Happy Thanksgiving!
The progress of porch
These photos chronicle several days’ work on the porch. Yesterday, the work was invisible, but important, as the room and the porch got wired for electricity. This morning, when I got home from a lovely early yoga class, there were several men on the upper deck. They will be working on cladding the wood and doing the decking. And the roofers may be here today, too (hard to tell who all is out there; it’s a crowd this morning). Additionally, the electrician is back to wire the floor of my office for heat.
Am I saying “my office” way too often?
I’m now going to head up to “my office,” to use those quotation marks to slightly different effect. Playroom is ascendant right now, office is marginal. The floor is littered with toys. The kids have been using my computer and printer without asking. I feel like it’s hardly mine. But I’m working on a small side project and it just needs to get done; doesn’t matter where; doesn’t have to be pretty.
Isn’t it funny how the closer one gets to something, the harder it is wait? This is true in races, too. The last 500 metres are often the worst of the whole race, and it feels next-to-impossible to take those steps. My coping method is to pretend that I still have another ten kilometres to run. Can I do another ten kilometres? I ask myself, and the answer is always, Yes. Weirdly, the steps come more easily when the finish line is out of the picture. So I’m still saying “Christmas,” when I imagine moving into my office.
Lunchroom helper to the rescue
Albus is the only lunch room helper in what sounds like a grade two classroom (the info I get from him isn’t always 100% accurate). At the beginning of the year, he was one of three lunch room helpers in the classroom, all of whom had volunteered for the job, but apparently “lunchroom helper” is a job with some attrition, because he’s now the only one. Lunchroom helpers supervise during two “nutrition breaks” as lunch is now called, and as I understand it there are no teachers in the classroom during that time. Just Albus. And a bunch of kids. Eating. And probably talking and laughing and potentially fooling around.
He says there have been no problems. He just has to stand up to eat his lunch (he didn’t qualify that as a problem).
So I said, um, what would you do if someone started choking?
And he shrugged and said with an optimistic uplift in his voice, “Hope for the best?”
Very proactive of you, Albus. Very proactive. (For the record, I suggested that in addition to hoping for the best, he head for the hallway and shout for a teacher.) But, really, I’m super-proud of him for volunteering to help out, and for sticking with it; and also for volunteering to torture parents walking their children home from school by being a school crossing guard, too. (Parents waiting for the 10-year-old kid in a safety pinny to tell them it’s safe to cross know exactly what I’m talking about…)
**Photo from our summer holiday, but of course. Doesn’t he look beautiful, and quite possibly, responsible?
Standing on the sidelines, kicking myself
**This is CJ’s drawing of the two of us. Yes, we’re upside-down. He’s the one standing on my head.
Today, I am feeling the effects of less sleep; it seems like there’s always a grace period after sleep-deprivation, followed by a crash. I’m in crash mode today, and hoping for recovery by tomorrow.
Yesterday, during the grace period, I burned through a crazy variety of activities while still flush from the after-effects of witnessing a birth. I napped in a dark room for two hours. I spent the afternoon with CJ. I made supper and vacuumed the house because the floor was nothing but crumbs. I packed a picnic for my soccer girl. I got ready for swim lessons, got kids snacked, changed, and to the pool, and then went for a much-needed run in the park across from the pool. It was gorgeous and sunny and I would have run and run and run had the kids not been waiting for me. I got back to the pool just in time, got kids showered and changed, raced home to put supper on the table, grab a bite to eat myself, and feed soccer girl.
We had less than half an hour to transition to the next activity: a soccer coaching clinic. Turns out Kevin and I are coaching all three of our kids’ indoor soccer teams (CJ isn’t old enough to be on a team, or no doubt we’d have managed to sign ourselves up to coach four). We’re not even sure how it happened. But Kevin is working quite a few Saturdays, which means that I will need to be there if he isn’t (with extra kids in tow? we haven’t worked out the finer details), so off AppleApple and I went to the coaching clinic. The coach leading the clinic is also coaching the U-10 rep girls team, so he had the girls come out to demonstrate. It was a pleasant stroke of luck that as part of the coaching clinic I also got to watch my soccer girl in action.
We spent three full hours at the indoor field, the last hour of which was just a great big game. The girls played, the rep coaches played, and the parent volunteers who had signed up to coach their children’s teams were invited to play, too. Only a few dads jumped in. I was one of two or three moms volunteering to coach, and we all passed.
I was invited to join the game! And I stood on the sidelines instead.
I was tired, yes, but that wasn’t why I didn’t play. I was chatting with a friend, but that wasn’t why I didn’t play either. It also wasn’t because I didn’t want to play; I actually kind of sort of really really did want to. Nope; I didn’t play because I felt intimidated. I haven’t played on a soccer team since the age of eleven. I’ve never practiced any of the skills and techniques the head coach was showing us last night. (Excuses, excuses.) All I had to offer, therefore, was fitness and a willingness to try. Except last night, I lacked the willingness to try. Why? On the drive home, AppleApple wondered why I hadn’t played, and when I confessed to feeling too nervous and not being skilled enough, she kind of huffed and said, of course you’d be good enough!
And she’s right. Because any willing participant would have been good enough. It wasn’t a test of my skills or abilities. It wasn’t about me at all. It was about running around, kicking a ball, and having fun. And those kids were having fun (so were the dads). Just look at my very own small and tough AppleApple who elbowed her way into the mix and stole the ball from the coaches and ran her heart out without once doubting that she should be there, doing that.
And so, regrets? I like to think of myself as a generally unregretful person. But it turns out I have a few. Many (most?) boil down to those moments when I let pride dictate in(action). When I don’t try. When I don’t take the risk, and join the game.
A somewhat sleep-deprived Carrie reflects on sisters and brothers
Big sister, little brother. Fooey is helping CJ read the book he brought home from nursery school. This morning, I am thinking about siblngs. Brothers and sisters. It’s fitting the kids are in pajamas in this photo, because I’m also thinking about late nights and being up past my bedtime.
Here are some other siblings of whom I’m awfully fond (and proud). They belong to me. On Thursday, two of my brothers, and my sister, who make up the band Kidstreet, launched their debut album. Of course, I was there on the dance floor to celebrate. (That was late night number one.) **Listen to their album on soundcloud, or buy their album on iTunes.
I am so proud of them for working together all these years, song-writing together, travelling together, performing together. Not all siblings could pull that off; in fact, I’m pretty sure they’re in the minority. All five of us are pretty close, as it happens, and I don’t take that for granted, not at all.
And I wish the same for the batch that Kevin and I have created, and for another brother/sister team who came into being just last night.
Because last night was late night number two. Last night, the stars aligned (they really did; it was dark and rainy and cloudy, but I’m positive about those stars). The stars aligned, and I drove to Toronto to be with friends who were about to become parents for the second time. Especially amazing is that I’d been present at the birth of their first child, too. So, last night, I got to see a little brother being born, and I remembered his big sister being born almost exactly two years ago. Just think about how her world has shifted this morning. She might not like it for the first little while, but she’s going to love that little brother. I just know it. And he’s going to love her right back.
I drove home in the middle of the night (still raining), filled with gratitude. Thankful for the moments when I see my kids helping each other out. Thankful for my own joyfully creative siblings. And thankful for friends who welcomed me — not once, but twice — to be a part of their birthing experience.
Now for a little nap, perhaps …