Tipping Over the Midpoint of Summer
Something shifted the last few days. The kids went from being happy to ignore me unless they were hungry to seeking me out to tell me things. Last night Kiki flopped herself on my bed and spent over an hour talking through college thoughts, growing up thoughts, future parenting thoughts, and what she is looking for in a future spouse thoughts. In the end I had to send her to bed because I could see that late night fatigue was starting to cause her to dwell on the negatives instead of the hopefuls. In Kiki’s case much of this was triggered by the overnight college orientation that she’ll be attending on Monday. It will be her first sampling of the year to come.
This morning Gleek came to me and told me every single detail about the dream she had. It was full of memory-fragments spun through a kaleidoscope and assembled into a sort-of narrative, which is much like most dreams. The details of her dream did not matter, my listening to it was really important. I was able to talk to her about dreams and help her pull out the relevant emotional content of this particular dream, which was that I was not in the dream and yet I was always there. She woke from the dream wanting to be with me.
At bedtime I lay down next to Patch and waited to see what he would talk to me about. He uses those quiet moments to unpack his brain before sleeping. Mostly it was about the current video game of choice. I listened, not because I care about the game, but because I care about the boy.
Link has not yet come to talk to me, but then he’s less likely to chat than the other kids. On the other hand, he’s more likely to seek me out to ask me things and request permission.
We’ve reached the midpoint of summer. The kids are shifting, ready for something more than just hanging around the house, but not yet ready to focus on school. I should probably schedule some family outings, times when we’ll get out of the house to go do things like swim. I’m starting to feel ready for these sorts of things. Though continuing to hide in work and electronic things also has its appeal. I do think it is time to venture forth more lest the summer get away from us completely.