Family

Blind Spot

By / August 31, 2012 / 4 Comments

Howard sent me a link to a game called Petit Computer with a note that it might be a good choice for Link’s upcoming birthday. I watched the video and it was like being transported back to all the computer avoidance of my childhood. My father was a computer programmer beginning in the days when that meant racks of punch cards. My three brothers and two of my sisters were all interested in the possibilities of programming. For me, programming was something to escape from rather than enjoyable. My response to Howard was that I was not a good judge of whether the game would appeal, because it looked hard and boring to me. I was just self-aware enough to know that not everyone shares my opinion of programming. My family members certainly didn’t. Many of my current friends are excited by the thought of putting together code which turns a pile of organized metal and plastic into a magic generator of games and productivity. I just want to turn on the computer and use it.

I think I was in elementary school the first time I located the blind spots in my eyes. Every eye has them. They are the spot on the retina where the optic nerve attaches. This means that no visual data is collected there. We don’t notice them because our brains fill in the gap with what ever is surrounding that spot. If you put something small enough into exactly the right visual space, it vanishes. I remember holding an optical illusions book close to my nose and moving it back and forth to watch a printed dot disappear into my blind spot and come back again. As long as the dot sat in my blind spot, it was as if it did not exist.

As kids hit their teenage years, they start needing a focus. They need something around which to form an adult identity and a direction to be heading. Children are happy to just be, teens want to be going somewhere. Link struggled last year because he knew that he needed a direction for his life, but the only thing he is really passionate about is video games. I keep trying to introduce him to things ancillary to video games in the hope that something would ignite the same passion. I gave him tools for making videos and video editing. We took him to GenCon. I kept casting around for something, anything, that would help Link find a focus. I never even considered teaching him to program a computer. Programming sat in my blind spot, because I didn’t like it and didn’t know how to make it sound exciting. It did not occur to me that to the right person, programming is exciting all by itself.

“Mom! I want to buy this game.” It was a familiar refrain, one I’ve been hearing all summer. Link has spent most of his lawn mowing money buying games on his 3DS. He researches the games himself, plays demos, and then comes to me for help when he’s ready to buy. The game he had found this time was Petit Computer.
“You really want this one?” I asked.
“Yeah! I can use it to write my own games!” Link’s eyes were bright and excited in the way that he is when he is truly engaged. When Link is talking about something he loves, he meets my eyes and speaks at length. His enthusiasm causes him to forget that words don’t always come easy. At all other times he uses as few words as possible. We bought the game. More than that, we made an appointment with one of his uncles, someone who loves programming, to sit down with Link and teach him enough BASIC to make the game do fun things.

It is like I turned my head and realized that a wonderful possibility was sitting right there in my blind spot. Among the things that Link will be getting for his birthday is a copy of Hello World! Computer Programming for Kids. It is possible that Link will not fall in love with programming, and that is fine. He needs something he is passionate about, not something his mom thinks he should do.

I never wanted to be the parent who tried to push kids into things I wish I could have done. Yet over and over I discover my own interests and biases leaking into their lives. All I can do is make adjustments when I catch myself doing it.

Cabbage Farming is More Adventurous Than Intended

By / August 29, 2012 / 1 Comment

(Warning: this adventure contains hornets, a moment of panic, but no serious injuries. If I ever have serious injuries to report, I’ll not begin that story by talking about cabbage.)

Near the end of third grade, local kids are each given a cabbage sprout and a challenge to grow it over the summer. In theory they will bring their grown cabbages to the school next fall to win prizes. I’ve never seen that part come to pass, but the cabbages come home because they’re provided free by a plant company. Patch proudly brought his cabbage home and we plunked it into the weed bed which has been a vegetable garden in years past. I expected it to die of neglect the way that Gleek’s had. Instead it thrived and over the summer months developed into a giant plant. This past week I’ve been staring out the window at the thing and realizing why that myth about babies and cabbage patches might seem believable. The cabbage head looked like an alien life pod. I knew that harvest time had to be near, so I consulted the internet for instructions and recipes.

Around 4 pm today I went to Patch to tell him that I planned to harvest his cabbage for dinner. His reaction was electric. He instantly jumped up from his game “We’re going to harvest it? Now?” Then he ran outside. I paused to collect a knife and my camera.

There he is contemplating his cabbage. Unfortunately the harvesting became more adventurous than intended. Right underneath the wood on which Patch was standing was a sizable hornet’s nest. Patch jumped up and down in excitement. Then moved in to a better photography position.

We got the above photo just moments before Gleek, who had come to watch the excitement, said “Wow. There are a lot of bees.” That was the last clear moment before my memories become a fog of shrieking Patch, Gleek yelling instructions, Patch freezing instead of running, me trying to swat a hornet off of Patch while not stabbing anyone with the knife nor dropping it where a panicked person might step on it. Oh, and I was barefoot, as I often am in summer. I wish I’d thought to put on shoes before heading outside. All of that in sixty seconds. Then we came indoors because there was a stinger to remove from Patch, Gleek discovered that one hornet had gotten inside her shirt and there was even more panic while that bug was slain.

The final sting count was three. Two on Patch, one on Gleek. We immediately administered antihistamines and daubed baking soda onto the sting sites. Then I prescribed a medicinal dose of funny animal videos for the next couple of hours. Within fifteen minutes all was restored to quiet. It was quiet outdoors as well. The hornets had returned to normal behavior. I noted where their entrance was hiding and vowed to return after dark with chemical weaponry.

So instead of having a fun family moment harvesting the cabbage, with photography. I went out by myself and cut it.

Patch grew a really good cabbage. It weighed five and a half pounds. I used about a third of it in soup for dinner. The other two thirds are in my fridge awaiting tomorrow’s recipes. The soup itself got mixed reviews. I loved it, as did Kiki. Link did not like it at all. Gleek and Patch both ate a reasonable portion, determined to eat the food they earned with pain, but finished up dinner by eating other foods.

The stump of the cabbage is still outside.

The internet tells me that it will sprout leaves that we can cook and eat. I’m curious to see what they will look like.

Once the world got dark, I went outside to spray the entry to the hornet’s nest. I don’t think I eradicated it yet, but I have other tools to employ on a different evening. I do feel a little bad, because the hornets were only defending their home. I actually find the tenaciousness of these huge nests kind of admirable. Unfortunately this is the second nest of 200+ stinging bugs that has taken up residence in a location that clashes with the safety of my kids. It has to go. As soon as the world freezes, sending all stinging insects into hibernation, I will recruit a crew to help me removed the wood under which these hornets are nesting. I’m tired of providing habitat for stinging bugs right next to my garden beds.

By bedtime the stings had faded to near invisibility. Patch and Gleek say they still hurt some, but they both completely forgot the stings for several hours this evening. Then they fell asleep without difficulty. I suspect another day will heal everything up again.

So: Growing cabbages = really cool and surprisingly tasty. I may repeat that. Housing hornets near my cabbage plant = bad idea, not to be repeated.

Life Begins to Settle

By / August 28, 2012

Something important happened last night and I almost missed noticing it. Howard and I were both pretty stressed about packing him for WorldCon, so I summoned pizza for dinner. The kids descended like locusts once the magical circles of goodness appeared. They were all right there, so I did a quick survey of each child, asking about homework.

Kiki didn’t tell me details, just enough to let me know she had it handled. “I got this mom.”

Link had only one math paper “I did most of it at school. It is pretty easy.”

Gleek had several assignments, but she knew exactly what they all were. She negotiated to do some of it that night and the rest in the morning. I said yes because I didn’t have energy to enforce anything else.

Patch also had several assignments. He told me what they are and laid out a plan to do some that evening and the rest in the hour before school. Again, I didn’t argue with the plan.

The pizza vanished, and so did the kids. They went and did their school work. Then they played until bedtime. This morning both Patch and Gleek completed their work, without drama, in plenty of time to play before school.

Last night and this morning my kids demonstrated that they are settled and happy in their new routines. They’ve got the right amount of work and are getting it done. I know not every night will go this smoothly, but it gives me hope that this year we all may reap some benefit from the groundwork laid last year.

The Eve of School

By / August 20, 2012

Summer is not gone, but it is waning. I can see it in the walnut husks on the tree that are beginning to crack and blacken. Soon walnuts will litter my lawn and deck. I also see it by the grapes growing heavy on the vines. Any day now the local robins will discover they are there and begin raiding. The signs are all around me, but summer still has some scorching hot days in store. What we’ve run out of is summer vacation. That is finished, complete. Tonight will not be one of staying up late just because. I will be carefully managing bedtime because this is the first school night of the year.

I remember when the onset of summer vacation felt rife with possibility. I made long lists of things I wanted to do, places I wanted to take the kids. Summer was play time on a grand scale. Once I began working, that changed. I could no longer alter my schedule around that of the kids. I had business obligations which did not defer to vacation, in fact some of the business tasks increased because of summer. Those big summer conventions take a toll. Instead of contemplating summer as a wide open possibility, I know in late winter what things must get done during the summer months. I do lots of spontaneous day trips for the kids whenever a free day hits, but we don’t plan and promise in advance. An unexpected result of this is that here I am, at the end of the summer, without a list of things I meant to do and didn’t. I haven’t spent these last few weeks frantically trying to finish items on that list. Instead I sit here on my porch, done with things of summer, prepared for things of fall.

It is possible that my feelings of completion have more to do with resignation. Ready or not, school will begin. I did not feel ready two weeks ago when I rounded the corner into August, I did not want to think school thoughts. But then later that same day, I did. It was like I found the drawer where all the school thoughts were stored. Once found, I was able to air them out and see what needed mending. It also helps me feel complete that I’ve done so many house tasks that have been waiting. I finally took a saw to the dead tree in my front yard. It has been rendered into a log, a stump, and a pile of branches. I’ve been staring at that ugly, dying tree for years and now I don’t have to anymore. Granted, I still have to clean up the tree shrapnel, but the major work is complete. The same with the summer conventions. In the next couple of weeks I’ll finish off these odds and ends of summer and we will fully transition into a different rhythm of life.

I am done with summer. I am ready for school. But there is a large part of me that wishes for a pause. A space in which I could spend two weeks to unfurl all those summer possibilities which we were too busy to contemplate this year. A space with the difficult pieces of summer complete, but the difficult parts of school put off for a bit. I would dearly like a pause. Perhaps I’ll find some of that in the writer’s retreat at the end of September.

Venturing Forth at the End of Summer

By / August 17, 2012

I never intended to make a tradition out of End of Summer outings. But somehow we keep having an outing with the kids and I toward the end of August. Three years in a row makes it a tradition right? This year we ventured to the Tracy Aviary where we found ducks swimming in pools of light.

Or at least ducks who obligingly swam right in the sun’s reflection. When they went fast it looked as though they were scattering light behind them.

We also got to meet Andy, a giant condor out for a walk. He was as big as a medium sized dog. I kept thinking of dinosaurs as I saw him stalk along. He’s fifty years old and being slowly rehabilitated so that some day he’ll be able to fly over the heads of guests as part of a bird show. I hope to attend that show someday. Big bird.

We had a good time. Even during the parts which were boring, too hot, and full of rush hour traffic. Outings have frustrating bits. The kids are ready to head into school next week. Gleek did her summer assignment. Link assembled his binder. Patch put his things together. We’re ready for the next adventure.

Being Between

By / August 17, 2012 / 2 Comments

For the first time all summer, I find myself between. There is no more work I can do for GenCon and I can’t yet begin post-GenCon accounting. I’ve mailed all the things to ChiCon, but have to wait for Howard to get home before the final preparations. I’ve finished off the house organization projects which got shuffled aside during the crush of other things, and I’ve not yet decided what house project to tackle next. I’ve let go of my summer plans, but won’t embark on school schedule until next Tuesday. I am between. In some ways it is a lovely space, but staying here too long would not be good for me. I like moving forward.

Yesterday I read a letter from a friend where she lamented that every year she intends to plan and prepare better for the beginning of school. Then every year she ends up dealing with the same frantic scramble to get everything done. I read her words and realized that one of my focuses over the past six months is that I’m trying to be less prepared. I live much of my life planning for the future. I’m paying attention to thing I need to do today in order to prepare for events a week, a month, a year in the future. I’ve slowly become aware that the world is full of people who do not do this. I regularly see something coming, stress about it, plan ahead for it, and then move onward; only to find that others hit this same emotional process weeks or months later than I do. Several times I’ve had to straighten out a financial misunderstanding because I’ve paid a bill so early that the recipient mis-filed the payment. I plan ahead. Much of this is my job. I am the one to reserve a hotel room in February so that Howard has a place to stay at GenCon in August. I make sure that merchandise arrives where it is supposed to and when it is supposed to. I create schedules out of nothingness and then remind everyone to adhere to them. I intend to keep doing my job, accomplishing concrete tasks on a think-ahead timeline, but I want to shed all the needless stewing over possibilities.

My kids start school on Tuesday. Beyond reminding myself what the wake-up, drop-off, and pick-up schedule needs to be, I am trying not to think about it. Entering school will expose my kids to new information and people. They will shift and grow in response. Some of that growth will be painful and difficult. Tantrums and meltdowns are coming. I know it. If I sit down to think about it, I could predict what those crises would be, but then I would begin planning how I could respond to these hypothetical crises. After that I can imagine that the child does not like my response and reacts poorly. I could stage an entire melodrama in my head with branching possibility trees, a choose-your-own-adventure of parental stress. Except when school really does start, odds are that my kids will depart from the script in the first five minutes. All my fretting, planning, preparing would then be discarded because we’re going somewhere else. Instead of trying to improve my predictive abilities so I can better plan, I’m trying to trust that I’ll be able to deal with whatever comes when it arrives. Some things are concrete and life will be better if I plan ahead for them. Other things are in flux and I need to leave them alone until they are concrete. Living in flux is where I have to exercise my faith; faith in myself, faith in God, faith in the family members around me. Faith is often hard, I want to be able to predict and plan, as if I could plan life into calmness. Controlling something that is in flux is like trying to grab a fist full of water. I need to learn how to open my fingers, let the water flow past, and wait for something solid to grab.

So I am between, and will be until Monday. I will do the few small concrete tasks which are nearby and then I will endeavor to fill the remaining space with something enjoyable. Perhaps I can make something lovely out of these last few days of summer.

Sending Howard to a Convention

By / August 15, 2012

Wind rushed past the sides of the van as the wheels rumbled down the freeway. Howard and I were on our way to the airport so that he could board a plane to GenCon. He would be gone for a week, I wanted to spend the thirty minutes of drive talking. I wanted to be with him as thoroughly as possible to make up for having to do without him. But I was tired. I cast about in my mind for conversational topics and kept pulling up the equivalent of tin cans and old boots. It wasn’t that my head was empty. My head was over-full with thoughts about the convention he faced, the things which could go wrong, possible ways to address the things which could go wrong, and then further along the causal chain of could-go-wrong clear out beyond the bounds of rationality. I looked over at Howard. He gripped the steering wheel and occasionally expressed frustration with the drivers around us. He was as full of stress as I was, yet the only thing to do was drive Howard to the airport and deal with everything beyond that when it came. We’d spent all morning scrambling with last minute business tasks. This was our chance to shed all that and be Howard and Sandra together, if only we could dodge the business thoughts and talk about something else. I commented on how the smoke from distant fires collects in the Salt Lake valley. As we descended into the valley I peered across to the barely discernible mountain ridge on the other side. Then I sat back and realized that Howard and I had fallen silent again, surrounded by thoughts we weren’t saying. I could feel the edges of business anxiety in my head. I wanted to be chatting and laughing with Howard about something cheerful, but the best we managed was a mellow companionableness as we drove down the road.

Howard hugged me tight before rolling away with his two suitcases, one full of clothes to wear, the other full of merchandise which arrived too late to be shipped. I did not stay to watch him enter the airport, the curb was needed for another farewell. The drive home from the airport was also silent, until the fourth time I had to drag my brain back from a path filled with useless worry. Then I turned on music and sang loud enough to drown out my thoughts. I continued to distract myself until late in the evening because my brain was ready to believe that I’d committed a failure of paperwork which would render Howard’s convention trip into an utter disaster. I fell asleep convinced that I’d be awakened at six in the morning by a panicked phone call.

I woke at eight, no phone call had come. Email gave me a quick note from Howard “Nice hotel and a good night’s sleep. So far so good, off to the convention center in 20 minutes.” He’d successfully arrived using the flight I’d booked. He’d stayed in the hotel that I’d reserved. Neither of these things had resulted in catastrophe, my weight of responsibility felt lighter. All the various preparations I’ve made since last January will either work or they won’t. It is all out of my hands. I am so happy to have it all out of my hands. I’m certain the booth set up brought its frustrations and stresses, but I did not witness them or be stressed by them. Instead I get to see Howard’s tweet at the end of the day “Rocked the booth prep for GenCon today. Planning to totally rock the show tomorrow.”

In comparison with Howard’s day mine is tame. He helped assemble the miniature shop in which he will live and work for the next five days until he disassembles it and comes home. I spent the day putting things in order, building shelves to store t-shirts, stretching out in my spaces. Sometimes when Howard goes on a trip, I sort of gasp with relief and collapse into a pile of post-convention-preparation uselessness. It is a definite “cats away, mice will play” feeling. For the span of time while he is gone, I can take more time off of work. Sometimes it worries me that I feel relief to have him gone. Then there are other times when I miss him terribly and can’t go to bed before early morning because the house feels wrong without him here. Today I went about my work and in the quiet spaces I missed Howard in a quiet way. My meanderings kept carrying me back to the kitchen and the flowers he bought for me on Monday because Monday was a rough day. Then I discovered the treat he hid for me to find. I’ll be glad when Howard can come back home to relax with me. Though it is going to be several weeks more before that occurs.

Disengaging the Mommy Radar

By / August 6, 2012

I do not want to be that mom, the one who hovers and is unable to let go. Yet my mommy radar is jangling in my head with pre-alarm signals. I dropped a child off this morning and I have not yet picked her up. She is off the grid and I can’t check to make sure that she is safe. I’d managed to disengage the radar, assigned Gleek to Safe at Camp status, but then she called home. She had a headache and a stomach ache. Both are likely the result of the fact that she did not sleep well last night and is suppressing nerves about camp. I now wish I’d taken time to sit with her last night, helped her get to sleep. Instead I just gave her reassurance over the phone and suggested that she get some rest. She sounded sad as she hung up the phone. They’ll call me again if there is any real cause for alarm. She is fine and well cared for, but now my mommy radar won’t shut up. I don’t want to be the mom who suffers because she is worried and can’t let go. I just wish there was a way to recalibrate the part of my brain which keeps getting alarmed because I can only count to three kids home safe instead of four.

Things I am Stressed About

By / August 4, 2012 / 1 Comment

I have decided that rather than letting all these thoughts swirl around in my head, I will pin them to a list. Once I make them hold still I have a better chance of figuring out which ones actually need my attention.

Gleek goes to camp next week. This will be her first away from home, away from family experience. I’m sure she’ll have a fantastic time and that all will go well, but it hasn’t gone well yet. My brain keeps worrying over Things Which Could Go Wrong much in the way that a dog will worry at a favorite chew toy.

Kiki has not yet finished her big summer commission. She is completely capable of doing it. It is her job. She is handling it responsibly and making steady progress. She is going to get this done on schedule. Yet my brain can’t stop tracking the progress and noting that it is not yet complete.

School is coming. I don’t know how the onset of school is going to unsettle everyone. I’m gathering my mental energy to try to launch us into the new school year, but it is not launch time yet. So that pent up energy keeps getting funneled into “preparing for school” which probably doesn’t need that much focused energy.

Money. The finances are actually fine. Before the end of the month we’ll have sales from two large conventions. However we’ll also have bills attached to those conventions. My brain keeps trying to reach out and do future math to balance estimated sales against probable bills. The truth is that my inner financial squirrel is never happy unless she has enough money stashed away to pay all of the incoming bills for the entire rest of the year.

Laundry.

Gardening. I thought I’d do a better job of getting outside regularly to keep my few flower beds under control. Instead they’re currently overgrown and weedy. This makes me alternately sad and grouchy.

Organization in various stages of completion. I’m still in process on a lot of organizational tasks. Unfortunately this means that I have boxes or objects stacked in odd corners around my house waiting for me to find the time to send them to their final destinations.

Cleaning. I did lots of cleaning in the past few weeks. Unfortunately the new cleanliness of some areas makes me see the mess in other areas. I keep seeing it and I keep not getting around to getting it done.

Writing. For the most part my writing brain is locked down so tight I can’t even see what is in there. I keep feeling like I ought to be opening it up. I ought to be airing out those thoughts and starting to mentally prepare for the writing retreat at the end of September. But digging into that tight knot feels difficult and scary. I’m afraid that it will be pandoras box, filled with all sorts of emotional stuff that I’ll have to dodge, manage, or internalize.

My brain continues to spin trying to convince me that I chose wrong in deciding to go to the retreat.

Link has turned another developmental corner. He and I spent over an hour last night talking about friends and friendship. Link is beginning to learn that the shape of his childhood friendships is no longer enough. He needs friends he can talk to about grown up things, but he is only just learning how to do that. I’m completely confident that he will work this out and find his people. He may even discover that many of his childhood friends are his people. But the process is going to be difficult and I can’t make it any easier. I just get to watch, throw out advice where he can grab it if he wants, and then wait for him to sort it out himself.

I need to go to the doctor for another thyroid check up. I don’t want to have to deal with it. I just want to find medical stability and hide there for awhile. I want a month where no one has illnesses or pain. I want a month without an excess of psychology to navigate. I want calm, order, and work done.

Food. Why can’t healthy food just materialize in front of me without me having to think it up and perform the work necessary to bring it into being?

Next week I’m expecting four hundred pounds of t shirts. I’m going to have to turn around and ship about half of those out to customers. So next week is a big shipping week. The GenCon shipments are all done, but World Con shipments also need to go out asap. I keep kicking myself for not getting the WorldCon shipping done last Monday when I meant to do it. All week long a piece of my brain has been berating me for not getting it done.

There is probably more, but I’ve got children hovering and asking what I’m going to make for dinner.

School is Coming

By / July 29, 2012

My kids schools have started sending me mail. The contents vary in detail, but the general gist is “School is coming, this is what you need to do to prepare.” I collected the letters and pinned them to my bulletin board because I wasn’t ready to think about it yet. Then I looked at my calendar and realized that August arrives half way through this week. School starts in three weeks, ready or not. So this morning I began thinking about the school year to come and talking to my kids about what we need to do in the next three weeks to transition smoothly.

Kiki is going to be a senior this year. I find it fascinating that the minute people hear this, they begin to ask all sorts of questions about career plans and then to spout advice. The only other time in my life that I’ve heard so much unsolicited life advice was when I was pregnant. The trouble is that people keep asking questions for which we do not yet have answers. This is not because we haven’t considered the issues, but because it is not yet time to have answers to those questions. I can’t tell you how we’re going to pay for college because I don’t know yet which school or what scholarships. Kiki is still considering schools and weighing options. She is still in the open possibilities stage of this process, the time of imagining her life in a hundred different ways. Yet all the questions are focused on narrowing down options and picking a path. As if picking a single path now determines her entire future. As if adults never change direction or readjust their lives.

Often I’m not actually a participant in these conversations about Kiki’s future, I just get to listen to them. Kiki does not seem to mind having them most of the time. Perhaps they are helping her see her choices. The truth is that I am not particularly stressed about college admissions for her. I know her and how competent she is. She will find a way through to good life solutions. Her solutions will be a better fit for her than any solutions that I can give her. It just falls to me to decide the quantity of financial support we can provide as she furthers her education. Those conversations and stresses will hit late winter. I’ll be stressed about it when the time is right, not now.

It is also possible that I’m in denial about how stressful this “applying for college” process will be. In which case I will snuggle my comfy denial close and keep it for awhile. My brain is already quite occupied with unpacking the school stresses that I put away last spring and now must pull out to examine. In the first few weeks of school I need to conference with Link’s teachers to make sure that his IEP reflects the diagnosis we made at the very end of last school year. We need to make sure that Link has the resources he needs so that he can take control of his life. Patch’s teacher sent a letter emphasizing the importance of multiplication tables. Those were the bane of his existence last fall and threw him into a pit of self doubt. I am hopeful that this new year will not trigger a similar emotional crisis, but I need to watch carefully. Gleek is headed into sixth grade. In Utah that is still elementary school, but the hormonal and emotional shifts which girls go through at this age can cause them to make really poor decisions. I’m not so much worried about Gleek choosing awry, but I really hope she doesn’t suffer because someone else decides to alleviate her own self doubt by being mean.

These are the thoughts that I shoved into the back of my brain last May and have not touched since. School is coming. It will bring me six hours of quiet house each week day. I’ll be able to re-separate my work time from my parenting time. That will be a blessed relief. School will also bring all of that other stuff. My fears will be appeased or shown accurate. My biggest fears revolve around the crisis that I don’t yet know the shape of, the new thing which shows up and blind sides me with its unexpectedness. Last year I didn’t know to worry about multiplication tables or a new diagnosis cycle. This year there will be something else. I can’t prepare for it because I do not know what it is. So I spend extra energy on the thing I do know. Patch will practice his multiplication tables and we’ll buy him new clothes because he shot up this summer. I’ll call Link’s teachers in advance of school starting. Gleek will go through the contents of her summer homework packet. In between all of that, I will take my kids out and do some fun things. We will try to grasp the last pieces of summer and hold them tight for as long as we can.