Back to "Normal"

Yesterday we took Thing 1 back to college.  Today I miss her terribly.


I picked T1 up on December 22 when school closed for the Christmas break.  In my mind it was going to be a fabulous Christmas season with her home making our family of 4 complete for the Holidays.


It didn't exactly start out that way.


T1's boyfriend is in the USMC and he was able to be home for the Christmas. I was thrilled for the two of them to be together.  Since T1BF joined the core, the goodbye's between them have been heartbreaking. We gave T1 complete free reign to come and go all she wanted before T1BF had to leave back to the Core on New Year's Eve morning.


After another tearful goodbye, I got my first born back for the rest of her break.  However it appeared that she left her good mood behind somewhere.  I couldn't believe that she wasn't thrilled to be with us! I waited all through Christmas week to get her back and she'd rather not be with us??


We had a screaming match long talk and afterwards things seemed to have settled into a good routine.  We had a great 3 weeks.  She was a stellar big sister to T2 and she was a great help around the house. Then the day came to her back.  It's a little quieter without her.  We'll go through less food.  We'll eat out less often.


I miss her. A lot.

T1 and T2 is one of those moments that actually make my heart cry

Indoor Voice

I have been blessed with 2 beautiful daughters that I will affectionately refer to as Thing 1 and Thing 2 (T1 & T2).


There is a 12 year age gap between my girls.  T1 is in her first semester of college and she is a lot like me.  We like to wake up quiet, we're very comfortable with our own company, we enjoy companionable silence when we hang out together.


T2 is a entirely different person.  She is loud. She is boisterous.  She does not have an Indoor Voice. She is in 1st grade. 


We have looked for it.  I thought she would have been born with it.  I've tried bribing her to come up with one.  I've even tried using poor health to drum up a sympathetic Indoor Voice ("Baby girl Mommy has a crushing headache can you please see if there's an Indoor Voice that you can use?")  


Nope. Nothing.


T2 is a product of Montessori preschool and fiercely independent.  You can call her highly spirited. T2 wakes up ready to go and ready to talk about anything. I love her so much that it breaks my heart.  


I just wish we could find, or buy, or grow, or even download an Indoor Voice for her.

After All These Years...

Yesterday morning was a very cold one here on Long Island.  It was one of those days where you don't really want to leave the house or walk around with wet hair after your shower. 


Before I could get to the blowdryer to dry my hair, I went to the front window so that I could dread the weather again and having to go out.  Across the street I see an ambulance at my neighbors house.  I know they are there to pick up Mr. L.  Earlier last year, Mr. L had a stroke and after some time in the hospital recovering and doing rehab, he was able to come home to his wife of 50 years.


You could see the toll all of this had taken on Mrs. L over the past year.  Even though it was Mr. L who had been sick, Mrs. L carried the burden on caring for him, the house, the garbage and recycling, and the impeccable lawn that was Mr. L's favorite pastime.  Short of trimming his lawn with a pair of scissors, we see him outdoors everyday the weather allowed, cutting, trimming, planting, picking up every autumn leaf.


Since his stroke, Mrs. L had to hire a landscaper to keep up with it all.  Luckily thus far we haven't had any snow that she needed to contend with.  A few of us neighbors helped where we could, but we never wanted to make either of them feel helpless.


When I looked out the window, and without knowing how bad Mr. L was, it took seconds for me to feel  sad for Mrs. L.  She has endured so much while sticking to her vows of "in sickness and in health." I know and I'm sure she knows that the eventual end result will be "till death did they part." This made me think about the heartbreak you end up with when your spouse leaves this world.


Living your day to day lives together; the home, the kids, every single memory you make, together, richer, poorer, good time & bad, vacations, and the years of no vacation;  it all ends one day and the person you've lived with longer than you were alone, is gone.  It breaks my heart today and for the future. 


And for Mrs. L.

My First Blog Entry

Sometimes starting something is the harder than the actual task itself.  That is a lesson I’ve learned over the years and one I keep re-learning over and again.  But I'm here - finally.

I’m starting this blog so that I can have a personal space to say a few things, share a few opinions and anything else that comes to mind. I’m not willing to let go of my secrets yet so in the meantime this blog will consist of mild content.

A bit about me.  I am a San Francisco native learning to call Long Island, New York home.  I have a great family that I love more than life itself and they basically drive me stark raving nuts everyday of my life.  Multiple times a day.