My daughter’s lunchbox. And the lunchbox that replaced it. And the lunchbox that replaced that one. And — you guessed it — lunchbox #4 went the way of the dodo, right along with my son’s lunchbox, this very evening. Five lunchboxes since September.

The only thing good about this? Husband and children are off to Target to buy lunchboxes #6 and #7 as we speak, giving me time to pen this little entry.

I won’t go so far as to say I’m thankful…

Each night, after he’s been dressed for bed, Evan stands on top of his dressing table and takes a flying leap into my arms. It started out as a hesitant, yet insistent, lean into my patiently waiting hands. Over the course of almost two years, it has progressed into a full-on leap, complete with air-time, giggles, and a rush of adrenaline in both of us. It’s our shared mantra, one we look forward to every evening. With a devilish grin he looks at me, and without so much as a response to my “Ready?,” he throws himself forward, implicitly trusting the arms outstretched and ready to catch him.

Every ounce of my rational mind says I shouldn’t encourage him to do this — taking flying leaps off high places just isn’t sound practice. But every moment of my mothering soul says I should let him fly. It won’t be into my arms one day. This I know. But when that day comes, I believe the lessons of these bed-time leaps of faith will be the force sustaining his flight.

“I’m having a bad day,” I said to Evan, unfairly unloading on his ill-equipped ears and foolishly looking to him for salvation.

“You hurt?” he asked empathetically in response.

“Yes, I hurt.”

He took the burden unjustly heaped upon him with astounding insight.

“Get BAND-AID,” he said. “You need BAND-AID.”

Zoe’s play date yesterday was certainly not her first. It wasn’t even particularly eventful, save the home gymnasium that afforded much delight. No, yesterday’s play date was simply four giggle-and-nonsense-filled hours of independent play at someone else’s house, providing fodder for delightful stories for hours and hours afterward. Normal, ordinary, kid stuff. And, in that very respect, it’s worth noting.

I can remember, distinctly, being close to Zoe’s age and spending countless hours with a gaggle of kids roaming the neighborhood. The woods behind our houses afforded much delight on sunny days. On rainy days, we’d parade from house to house, raiding kitchens and playrooms with reckless abandon. We weren’t given any supervision beyond that which an eye out the window or an ear to the door could provide.

Quests, hunts, games, puzzles, frights and giggles — they were all ours. Our play was imaginative and spontaneous, and all of it our own doing. Those supervisory eyes and ears rarely, if ever, entered our world, and, when they did, they disrupted the play — not added to it.

Zoe is making (has made?) that transition from looking at me as her playmate to looking to her peers to fulfill that role. It’s bittersweet, but far more sweet than bitter. I’m glad to see her enter a world that is sure to be full of fond memories and life lessons from her own, independent experiences. That is what being a kid is all about.

Go on, Zoe, and play. I’m happy to be left behind, relegated to a watchful eye in the background. I suspect, though, that my eyes will be taking in far more than they’re looking out for.

Although I can’t claim to have never felt the pressures of socio-economic differences, I can say that I’m pretty much past it all. I live a pretty good life, my bank account is a stark reality, and, despite all appearances to the contrary, folks on either side of my place on the economic bell curve probably feel the same way on both matters. For every person that appears to me to have a bigger house, nicer clothes, and more frequent vacations, there’s a person looking at me coming to the same conclusions, and vice versa. So on it goes, ad infinitum. There’s little sense getting wrapped up in all the nonsense, then. And, for the most part, I don’t.

I can remember, though, as a little girl, inviting a friend over to my house. The minute she appeared at my front door she said, incredulously, “Your house is huge.” Not two weeks later, I was invited over to another friend’s house, and I couldn’t help but say the same thing about her house. So young, and yet so very, very aware of things.

I thought of that this morning as I dropped my daughter off at a play-date with a classmate. As I turned into a neighborhood of million dollar homes (this being far above average in my area), I couldn’t help but feel a little out of place. Still, my discomfort wasn’t so much from the exposure of my insecurities; I was more concerned about the comments I was hearing from the back seat.

“Wow, that house is huge!”

So young, and yet so very, very aware of things.

As quick as I am to try to understand just where this awareness came from, I recognize that it’s only natural. Things that are different — things that are foreign — are a natural source of intrigue for kids trying to make sense of their place in the world. I can’t begrudge her the experience of understanding that we all are, in fact, different. (I think that my relative insulation from such differences growing up led to a much greater shock upon discovering them as a young adult.) But I can hope she’ll come to understand that different doesn’t mean better — or worse.

That’s a hard lesson to learn, though, when different, this time, means an indoor gymnasium complete with tumbling mat, balance beam, parallel bars, and trampoline.

…wallpaper would be outlawed.

Evil, Evil stuff, that is. Screw personal property rights. Screw individualism. Because, you know, no matter how en vogue the paper is when you apply it, it really will become hideous. Not merely ugly — full on hideous. It’s only a matter of time.

You think you won’t outgrow it? Fine. Guaranteed your buyer will hate it. Guaranteed. And that shit is miserable to take down. MIS. ER. A. BLE. This, I know. Intimately.

So, really, my proclamation is all about doing unto others as you would have done unto you. My reign isn’t that despotic.

(Guess what I’ve been doing? It’s that time again.)

Raleigh, NC: 73 degrees and sunny.
Gillette, WY: -10 degrees. MINUS TEN DEGREES. Who cares what the sun is doing?

Too far from home, in so many ways.

Come home soon, Tim. And hurry. Looks like we’re getting snow tomorrow.

Feeling Lucky? Google “SOCATOA” and you’ll get a lusty story about a woman and her fetish for trigonometric functions. It appears, for reasons I’m entirely unable to understand, that when one Googles “SOCATOA,” my blog entry is the top hit. For some unsuspecting graduate student in a university library today, my words were what appeared before her when she sought help for her Physics homework. Funny thing, this Internet.

Why she stuck around long enough to read the entry, despite its obvious inability to fulfill her quest, is certainly a mystery. But, she did. And, following the moment she took to read the entry, she took the moment to leave me this comment:

Kristy–I’m a grad student…single, 26, confused…don’t worry, this isn’t a Dear Abby thing, I just wanted to tell you that I stumbled across your blog a minute ago because I literally typed “socatoa” into google to try to make sense of my physics homework…and I was so touched with your entry…I guess I just wanted to tell you (as if you didn’t already know!) that you are an incredibly lucky woman. From where I’m sitting (at the University library), what you have in your life, with your two kids and your husband who genuinely loves you…that seems like the most enormous challenge in the world. I truly wonder if I’ll ever be able to write something like what you wrote with so much love and satisfaction and confidence in my “voice”…good luck to you and your family–Ami

My words might have given her pause for a minute or two — long enough for her to leave her kind comment. I suspect, though, that she moved on shortly to find the real answer to her Physics question. From there, perhaps she’ll triumph in the challenge she sees and will write about it in her own insightful voice. In any event, she’s soon enough forgotten about me. But her words? They’re not forgotten in the least.

It’s too often that one can get lost in the day-to-day drudgery of life. This blog helps me minimize that tendency; it makes me stop and savor and drink in moments that might otherwise to be mundane. But, it’s also very narcissistic. Insulated. Myopic, at times. Thousands of words, lost in their own kind of drudgery, but for the complete stranger who can put it all in perspective in a few short sentences.

Somewhere, in some University library, a thoughtful woman stumbled upon my words today. I’m so very, very thankful she chose to tell me what she felt and, in doing so, remind me of what I have in my life. Because of her, I’m the one who’s feeling really lucky right now.

For what it’s worth, our family is on a budget. In the days prior to kids and when both my husband and I were working, a budget was some nebulous idea of where we should be spending our money. That idea routinely got tossed out the window each month in favor of more concrete, material purchases — fun stuff. Now, we’re not afforded that luxury. Quite simply, the money that comes in has a very concrete, and not at all material, place to go. Mortgage. Food. Utilities. Preschool. Gas. Decidedly not fun stuff. Luxuries, let it be said, are few and far between.

So it’s telling, then, that I spent thirty five dollars this evening. On a babysitter. So I could knit.

Pampering? Or Priority? A little of both, I say.

And I’m worth it.

Tim headed out of town today for the entire week. He left at 5:45 am. At 6:00 am, my son woke up with a fever. Murphy is alive and kicking. You know what? I took it in stride. I didn’t panic. I didn’t even find myself calling upon my inner strengths.

It used to be, Tim would go out of town, and I’d call in the troops. With a frenetic nervousness, I’d book activities to consume the days and schedule family members to come over for the late afternoons and evenings. I can’t do this by myself, I’d think to myself. I can’t do it.

Things have changed. More and more I find myself forgetting to call my family members when Tim heads out of town. More and more I find myself “winging” the days, letting our activities be ruled by happenstance and serendipity. More and more, I find myself knowing I can do it.

This growing confidence isn’t entirely a product of my children growing older, putting experience under my belt and making the task slightly simpler at the same time. In some ways, they aren’t easier. A willful four-year-old and a quintessential two-year old are far more challenging, on every level, than a two-year old and a take-along infant. But, somehow, things are easier. It’s a little about stride, I suppose.

A year ago, on a day Tim was out of town, I could reliably predict the end of the day would see my raw nerves, a strained voice, and an anxious eye to the kids’ bed-times. Today, there was none of that. It was a calm evening, with fun and laughter — mine, even. And, in a most telling turn of events, the house is in order. I’ve not slumped into the couch in defeat immediately after putting the kids down; I’m quietly, and fondly, reflecting on the moment. Day One, under my belt.

We’ll see what I have to say on Day Five.