Snacktime
The black-raspberry canes in our back yard are enjoying a fruitful season. Which makes for an excellent serve-yourself anytime snack. The very definition of local food. Get ’em while the gettin’s good.
And if you’re of an entrepreneurial spirit, like AppleApple, you’ll spend a good half hour on a Saturday picking a pint of berries to sell to your mother (even better, you’ll employ your younger siblings at one penny per berry picked).
Horse camp
This child has not had a day of hanging around the house doing nothing since school ended two weeks ago. The very next day, we dove directly into our Canada Day camping trip; two days after that, we delivered her and her older brother to a wonderful overnight camp for another week of adventure away from home; from which her dad picked her up super-early last Saturday for a two-hour drive to a two-day soccer tournament (she got car-sick on the way to the tournament, and went on to play three back-to-back games looking not a bit like her usual self; thankfully, all was well by Sunday’s game); and on Monday morning, bright and early, the little kids and I drove her out to the country to the much-anticipated horse camp.
For the week, she got “her own” pony: this sweet brown mare named Lola. She learned how to ride in proper English style, how to hold the reins, and keep her heels lowered in the stirrups, and how to do a rising trot. She also got to ride a horse while it swam in a pond on the farm. How cool is that?
This morning, she said, “Tomorrow, I’ll get to do nothing at all at home.”
“Your brother has his soccer tournament, and we’re all going to go.”
“Well, Sunday, then.”
“He might make it into the semi-finals.”
“Then I kinda hope he doesn’t–“
At which point I stopped her, because that was exactly her brother’s attitude toward her tournament the previous weekend; and because, though I get the sentiment, we’re trying to foster a mutually supportive environment here. Everybody on board, please.
“Okay, well, Monday, then I’ll get to do nothing.”
“Swim lessons,” said her dad.
“So when do I get to do nothing?”
Luckily for her, I’m pretty sure swim lessons don’t start until Tuesday. So she can have a full day to do nothing. And swim lessons aren’t exactly rigorous — it’s our one guaranteed daily activity, biking to the pool and getting to swim. And then she can keep doing nothing for the entire month of August, because this is it: the last planned camp of the summer.
The definition of a perfect summer afternoon
Yesterday: five boys in the back yard, already semi-bored from summer holidaying, looking for fun, finding it spontaneously. Four ten-year-olds welcoming the three-year-old into the group. After the splashing and the snacking, they retreat to the basement. The three-year-old emerges, flushed and sweaty, requesting his shirt off, and races back down again, shouting, “I’m a bad guy now, too!” “Um, what are you doing down there?” “Playing a battling game.” “Okaaaaay …” (As long as no one gets hurt.) (No one gets hurt.) From basement battling to board game in the living-room: Mama eavesdropping on the goofy, happy conversation. Finally, Mama needs to leave to pick up the girls, one at a play date and the other at horse camp. “We can stay home alone.” “Yah, I’ve stayed home alone a lot.” “Me, too.” “It’s okay.” “Right, well. No. Not gonna happen. You’ll have to find another plan.” So, five boys walk down the sidewalk and around the corner — even the three-year-old, who refuses to be left behind — to someone else’s house, to keep on playing. (Mama retrieves the pleased-as-punch three-year-old once they’ve reached their destination; and drives off to horse camp thinking of boys at a not-quite-in-between-age in damp swim suits on a front porch, playing Apples to Apples; and one of those boys is hers).
In the garden
Here’s what I like doing in the garden: pulling things up, chopping things down, and day-dreaming. I wander around with my garden gloves and imagine what the apple tree would look like if we built a treehouse around it. I imagine a child hidden high in the leafy branches, spying (like I loved to do, as a child). Imagining what could be is as satisfying as bringing it into being. Well, it’s not really fair to compare the two, because both are extremely satisfying, but in different ways. I love bringing an idea to fruition: that ah sensation of accomplishment. But I love equally letting my mind wander through plans and plots and possibilities. It’s like being at rest and at play at the same time. These are some of the happiest moments in my every day.
Dance Camp
There was only one prince at the princess-themed dance camp. “Well, you did sign him up for a girls’ camp,” said Kevin, to which I took great offense–boys can dance, don’t stereotype by sex, all the rest of it, as if I hadn’t signed him up purely because it was a camp that his sister would agree to go to AND that would accept three-year-olds (ie. a total marriage of convenience). Then I went to the recital. And I thought to myself: alright, I’ll admit it, I signed him up for a girls’ camp. He wore an expression on his face, throughout, of toleration. As in: I’m showing up, I’m wearing the knight outfit and carrying a sword, and I’ll bow when you make me, but we must never speak of this princess crown again. Whereas his sister looked blissfully happy.