The Po Show

First Day of Fall

Or Autumn. Anyway, it's supposed to be 83 degrees today. So much for crisp fall weather! Of course it was 48 degrees when we got up yesterday. Thanks, Ivan.

Last night was Matthew's Open House, which sounds like you bring the kids, right? As opposed to Parents' Night, when, as the name implies, just parents go to school. Okay, it's semantics, but it was still a big problem for us.

We picked up Ross at the train station, then headed over to school for the Open House, which was to start at 6:45. We discovered that it was expected that parents only would attend the events (7:00 Principal's address in the theatre, 7:30 grade presentation in the media center, 8:00 class presentation), and that kids were to go up to the gym, where there were "babysitters" (aka four teenage boys). There were a TON of kids, all running around throwing balls around the gym. At first there weren't very many, and Matthew and Tessa were happily running around, so Ross and I went to the first presentation.

He went to check on them at 7:30 and I went into the class presentation. He never came back. Around 7:40 I saw Matthew's face peer through the glass part of the door. I waved. Then Ross looked through (with Tessa's beaming at me from his arms) and motioned that they'd meet me later outside the other door. I sat for a second more, then got a bad feeling and made my way out. I looked for them in the halls, and when Matthew saw me he ran over and buried his face into me. Obviously the gym had been too noisy and overwhelming for him. Ross said later that he had been wandering around the perimeter of the room, his face bright red, not yet crying but obviously on the edge. Poor boy!

Ross suggested we go down to Matthew's classroom to wait for the teacher and the other parents. Apparently the grade presentation went very long, because they didn't show up till 8:15. Matthew was beside himself by that point and Tessa was rolling around on the floor. His poor teacher had to do a speed version of her presentation since it was so late, and I had both Tessa and Matthew on my lap, sitting in Matthew's little bitty chair at his little bitty desk.

Um, this got long and I was talking about fall... Oh well, fall is always hard. Starting a new school year is always hard. It's even harder when you've moved to a new house and a new school and a new state. It's harder still when you're a ball of constant anxiety like Matthew, who talked to me yesterday afternoon about all the "strange things that have been happening since we moved here."

Hope things settle down a bit soon. On a brighter note, I got to leave Tessa at nursery school yesterday for a whole HOUR. I drove around with the radio blasting Green Day and went to the post office all by myself. Par-tay :)!

A Mind is a Terrible Thing to Waste

As we are almost settled in here, what with Matthew finished with his first five days of school (since they started on a Thurs. and this week had two days off for Rosh Hashanah), and Tessa having gone to one whole day of nursery school (since she fell dead asleep on the way there the second day and could not be roused, and then had a day off for R. H.) and some semblance of a schedule is materializing out of the chaos that has reined in our lives since we moved here six weeks ago, my thoughts begin to turn to (gasp!) what I'm going to do with myself here. [Damn! That was a lengthy sentence that could almost rival Joan Didion!]

I just don't know. I'll go insane if I don't intellectually engage myself in SOME way. Davis is still a bad memory. That was a bad, bad year in most ways, not the least of which was that I did not adjust to the SAHM thing very well. I bitched about my job last year an awful lot, but it was still nice having a job and talking to adults everyday, and having quiet time, and at least occasionally being intellectually stimulated. The last month I was there, during which a great new post-doc arrived, was really wonderful. We had some fabulous conversations about science and research and life in general.

So what to do now? I am child-free for two and a half hours, three days a week. Hmm. That's not a lot of time. It's like last year when my friend Jill's second son started nursery school. She said all kinds of people asked her, "So are you going back to work now?"

She'd answer, "I'm free from 9:00 to 11:00, three days a week. Yeah, gimme some work."

Of course, additional childcare could be arranged for Tessa. But I'm caught in the whole It's-all-me-now scenario. Ross is gone for 13 hours a day. And really GONE, in that he's way out in the city, a half hour train ride away, plus to and from the station time. And he's not really at liberty to stay at home when the kids get sick anymore. I've been used to having a spouse with at least a relatively flexible schedule, and I don't have one anymore.

I've flung myself headlong into this ebay thing (mostly because it's become my obsession du jour, or de l'annee (leila, I'm sure I got that wrong :))), and I've currently got 113 items up for sale. Yes! I'm INSANE!!!! But even if I spend untold hours and make $500 a month, is that really enough?

I just don't know. I do know that I got all excited yesterday when I realized that they screwed up on my Paxil prescription and put down one more refill when I'm not supposed to get any more refills. I was afraid I was going to have to go find a new shrink, or at least a GP who was willing to give me more refills. Now I get one more month to put it off.

I don't think it's chemicals that are my problem anyway.

My problem is me.

The End of Summer

vacation, that is.

Today was the last day of Matthew's summer vacation. I wanted to do something fun and special, but we had the remnants of Frances hit us today and it POURED all day. So we stayed home all day. Tessa did go out for a walk with my FIL in the torrential downpour, which she loved. The girl loves her puddle jumping.

Matthew is excited about school starting and I am definitely excited about getting a break from two kids all day everyday. It was a tough summer, though in my typical fashion I'm remembering all the fun times and pushing out all the memories of how insane my children made me for the last two and a half months.

I am so not cut out for single parenthood, which is more or less what was in effect for the vast majority of the summer. We were in CA without Ross for five weeks, then we got back here and spent long days with Daddy at work 12+ hours. Hot, sweaty days too, at that! I just cannot get used to the humidity.

My head swirls with worry. How will Matthew handle the long school days (8:40 to 3:15. That's a big change from 8:35 to 11:50)? What can I pack in his lunch (for the kid who eats nothing but pizza and garlic bread, neither of which can be cold)? How will he handle the new kids in class, all of whom will be younger and probably much smaller than he? How will he BE this year, in general?

I've enjoyed the lazy mornings we've had, where we didn't need to be anywhere at any given time. The kids stayed in their jammies late every morning. I was able to leisurely sit around with them, then take my shower, then make my coffee, then lounge around with them some more. No more...

Plus it's still supposed to be raining hard tomorrow morning! What a hassle! The school is close by, but there's no parking around.

Sigh, my gigantic first grader...

Quiet

It's quiet here. The only sounds filtering through are the clock on the wall and the occasion sounds from outside the window (okay, that's a little noisy: someone is weedwacking next door).

I'm all by myself in the house. I just spent the last hour on the computer, drinking coffee. No one was pulling at my arm, trying to get me to come to another room, no one was asking me for a drink of this or a snack of that. No one was trying to tell me in excruciating detail the various strengths and effects of various YuGiOh cards. The TV was not on. No one was trying to crawl into the desk chair with me, no one was trying to jump on top of me.

It's been a long time since I sat in quiet by myself. It's the first time it's happened in this house. It's the first time it's happened since last June.

As crappy as my old job was, it was a wonderful sense of relief to unlock the door to my office in the morning, boot up my computer, and sit in the quiet all by myself. After the harried process of getting us all ready in the morning and both kids off to school, I could physically feel myself unknot as I sat down in the quiet.

For two and a half hours, three days a week, I'll have that quiet again, once Matthew starts school next week and Tessa starts preschool the following week.

OMG, I can't wait.