill cup on the way – as it has many times before – and staining my work clothes which always feel like I’m playing dress up in anyway.
It means only 28 more days of picking up after school and listening to the reports of school yard drama that are always much more tame than advertised to be. It means only 28 more days of wrangling homework and music practice and making sure it all gets done before t.v. time and David getting home. It means only 28 days more until I can sleep in…at least for the summer. The countdown begins…Oh yeah, and I bet the kids are excited about it, too.
Friday, February 26, 2010
Summer Camp in February
I have spent the last three weeks obsessing over what to do with my kids during the summer. Most of February has been consumed with looking at summer camps for July and August. Something wrong with this picture? It's rainy and cold here in L.A. (sorry for you folks up to your eyeballs in snow), our typical winter weather...a few Christmas decorations still haven't found their way back into the rickety cardboard box in the garage, and I'm contemplating taking a small home loan out in order to be able to afford to send my kids off to frolic in fields, skip rocks on ponds and toast marshmallows over a fire pit so that I can go to work while they are out of school. It's February...okay, almost March, but still, I can't manage to wrap what's left of my parenthood addled brain around the idea of planning for summer.
One year, I tried winging it. I was going to adopt a free and easy, "everything will work out as it is supposed to" attitude. I hate that attitude. I hate people who espouse that attitude. It almost never works out as you want it or need it to and I guess it is primarily for people who don't care that “that’s how it's supposed to be” isn't always the way you need it to be. It was a nightmare...truly, one of the worst summers of my life. It seemed like I spent the entire summer with my butt plastered to hot leather car seats as I drove different kids to different camps, none of which lasted a full day and required me to use my lunch hour to shuttle them back and forth between camp and babysitters. It was cheap, but in the end, not worth the cost of the mental anguish it caused me.
The next summer I swore to send them both to one, full day camp which was close to where I worked...walking distance in fact. Oh, it was a swell idea until I opened up the brochure and found that picture perfect camp arrangements come at a price...a price that would have been enough to send my entire family of four to France for two weeks and still have money left over for tickets to Disney Paris. But unfortunately, it was camp, not Paris that we ended up shelling out a small fortune for and even though it was easy on my psyche, my pocketbook is still hurting.
So now, it's time to plan for camp again…in February. A friend told me about a camp her children adored which was not far from where both our husbands worked. I liked the idea - it was a real camp in the woods, it was full day, expensive but not bank breaking, and because it was near my husband's office, he could take on part of the summer shuttling duties this year. But then she added, "Unfortunately, new families don't always get in on the first try. You might end up on a wait list." A wait list for camp...not Harvard or Yale, not opening night at a new nightclub...a summer camp. I felt defeated but managed to shove down the growing fear about having to face another summer of winging it and picked up the phone. I called the camp office to see if I could find some way to better my odds of getting my kids in. Cowboy Bob answered the phone. I found that charming, but still had to bite my ever sarcastic tongue not to respond by saying, "Hi Cowboy Bob, this is Crazed Mommy Dawn..." He told me which program days might give us a better chance of not getting wait listed but suggested we drive our application and deposit check over the next day instead of using the mail.
I quickly filled out the application and then decided to use a tactic that helped us get our first house by winning over the owners with a personal note and photograph as a way of begging them to sell it to us and not the five other couples making offers on the house. It worked for a house, so why not for summer camp? I printed out a picture of my girls from last summer and had them each write a little note on the picture about why they wanted to go to the camp, folded it up and tucked it in the envelope along with the application. I felt foolish, like one of those parents you read about who hire consultants to get their kids into the right kindergarten. But I didn't want to get my kids into kindergarten, I just wanted them off the streets during the summer at a camp that wasn't just open from 9 to 12 and that wouldn't require me taking a second job to pay for it!
I sent the application off yesterday. So now we wait to see if we get into camp. In the meantime, I'll think about what other trip - maybe Greece, maybe Rome, maybe just fixing the leaky roof we discovered in all the February rains - all the things we could have done for the cost of summer camp.
One year, I tried winging it. I was going to adopt a free and easy, "everything will work out as it is supposed to" attitude. I hate that attitude. I hate people who espouse that attitude. It almost never works out as you want it or need it to and I guess it is primarily for people who don't care that “that’s how it's supposed to be” isn't always the way you need it to be. It was a nightmare...truly, one of the worst summers of my life. It seemed like I spent the entire summer with my butt plastered to hot leather car seats as I drove different kids to different camps, none of which lasted a full day and required me to use my lunch hour to shuttle them back and forth between camp and babysitters. It was cheap, but in the end, not worth the cost of the mental anguish it caused me.
The next summer I swore to send them both to one, full day camp which was close to where I worked...walking distance in fact. Oh, it was a swell idea until I opened up the brochure and found that picture perfect camp arrangements come at a price...a price that would have been enough to send my entire family of four to France for two weeks and still have money left over for tickets to Disney Paris. But unfortunately, it was camp, not Paris that we ended up shelling out a small fortune for and even though it was easy on my psyche, my pocketbook is still hurting.
So now, it's time to plan for camp again…in February. A friend told me about a camp her children adored which was not far from where both our husbands worked. I liked the idea - it was a real camp in the woods, it was full day, expensive but not bank breaking, and because it was near my husband's office, he could take on part of the summer shuttling duties this year. But then she added, "Unfortunately, new families don't always get in on the first try. You might end up on a wait list." A wait list for camp...not Harvard or Yale, not opening night at a new nightclub...a summer camp. I felt defeated but managed to shove down the growing fear about having to face another summer of winging it and picked up the phone. I called the camp office to see if I could find some way to better my odds of getting my kids in. Cowboy Bob answered the phone. I found that charming, but still had to bite my ever sarcastic tongue not to respond by saying, "Hi Cowboy Bob, this is Crazed Mommy Dawn..." He told me which program days might give us a better chance of not getting wait listed but suggested we drive our application and deposit check over the next day instead of using the mail.
I quickly filled out the application and then decided to use a tactic that helped us get our first house by winning over the owners with a personal note and photograph as a way of begging them to sell it to us and not the five other couples making offers on the house. It worked for a house, so why not for summer camp? I printed out a picture of my girls from last summer and had them each write a little note on the picture about why they wanted to go to the camp, folded it up and tucked it in the envelope along with the application. I felt foolish, like one of those parents you read about who hire consultants to get their kids into the right kindergarten. But I didn't want to get my kids into kindergarten, I just wanted them off the streets during the summer at a camp that wasn't just open from 9 to 12 and that wouldn't require me taking a second job to pay for it!
I sent the application off yesterday. So now we wait to see if we get into camp. In the meantime, I'll think about what other trip - maybe Greece, maybe Rome, maybe just fixing the leaky roof we discovered in all the February rains - all the things we could have done for the cost of summer camp.
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