Parenting Madness Before Packing for a Trip
The other night Baddy looked at me strangely. “What?” I asked, running around the house barefoot with three boys asking me questions and following me like baby ducks.
I was getting us ready for our trip to Telluride, where the boys will compete in their last freestyle event of the season. “Are we going to be with our friends?” Thumper asked, worried that I’d landed a writing gig and we’d be staying at a “luxury mountain resort” instead of a packed condo with all his friends. “Did you know an Alaskan Inupiaq won the Iditarod?” Feisty-One asked, referring to a school project. And then I heard a little “Mommy, but Mommy…” from Hootie-Hoo, who really had nothing to say but felt the need to be part of the commotion.
I was thankful for the inner peace I’d been cultivating, because otherwise I might have been a loose cannon ready to blow. Instead, I was like Julie Andrews in The Sound of Music, ready to break into song. I was thankful for my quirky family and for the awesome fact that with a 6-, 9- and 11-year-old, the time is now to enjoy them and not let them drive me mad, because soon that madness will be gone, and I’ll most likely go mad from the lack of it.
One conversation helped me let go of things that were troubling me, holding me in a vise grip and drowning me. Sometimes, if you can, it’s good to walk away from things that are too much of a struggle, return to them later and let things happen on their own accord.
As spring break approaches, I’ve decided that since I’ll be home all break with no plans while my friends jet off somewhere warm and far away, I’ll write for the sake of writing and let the business end lie low. I’m sure I’ll have plenty of material, and frankly, people close to me, like my Aunt Tutti, have told me they miss my writing about the daily nuances.
In fact, I’ll start now by telling you that my office smells like dog and tweenager since we told Thumper he can no longer have his computer in his room. As a result, he and Muki are slowly taking over my space with dog bones and tween paraphernalia, the two of us on our computers, him Skyping all his girlfriends and editing his freestyle movies and me blogging about it all. It’s all so humorous if I take the time to think about it: Thumper deciding the only way he can get out of bed in the morning is if I drag him out; Hootie-Hoo telling me he doesn’t buckle his seat belt because “I’m like that”; and soft-spoken Feisty-One blowing us out of the water by qualifying for the 2011 USASA National Championships and announcing at dinner that he has his first girlfriend.
And now off we go on another journey, this one not so metaphysical. We can only hope Baddy and I won’t embarrass our children by letting loose too much and doing karaoke to AC/DC. I think I’ll leave my cameras in the room, except the tiny one, because it’s no secret: I’m always packing.
