Mindy's Non-Adventures

I've just skimmed the posts I've written over the last five months, and I have to say, either nobody is reading this, or you're all just assuming I'm being self-deprecating and exaggerated. Y'all. I am not. The last six months or so have seriously kicked my butt. I'm not allowed to share some of the things that have happened, but between death, major schedule changes, broken bones, and potential life altering "things" that I had to prepare for "just in case", no wonder my new hobby involves planning trips to anywhere but here. I keep telling my husband that I am tired, but he doesn't get it. He hears tired and thinks "I guess she needs a nap? I mean, she slept in late this morning so she should be fine."  He does not hear the loaded meaning behind  tired . My brain is tired of  juggling schedules and planning for contingencies that were very real even if I can't share them with everyone. My heart is tired of hurting over t...

August... Yesterday I visited my grandmother in the hospital. She is near the end of her life. All conversations about her are like a game of Taboo. We can't actually say the word "death", but that's the word on the card. Death is taking up residence in our lives again. You can feel him in the air. He's sitting in the empty chair in my grandmother's hospital room, waiting patiently but assuredly. We still talk about the future with her. Where will she live? Who will care for her? What will she do when _______  happens? It's a futile scramble to fight the natural way of things. Death sits quietly, whispering peace and stillness to the room. He lives at my grandmother's house. Where her home was once thriving with plants and flowers in every room, it is now decaying, the flower pots full of crackly, dried up remains of what were once living. Some of them are hanging on, but they're yellowed, drooping, and weak. They're shadows of what they on...

The past few days my mind has insisted on drifting back to Paris at every opportunity. Generally during the day there are too many sounds and responsibilities to merely sit and think. At night, however, my mind has been coming alive with memories. This time, my heart keeps going back to the Eiffel Tower. My first day in Paris was ridiculously perfect, but that evening was one of those surreal experiences that still feels halfway imagined. Actually, it's not even the Eiffel Tower that I keep picturing, it's walking in Paris afterwards. It was midnight, and we walked through a light rain. The city was quieter than I expected a major city to be. Hardly anyone was walking, there were few cars on the roads. We walked by this one restaurant with a red awning that was full of boisterous cyclists celebrating the end of the Tour de France. The rain made the city lights sparkle. The lights weren't harsh and florescent. Instead, they all had a soft, warm, incandescent glow that made t...

Can you feel it? That warm breeze filled with hope and pollen can only mean one thing: February is over. Stepping from one month into the next is me jumping over my last major hurdle for my school year.  Don't miss this day. It is the beginning of the end of winter, and I can see spring coming. We will finish! The math will be done! The writing will be written! The science will be scienced! Yes, maybe we'll have to push math into the summer. Again. And okay. I'll plan to do more of my science book with the kids because that did not happen like I wanted it to this year. But that's okay. My major boxes will be checked, and I am close to enjoying my summer and appreciating a few months of "only" being the mom. Not the mom, teacher, and program director. Nope, I'll only be the mom.  Most of the school year includes a lot of no because we've already used up our yeses. Yes, we will participate in various classes, musical theater, basketball, church youth...