life by the drop

2008-04-10T12:49:00.002-05:00

the joys of interwebbing

I spent about two hours today trying to remember what gmail account and password I "migrated" this blog to last year. What a mess. And, of course, that is just the time I spent today - leading up to the solution. I've spent some little bit of time on it, thinking, planning, and reading help message boards, every day for the last month to break into my own account.

I guess about once a year, I get a real itch to start blogging again, and I either set up a new blog or have to recover what sort of a person I was a year ago to guess what email and password I might have used to update this one.

I felt so relieved when I got here, that I actually shouted for joy. But now I'm too tired to write.

Maybe next year...

2007-02-14T09:41:00.000-06:00

Buying bread

Ok. So William and I got into Breal Loaf and now we are frantically trying to figure out how to pay for it.

Tuition - 3870 less 1330 in grants for each of us. 2540 x 2 = $5080

Housing - After two weeks of calling places the day after they were rented, we finally found a house with utilities included for $2300 with a $500 deposit

Daycare - provided on campus, uncertain of cost.

Boarding the dog - approximately $700

Food - ???

So about $8500 plus food and childcare. Terrifying, yet typical. Hilarious, actually, when you consider that we are trying to get to the end of February on $7.03.

2006-06-13T23:22:00.000-05:00

Summer of Swim, day 13

We stayed overnight and went to visit Will's dad in the hospital today. He apparently has a hole in his colon, and they are siphoning out all the junk it is dumping into his body through a tube that goes from his reopened surgical wound to a machine that collects it. It's pretty gross. They are hoping his colon will heal itself, but at some point they will decide to remove it if it doesn't heal on its own. We had to wear gowns and gloves to go into the room, and it is really all pretty alarming. We stayed for 30 minutes or so, but then he seemed tired, so we took the kids back to Sea World to swim before I had to be back for a meeting with my principal (more about that tomorrow - Mahala is sitting at my shoulder asking me worriedly about whether the Sandman is going to come.)

I have decided that I prefer the afternoon shift at Sea World to the morning one. This may change as the weather gets progressively hotter, but for now, I would rather go at about 4 pm than at 10 am. I went ahead and bought Mahala a season pass (it was only $5 more) in case we go back this week before she returns with the grandparents.

2006-06-12T22:59:00.000-05:00

Summer of Swim, day 12

So. We got back from Vernon last night, and we brought my little neice, Mahala, with us. She is four. She loves Merlin. She wants to do everything that Merlin does. It is quite comical. Today we went to San Antonio to see William's father, who is back in the hospital, but we got such a late start that we ended up not going to the hospital. We got to Sea World at about 6:45, went to Lost Lagoon to swim and then caught the "Summer Nights" Shamu show - which was marginally better than the "Believe" show if you completely disregard the sappy, overdone salute to "our heroes" in Iraq (which is in both shows, but seemed somehow stronger in the evening show.)

I don't know.

I have family in the military. They took the job because it was attractive to them. I hope the people who are serving now took the job because it seemed likely to benefit them, and not out of some patriotic notion of defending me. I work in an industry that is prone to characterizing its employees as martyrs (that would be teaching), and I don't think the image benefits teachers. It encourages people to think that what we do should be provided practically free of charge without complaint or consideration for the cost of living. It encourages new people entering the field that they need to sacrifice their personal time and money to make things work for their constituents - and that tends to burn people out quickly and cause high turnover, which, in the long run, is detrimental to the institution.

So, if you are serving in the military, I hope you are doing it because it will pay for your college, or you wanted to travel, or you wanted to learn to fly a jet, or some reason like that. Because the idealistic reasons that people give for being in the military alarm me - just a bit. I am glad that there are people who are willing to take the risks associated with defending our country (even if I am uncertain that our president has led them to the best course of action), but I hope that they are doing it for their own reasons (just as I am teaching children for my own reasons) and not with some sense that they are owed more than the pay and respect that should be accorded to anyone who does their job gladly, out of a sense that it is the right action to take both for themselves and for society.

2006-06-11T23:31:00.000-05:00

Summer of Swim, day 11

The kids swam today for about 2 hours in the backyard pool while I only got in a couple of times to gather things up before the trip home. Swim toys always seem like such a good idea until you have to hunt them down. I will say, though, that both kids seem to be doing a lot more underwater swimming - probably a consequence of their getting older and back into the swing of being in the water every day, but I like to think the dive toys are providing some incentive.

2006-06-09T12:05:00.000-05:00

Summer of swim, day 9 - night swimming

I would never have my own pool - not living in Austin where you can't throw a rock without hitting a nice, inexpensive or free, publicly maintained and lifeguarded pool. But I love the little above ground pool in my mom's back yard. The kids are all tall enough to stand with their heads above water now, which is nice, and it offers one of the features that I like best about a private pool - night swimming. Though I haven't taken advantage of it much this trip (I crashed last night at about 7 o'clock, I think.), there is something especially fun about sliding into the water at night, seeing the moon reflected in the water, the water holding you up while the dark sky and stars cover you. Maybe next time.

2006-06-08T21:56:00.000-05:00

Summer of Swim, day 8

I took a break from the water today, owing to my six and a half hour drive to Vernon to pick up Merlin, but both kids swam in the above ground pool in my parents' back yard. I'm sure to be getting in myself tomorrow.

2006-06-07T22:57:00.000-05:00

Summer of Swim, day 7

Today we swam at Barton Springs Pool - the swimmin' hole that Austin is famous for. It is a constant temperature year-round (a brisk 68 degrees)because it is spring fed from the Edwards aquifer. I took a group of 12 ESL students to swim after their Spanish clep test, and Gavin and William met us there. It was a beautiful day in the high nineties, and the water felt divine. All-in-all, an excellent idea on my part. There is an admission charge ($1 children, $2 teen, and $3 adult), and it really is incredibly cold, so we wouldn't go there every day, but it is - pretty much without fail - a good time. After I returned the students to school, we went over to Adam & Melissa's to cook out on the grill. A very good day, indeed.

2006-06-06T20:59:00.000-05:00

Summer of Swim, day 6

Today we went to Dittmar pool. It is about 3 miles from our house, and it is currently in the running for my favorite free pool. Why? It has an entire section of the shallow end shaded. There was a hugely mixed crowd- from a tiny baby napping on his floatation device to this huge Mexican guy who had tattoos running from his chest all the way down his arm (Gavin tried to fool him by pretending to throw the water ball to him, but pushing it under the water instead of releasing it as a toss, and it was quite comical from my perch to covertly observe his game with my son.) - and everyone was friendly. I sat in the shade trying to learn Spanish from a book for almost two hours while he played "monkey in the middle" with two little kids. Then he flirted with a circle of women who were congregated around an infant that could not have been more than a month old. Then he conned me into tossing rings for him to dive for - and three, then five other kids joined in. I spoke in some of my seriously fragmented Spanish to the mother of two of the ring divers who had come to sit down beside me to watch her boys.

Oh how I love the south side.

2006-06-05T22:03:00.000-05:00

Summer of Swim, day 5

Today we went to Sea World San Antonio and had a marvelous time. We got to the park about 3:30, and Gavin wanted to go straight to the penguins, so we headed that direction and stopped to get wet at the little splash playground. Then we saw the new Shamu show (Not bad, I guess, but I kind of miss the old days when they just told you interesting things about the animals. All the emotional music and stories just kind of leave me - blah.) We spent the last hour and a half swimming at the Lost Lagoon in the wave pool (which always reminds me and William of Budapest, since that is where we first encountered a wave pool)and the Spash Attack playground. We left at 7:30 and went to Will's parents' house for dinner. A very satisfying day.

2006-06-04T22:45:00.000-05:00

Summer of Swim, day 4 - bringing diversity to the East Side

Today we went to Metz neighborhood pool because we heard there was a water playground. It turned out to be not much of a playground, and the Metz pool was closed because they didn't have chlorine. So we drove about 3 miles over to the Martin neighborhood pool and swam. The only thing I didn't like was that there was nowhere to sit in the shade and the pool at the same time. It was a pretty high-energy crowd, not too crowded, though. Many random kids used William as a shield in games of water tag. It was quite funny to watch them grab his arm and duck behind the only large white Mexican in a sea of brown bodies. (It kind of reminded me of one of the tenets of the Monty Python skit "How Not To Be Seen" - Don't choose an obvious hiding place.) I think there is corrido material in there somewhere. Hope to get off my ass and post the pictures soon.

2006-06-03T22:47:00.000-05:00

Summer of Swim, day 3

Today we swam at Marble Falls. We didn't stay in long, though, because the water was pretty murky. Gavin asked to go swimming as soon as he woke up, but I stalled for a couple of hours and tried to negotiate waiting until we got back to Austin to go to the pool, but he wouldn't have it. So I got in for about thirty minutes and then got out on the pretext that I liked to be able to see my legs when swimming. He said, "Why do you want to see your legs?" I responded that it made me uncomfortable for parts of my body to disappear when I knew they were still there. He said he couldn't see his hand, but he felt great. This is the tenor of many of our conversations.

2006-06-02T22:49:00.000-05:00

Summer of Swim, day 2

Today we swam at Dick Nichols pool, a very cool, totally free pool that is about 6 miles from our house. Gavin and I went alone as William was in a meeting and Merlin was at my mother's. There is a playscape - which we didn't have time to explore - and a large 3' section that made it fun for both of us. They also had a wading pool that Gavin spent quite a bit of time in while I worked on a potential YMCA schedule - if we join. I think it could be pretty cool.

2006-06-01T10:54:00.000-05:00

Summer of Swim, day 1

We didn't swim today because it was raining. William and Gavin, who is currently complaining because he is named after a knight and not a wizard, were in San Antonio for most of the day helping Grandma move into a nursing home. I was there yesterday packing up boxes, but today I had to go to the Blanton Museum for a training that was pretty cool.

2005-08-10T21:26:00.000-05:00

Craziness

Just the usual craziness around here. Will is out of town. I'm doing back-to-school inservice type things that are not getting my room or curriculum ready, but are instead driving me insane right before I get students. I am tired and the school year hasn't even begun.

Gavin had his 5th birthday, so we had a big party over the weekend. He is now Nintendo-obsessed. I'm grateful for the quiet time, but uncertain about all the implications of plugging my child into the gaming mentality. ah parenting. If you're not feeling uncertain, you're doing it wrong.

William and I will have our 10th anniversary on Friday. I imagine we will be celebrating by painting my classroom.

2005-07-19T23:08:00.000-05:00

Trying Tuesday (aka another essai)

Sparring

“Bow this way. Bow to your partner. Begin.”

Feet and fists fly by me as I shift my weight: front to back, side to side; I am watching, waiting, in a word: hesitating. We spend the last few minutes of each kung fu class this way, engaging in “no-contact” sparring. We pair off and assume a sparring stance, hands up as if to punch or block and feet planted in a wide stance for balance, yet ready to shift for a kick or evasion, and then we throw kicks and punches toward our opponent without actually touching them. We watch. We circle. We wait. We strike. We react. We reset. We try to intercept the message of our partner’s body and deliver one of our own. We use this small part of each class to integrate our forms into our natural reactions, to essentially become the forms that we have been living with in practice. We spar for a minute or so and then slide down to a new partner, bow, and begin again.

Though no score is kept and no contact made, I can tell that I always lose these matches.

The first couple of weeks I simply talked my opponents down. I would grin or giggle, say something silly or make an off-the-wall observation. My partners would shake their heads, trying to clear them of the babble that was cluttering up the space between us. I made myself utterly non-threatening and at the same time incapacitated my attacker. Then one day while working with a kids’ class, Sifu Paul barked out, “No talking during sparring!” He didn’t exactly cut his eyes at me, but I could tell he was hoping that I could take a hint.

Damn. Disarmed.

I vowed never to speak during sparring again, but sometimes my partners make this a real trial.

I sparred with an older man I had not met before. He complained to Sifu that my hair getting in my eyes was preventing him from making eye contact and was distracting him. I have no response to this.

At the next class, Sifu was running through his drill as we sparred, “Stay light on your feet, remember your fore block, watch their eyes, not their feet, watch your partner, try to anticipate their next move,” and I mumbled, “Can you ask them to stand still while you practice your sparring techniques?” The young blue belt across from me looked confused for a moment and then said, “Would you like me to?” I considered taking him up on it. Pathetic. I know. I declined and continued getting theoretically pummeled. Mouth closed. Hair out of my eyes. Not distracting.

I once had a partner with five eyebrow piercings and an almost threateningly quiet and serious demeanor settle into sparring stance and then turn his front hand palm up and flick his fingers up in a “bring it on” kind of gesture. I fell out of stance in my surprise and broke my promise to remain silent. “What is this, The Matrix?” Sifu rolled his eyes. Whether at me or my partner, I’m not sure. Back in sparring stance, I strangled the urge to mock my partner further, though he got his revenge by touching my face as we sparred – proving undeniably that he could move through my defenses with ease.

Another time I squared off with a student with whom I’ve been friendly in an acquaintance sort of way. He is obviously committed to his practice as a fighting art and is even a little scary in the force with which he executes his forms. His devotion seems child-like in its determined single-mindedness, and I tend to hold him in my mind as both adorable and psychotic. I waited, expecting him to put on his usual “mean” face as he turned to me, but instead he came up from his bow, raised one eyebrow at me, grinned, revealing ever so slightly his broken front tooth, and looked for all the world as if he was going to say, “So, what’s your sign, baby.” I was unable to recover in time to salvage the exercise, and my friend had the good grace to at least look abashed for his part in the debacle.

I’m surprised that Sifu continues to let me spar. While I wouldn’t cut that piece from my martial arts practice, it isn’t why I take the classes. I want control, flexibility, focus, stress-relief, a physical outlet, and the opportunity to learn something not just new, but outside of my experience entirely. Growing up, I had health problems that prevented my participation in sports or serious physical activity, so I became a watcher. I am accustomed to sizing up a person’s personality, their mental strength and weakness, their spiritual generosity and meanness. Learning to engage physically has felt like retraining my brain, and I enjoy the combination of mental and physical challenge that learning a new form presents.

So, considering I have chosen this course of physical activity, and I profess to enjoy it, I have to wonder why sparring provokes me to throw up shields. Is it facing someone as if you are going to hurt them? Is it the arrogance inherent in attacking someone? Is it the fear that I can’t do it well, so I may as well make it silly? Probably.

My daughter spars magnificently. She is all of 6, and I have seen her press a full-grown man, a brown belt, no less, back to the wall with the forward drive of her punches and kicks. As she faces someone easily twice her height, three times her weight, four times her age and as close to the black belt end of the spectrum as she is to the white, she furrows her brow in concentration. She scrunches her nose and bares her teeth like a rat, and her hands tighten into tiny fists of fury. She advances in a fluid flurry of motion, and I can’t help but notice that her hair, like mine, tends to fly in her face and obscure her eyes. Powerful. Confident. Focused. And, of course, just a little bit difficult to make eye contact with.

She has offered to teach me. I wonder whether she can. Can she teach me to fight with the fearlessness of a six year old? To engage life in this moment without thought to appearance or consequence? Am I too experienced to learn not to be intimidated by people who are larger or higher level than I am? Watching my daughter, I consider: what might it be like to face every task I undertake with sincerity instead of cynicism?

2005-07-05T13:35:00.000-05:00

Trying Tuesday

In honor of the pursuit of happiness: an essay.

To the Marriage of True Minds

This morning I got out a fresh razor to shave my legs and when I took the protective plastic thing off of it, I saw that the blades were clogged with tiny red beard hairs. Damn it. It is alarming that after 10 years somebody can still catch you off guard like that. It is weird for me to wrap my mind around the fact that William and I are hurtling toward out tenth anniversary.

There is a lot of talk these days about what constitutes a marriage. Is it strictly between a man and a woman? Is it two consenting adults? I once asked a friend’s mother – how did she know that Stan was “the one.” How did she know she was in love? She said, “Merideth, when I got married, I didn’t know what love was.”

It’s been ten years. Do I know what marriage is? I feel a bit anxious about bragging on our ten year victory. After all, my parents were disastrously married for 15 years before they divorced. How will I know when I’ve made it? When can I breathe out that sigh of relief that I’m holding in? When we first married, I would wake up every day and say, “I love you this morning.” It unnerved William. Would tomorrow be different? Tomorrow is always different. Marriage is a daily commitment, but over the years it has come to be as natural to me as waking up in the morning. I rarely startle him anymore with a reminder of the tenuousness of life in general and relationships in particular.

For all that this is working out for me so far, I don’t think I would do it again.
In ten years, we have weathered a three month trip to Europe with no money, two children, living with my parents, traveling with his parents, moving across the state twice, the deaths of loved ones, two teaching certification processes, a masters’ degree, buying a house, refinancing a house, fluctuating sex drives – and not always compatibly fluctuating, running up credit cards, paying off credit cards, running up credit cards again, and of course those little daily surprises like peanut butter in the fridge (He doesn’t eat it – he doesn’t know where it goes.) and unexpected red hair in what you thought was a fresh razor. Life has happened to us. It shows on our faces. It is heavy in our hearts. I’m not sure anymore whether I could carry it by myself.

Marriage is different from friendship, but large enough to include it.

Marriage is different from love, but strong enough to create it.

Marriage is a trust defined by the participants, and what it provides most profoundly is belonging, an almost casual sharing of identity that most of us take so completely for granted that we don’t give a thought to what we might mean – all of the things we might mean - when we say “I do.” Certainly some services include the phrase “not to be entered lightly,” but we do enter it lightly. And often, we leave it heavily, shattered by the realization that we are not who we thought we were, and they are not who we thought they were. In light of this new knowledge, one can see why Michel de Montaigne would write that “Marriage is like a cage; one sees the birds outside desperate to get in, and those inside equally desperate to get out.” It takes time and experience on the inside to know for yourself what marriage is and whether you and your partner can make it work. And right now, some people are not afforded a level playing field to find out. It seems so fundamentally wrong to deny someone the right to take this risk, to express this hope and belief in their beloved that things will work out as long as they have each other.

I want to say that to deny a person the right to validate their relationship in this way is cruel. I wish I could say it was unusual. Unfortunately, I have to settle for saying that it is ridiculous. That my hope and belief and joy in my marriage with William is somehow made less by according same-sex relationships the same right to build marriage for themselves is - well, I can’t think of another word for it – ridiculous.

In Loving v. Virginia, the Supreme Court expressed similar outrage towards the state’s ban on interracial marriage, reaffirming the sovereignty of individuals in choosing a marriage partner:

Marriage is one of the "basic civil rights of man," fundamental to our very existence and survival.... To deny this fundamental freedom on so unsupportable a basis as the racial classifications embodied in these statutes, classifications so directly subversive of the principle of equality at the heart of the Fourteenth Amendment, is surely to deprive all the State's citizens of liberty without due process of law. The Fourteenth Amendment requires that the freedom of choice to marry not be restricted by invidious racial discriminations. Under our Constitution, the freedom to marry, or not marry, a person of another race resides with the individual and cannot be infringed by the State (Warren).

Our country is struggling over a definition of marriage that everyone can live with. How about this: Marriage is surprises, boredom, laughter, continuity, struggle, stability, interdependence, validation. I know it lacks something in the gender specification department. I consider that a positive. Marriage is a public affirmation of a deeply personal ideal. The notion that this ideal might be defined differently by different individuals should be neither surprising nor threatening, and I can only think it is an extremely weakened personal ideal that cannot withstand the coexistence of variation.

On the one hand, one might argue that true marriage happens to you whether you have a piece of paper from the state to support it or not. But many couples are working for their marriage to happen without the support of the 1,049 federal laws extending rights, privileges and benefits to their fellow married citizens (OGC). In a world fraught with burdens that marriage is meant to lighten, they struggle with one extra impediment to their right to pursue happiness.

2005-07-05T12:25:00.000-05:00

Remember me?

Hello all. Just thought I'd post for the unrequited faithful that check in here once a... month? to see if I've actually posted. For those who don't know, I started a job in January teaching 10th grade English. It has been stressful and strange being back in the classroom, but I think I will get the hang of it eventually.

I am about to head out for my annual summer visit to Vernon, so I will be without internet for a week or so. Blah. I'm running around the house packing and picking up and generally getting distracted at every opportunity.

I've been in a bit of a tizzy over how to use/what to do with this blog. I have some essays stored up that may never see publication in any other venue, and some ideas for a few more. I'm poor at linking to things, but occasionally get the itch to call attention to something unusual. Don't know. I'm going to give it a think over the next week or so and try to make a decision (the horror).

2004-12-13T14:45:00.000-06:00

The drinking has commenced

I sent off my last paper today at 11:25 am CST, so I have officially completed all the work required of me for a M.Ed. I suppose I could fail the class, but I think it is fairly unlikely. I have one "A" posted, one pretty well in the bag (might be a B, but it's an elective, so "oh well") and a third grade completely up for grabs. No idea how I did in that class.

My lovely William bought me one of the two requested graduation gifts - a nice fountain pen. And honestly, though I'd like the Laphroaig, I'd likely drink it all in one go at this point and not enjoy it the way I should. So, perhaps after I gain employment.

In other news, Merlin asked me this week if I remembered her dance recital. I cautiously replied, "Uh, yeah." Then she asked if she'd be getting balloons and flowers after her storyplay performance tomorrow like she did after her recital. Gavin's gem of the week: When we asked what they were going to be in the Christmas pageant, Merlin said, "I think I'm an angel." and Gavin replied, "I'm the dragon." Well... we do go to St. George's, so I suppose it is possible, but somehow, I think not.

2004-12-07T11:22:00.000-06:00

Morality Milestones

This week, in response to my exasperation over some new messy disaster my son brought down upon the house, Gavin, with extreme patience, placed his hand on my arm and said:

"Mom, sometimes I'm good and sometimes I'm bad."

In the tone of "just get used to it." Damn. He is only four. It seems to me that this realization shouldn't really have come to him until he was at least 11 or 12. At four, you should still believe that if you tried really hard you could be good for your mom all the time.

I'm in so much trouble.

2004-12-06T23:12:00.000-06:00

Technically, I've graduated...

I think the ceremony was this last weekend (I didn't bother with it), but I still have a Lit Review to write/rewrite and turn in. I am quite relieved to be done with everything else, though. I have no idea if this will herald a return to blogging or not. I need to reinstate all my links since I lost them when I changed the format. (you like?) Also I have become quite spoiled by the conveniences of livejournal that I can probably customize my blog to have...but, you know, I would have to like ~~work~~ um have William work on it. Hope to be typing at you soon. I have almost 2 years worth of ~~textual frustration~~ pent up entries to convey.

I wonder if anybody is out there.

Hey, Dave, are you wondering the same thing?

2004-07-01T13:52:00.000-05:00

Oh what a beautiful day

*tentatively* everything's going my way? Well, whether it is or no, it is, in point of fact, a gorgeous day here in Austin, TX. It has rained almost every day for the last 30, and while I enjoy that kind of weather, it is odd - even for Texas which has consistenly odd weather. Had I posted an entry yesterday, it would have been "the rain it raineth every day." I can't help wondering if it was - damn, what do you call that in a book when the landscape/weather reflects the protagonist? False sympathy? No, sympathetic fallacy. I couldn't remember until I typed my personal translation. Somebody correct me if I'm wrong.

I took the bitch of a state certification test for Master Reading Teacher on Saturday and then turned in my case study yesterday. The downpour yesterday morning (about 5am, I should say) made me wonder briefly if flash floods would prevent me from turning it in on time, and I met that notion with a healthy mix of hope and dread. Anyway, the rain cleared off, the case study turned in, and I had about 30 minutes of euphoria at wrapping up three weeks of incredibly hard work and frustration that, of course, didn't produce the stunning results one always desires out of such concentrated effort.

Man, the difficult thing about writing after 4 months or more of...not...is the trapping of ideas. I've had ideas that I've wanted to write about in the last six months, but they feel rather like fireworks that have gone off in my mind, and as I pause a moment to observe and think, 'ooh, pretty' the pattern dissipates and I cannot call back the exact shape and color of what I meant.

I know, excuses, excuses.

At this point, having undoubtedly alienated my (admittedly small) readership, I have to wonder why I am bothering to blog at all. I've decided not to think on it much more and just post anyway.

I'll leave you with this - the t-shirt made my day.

2004-06-25T16:50:00.000-05:00

Hello?

I'm thinking of defecting to livejournal. I'll let you know if I get the energy to pack up and move.

thought you ought to know

Otherwise things are going along as usual - school, kids, disaster of a house, school, insane dog, family, school, lack of sleep - accompanied by all the regular avoiding behaviors.

The result?

I don't seem to be able to write myself out of a paper bag. Sorry!
*grins anxiously*
(see why I belong on livejournal?)

My extended absence from the blogosphere has apparently necessitated my removal from Adam's links to Friday fivers, a tradition that started just over a year ago with Melissa, William, Adam, and I.

(See, I'm doing that lj thing again. I fear I have crossed over to the dark side permanently.)

It's sad when your friends outgrow you.

Anyway, I'm taking a big test tomorrow and then I'm going to get smashed in celebration and then I'm going to clean my house, and then I'm going to see if I still recognize my kids, and then I am going to not do the annoying antisocial Harry Potter reading at Adam and Melissa's 4th of July party (Where is book 6? Write, woman, write!)and then I am going to move to livejournal. Maybe.

"Be seein' ya." (Self-indulgent British tv reference for my husband, who undoubtedly has also stopped dropping by my blog.)
*struggles not to put in lj "feelings" codes and loses*

2004-04-04T20:58:00.000-05:00

surfacing

So we have been home for a week and a half now and things are both starting to settle and beginning to get really busy. We saw some beautiful country in Wales and England (4 national parks including the breacon Beacons which we stayed in and Dartmoor which was the setting for The Hound of the Baskervilles) as well as castles, ruins, and coastlines. The kids were pretty good. I can't wait until they are old enough to be force-marched across Ireland. But Merlin wants to go to Paris, so I guess France will be the next trip (in 2yrs - once we pay off this one!)

So, my world traveler advice for traveling with children?
1) Don't attempt things in other countries with your kids that you would not do at home. If you don't take them to fancy restaurants at home, don't experiment with it when you get to another country.

2) Keep in mind that everything you love as well as everything that annoys you about your family will be seriously magnified by your complete inability to escape each other when you travel together. Adjust your attitude/reaction time accordingly.

That's all I can think of really. We took rain boots for the kids which turned out to be a brilliant idea, and I bought a high quality travel thermos that probably saved my sanity (it carried the caffeine, after all.)

We missed Scotland (again!), but my pet theory that the Scots are the nicest people in the world was upheld by a Scotswoman who ran a B&B that we stayed in at Tintagel.

I am still on my post-travel euphoria about Austin. I want to do every touristy and interesting thing there is to do here. I am loving the mild, wet, warm weather and the wildflowers everywhere, and I have made a cd compilation of songs by Texas people. I had to leave a lot of favorites out, and it is decidedly "cowboy poet" in its content, but it is a pretty good CD (actually 2 cds.) If you want one, let me know and I'll mail out some copies.

2004-03-16T09:53:00.000-06:00

Hey

We are in Wales.