In-Between Time

Throughout this process and even now, people we speak to ask how the kids are doing with the move. 

I appreciate this thoughtfulness.  Each of our kids have struggled with the whole process in different ways and to differing degrees.  Right now the boys seem to be doing okay, but that might be simply because it's summer break, where their mornings are spent trying to accomplish all their daily tasks that must be completed in order to earn time on the Nintendo Switch.  Oh, you're not the kind of parent who regularly employs bribery to assert some measure of behavioral control over your children, and your panties are becoming increasingly bunched over my last statement?  My guess is that your progeny are either babies, or imaginary.  Please move along.  There is nothing for you here, in the land where I'm afraid we do have to say things like, "You must complete X amount of creative time, and X amount of reading time, and X amount of outside time before we will allow you to rot your brains with X minutes of Zelda.  Why, yes, we are the cruelest possible parents in existence; thank you so much for noticing!"

This isn't even getting into chores.  In the space of time our 10 year old spends poring over the day's chore list to make sure it is fair and just in every possible way, with no unequal distribution of tasks, he could have finished half of those chores.  I tolerate the cries of "Why do I have 2 hard chores and one medium chore when she has 3 easy chores?" because this is also the kid who prefers to see the chore list first thing in the morning so he can do his right away; no unfinished work is allowed to dangle over his head all day.  What makes a chore "medium" or "easy" in his estimation?  No one knows.

I get an almost indecent amount of joy out of taking pictures of our kids doing chores.  Hey, you have your weird hobbies, I have mine.

With all that, I don't know that our boys have the additional emotional bandwidth for existential angst over the move.  It also helps that we've been to the pool almost every day for the past week and there we met a nice family with two boys of matching ages to our own.  Sometimes God answers prayers through affordable family pool passes.  Not what I would have expected, but then, that's God for you.


Adelaide is paradoxically eager for school to start, in order to "get it over with."  The two of us ventured out last week to The Book Barn, which consists of three locations of a book store within a mile or two of each other, each more charming than the last (providing you start with the least charming location, of course).  We've both had a hard time putting into words what we loved so much about this used book store; Adelaide loved the goats, the whimsy, and the books, while I loved the gardens, the whimsy, and the books.  And the clever shelf markers.  And the rambling-ness of the place.  And all the rest.

Please enjoy this example of their cleverness taken through my dirty windshield.

It definitely feels as if Real Life has been put on hold.  Currently I am banned from the kitchen as the boys prepare a "surprise" for Derek.  I have been told it's not something to eat, despite their needing a pan and food coloring, and just now I overheard Caedmon say to his brother, "If you use cooking ingredients, even if you're not, like, cooking, it often turns out well."  Forgive me for my apparent deep-seated cynicism as I say there is no way this is turning out well.

I'm thankful for this slow time before school starts and I find another job.  (Will I ever find another job?  Who knows?  But rest assured I am handling the unsettled quality that currently characterizes this aspect of my life super duper well.)  It's allowing the kids and me a gradual easing-in to this new life of ours, one where there's time to drag them on hikes, and on walks around town, and where we get to try pizza place after pizza place until we find Our Favorite.  I don't think anyone can complain too much about their life if they're getting pizza once a week, and I am not exempt from that.