Once the kids go to school and leave the toddler years, family responsibilities become fairly predictable. The kids get on a bus every morning at a certain time and return back at another set time. In between that time, I have a blank slate of time to get things done. Sure, there are occasional sick days or parent-teacher conferences, but for the most part, I can get a lot of work done. Things get out of sorts at the beginning of September when school starts up, right before the winter holidays and now, June.
Yesterday morning, I got a chunk of research done on the politics of preschools, but the rest of the week was spent flying between visiting schools and running errands and making summer plans.
The calendar is God right now. Both boys have a dozen end-of-the-year activities — Jonah’s middle school graduations, several class trips and field days for both kids, Jonah’s sport matches, and some special ed meetings for Ian.
I’m planning the summer schedule. Ian is all set for July, but needs some activities for August. For the first time, Jonah won’t be going to a day camp, but will be working at one. Somehow I have to squeeze in pre-high school sports and music lessons. I need to have him booked up, so he doesn’t spend the entire day annoying me with hours and hours of Skyrim-play.
There’s the constant effort to keep the house standing up. Houses want to crumble, and it takes work to keep that from happening. Our back porch is cracked and needs replacement, so I’ve been talking with landscapers. One guy wanted to install an enormous stone monument in our backyard. The other guy told me to call in another professional to first repair the water damage to the shingles.
The CSA vegetables are back in town and Steve’s blood pressure is too high, so I’m back to cooking healthy stuff. No burgers allowed.
I have exactly thirty seconds  to take pictures between finishing dinner and ravenous boys devouring it. 30 seconds isn’t enough time to properly photograph and style the food. How do the food bloggers do it?
A couple of days ago, I got stuck in traffic in town and wasn’t home in time for Ian’s school bus. Jonah was frantically texting me to bring a forgetten premission slip to school. Not only did he need something, but he wasn’t home to collect Ian. Even with some obnoxious Jersey driving, I was late. Luckily, the bus driver waited for me and didn’t take Ian back to school.
June is thick with good stuff. I sometimes get frustrated, because I can’t do everything. Not enough writing is happening this week. But it’s all good.
Apt. 11d 
Aargh on the craziness of June. Someone posted on FB that her brain had shut down. I’m like that, too, that when there’s too much, my brain shuts down and my capacity decreases. I admire those who are the opposite and get more efficient as their schedule gets more complicated (I think they exist).
I am reading the Anti-Romantic child, and I like it. I was pre-disposed to seeing GIlman as a self-centered navel gazer, but the book feels authentic, a well written and sensitive depiction of adjusting to having a life and family different than the one she expected to have. There’s interesting information about hyperlexia with specific examples from her son and in describing the relationship with her son’s father (and his relationship to his son).
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I have the book on my coffee table but haven’t cracked the spine yet. I have to check out her hyperlexia stuff. Watching a 3-year old and mute Ian teach himself to read was one of most amazing things about his disability.
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A big summer plan is to order physical books for summer reading. I want a stack for myself (for when I hang out with the kids at the pool — our first time this year with access to the community pool) and for my kiddo, who has realized she doesn’t like reading electronic books.
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Yeah, we have to stop this insanity. It’s too much. The 8th graders have basically stopped learning. All of June is one big field trip. Meanwhile, I’m supposed to be heading a field trip to the swim club tomorrow, and we’re getting a freakin’ tropical storm. We can’t reschedule because there are *literally* no other possible dates.
All week I’ve been running around like a crazy person. Next week, the 8th grader goes on a 3 night field trip to DC, which I think is absolutely useless. She also is doing PT for an injured hamstring so she can dance in the freakin’ recital. And I’m regretting making her sign up for weekly summer wind ensemble because I am sick of driving her places.
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I think you’ll find the book interesting and am eager to hear your take on it. The parallels between what I’ve gleaned here on this blog and Ben/Gilman are pretty striking (would be interesting to know if you see them, or if I’m being too shallow) and I was pleased to *not* find her tone annoying. I’m not sure why it doesn’t annoy me — but I think it might be ’cause I think she’s fairly upfront about her various privileges (mom owns a literary agency, education at yale, faculty positions at yale/vassar, . . . .).
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And, I’m rabidly anti-divorce, but I could see the case for both why she married her first husband and why she couldn’t stay married to him in her writing, which is pretty remarkable, given my antagonism towards divorce.
(mind you, I’d probably say the story of why she got married in the first place might be an example of why arranged marriages/marriage brokers/online dating might provide better matchups, but, I could understand )
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I’m rabidly anti-not-burger eating. Maybe at least Jonah should get a burger. My blood pressure is fine, but I can’t get my cholesterol down.
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Yeah, Jonah needs a burger. His skinny white legs are freaking me out. He isn’t 100 lbs yet. Some of his friends weigh 150-170.
I skimmed the Gelman book in McDonald’s today. (Really. I needed a Big Mac.) There are several weird parallels to my life. She’s dealing with the emotional drama of leaving academia at the same time as dealing with the emotional drama of having a different child. And both of our kids seems to have similar (rare) types of autism. I might not be able to give this book a proper read therefore.
Even without those parallels, I’m so done with all that drama that I don’t want to read about someone else going through it. My life is different from my planned life, and I’m cool with that. I’m having way more fun in this life than I would have had in that other life anyway.
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There’s a restaurant here that makes a $9 version of the Big Mac and it is so worth it.
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Yes, I can get how the book might not be a light read for you.
It might be something that others around you might get something out of, though. I think what’s making me want to talk about it is that in spite of my initial resistance, she’s managing to get my understanding about ideas that don’t come naturally to me, which means that she must be a pretty persuasive story teller.
(I can do without the wordsworth theming, though).
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I need to be in another country without access to McDonalds for at least 3 months before I need one. Burgers on the other hand are a good thing.
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