Flashback

I spent the morning at the pool today for a swim meet.  We swam against Lehi and we were hosting the 2nd half of the meet.  the first half swam at their pool last night.  The Girl coached her 9-10 year old swimmers there.

What I love about swimming against Lehi is my long-ago and not-so-far-away dear-friend-Keith's daughter swims.  I know that at least once a summer I get to see my old friends.  Keith and Julie are terrific and their sweet girl, Nicole is pretty amazing too.  The great thing about it is, this week, I actually saw them three times!

Their son, Zack, had his Eagle Court of Honor on Monday so we saw the whole crew at that, of course.  Then Julie and Zack surprised me by being in The Girl's driver's ed class earlier this week, so I saw half of them there.  And today I saw the whole gang again at the pool.

Seeing Keith at the pool is like a trip to the past.  He was my best friend in high school.  He swam and played water polo, and I hung out with him and the other "cool pool boys" in awe, at least most of the time.  Hey, they were really cool and were hilarious on top of that.  Now, of course, we are still friends, but in a mature, reserved, adult way: I am much more sure of myself than I ever was in high school, and we both have our heads screwed on even better now.  Good thing, as we are not the punk high school kids we once were.

Still I have my moments, though. At one point today, Keith was laying down in the shade, between Nicole's race events, and I had the strongest urge to go pounce on him--pile driver style--just like I would have done if I were still 15 years old.  I am happy to report that I suppressed the urge and just laughed at myself (in my head) instead.

The really funny thing  about being at the pool with him today, was watching The Girl who has a dear friend, Spencer, who is to The Girl what Keith was/is to me.  It is good to have friends like that. I highly recommend that.

Just don't pile-drive them when they aren't looking.

The "Stay-At-Home-Mom" Is a Misnomer

The other day had me wondering what was going on with my life.  Well, that, and how do people manage and afford more than TWO kids?  Here is a peek at my day on Tuesday.

I drove to the city pool in the morning--6:30 AM.  The kids have swim team practice and I go to water aerobics the same time.  I drove home with The Boy at 8:15.

The Girl stays to coach the second shift of swim kids, so I drove at 9:30 to pick her up and bring her home.

At 10 AM, The Boy goes to the high school weight room where he has an hour of lifting for football.  So I drove to the high school at 10 AM.  The Girl happened to start her driver's ed class at the same time, so I dropped her off at class at 10 AM. At least that was one trip that they coordinated.

After his weight lifting, I drove back to the high school at 11 to pick up The Boy.

The Girl got out of her class at noon, so I drove back over and picked her up then and brought her home.

She had to be at work at 1 PM, so I drove her back over to the pool at 1.

The Boy got a message from his friend and asked if I'd take him to the pool to play for a few hours.  So I drove back to the pool at 2 PM.

He was ready to come home at 4:15, so I ran back over to get him and brought him home.

Then at 6:30 he had an agility and conditioning practice for football so I drove him back to the high school at 6:30 PM.

The Girl got off work at 8 PM so I drove back to the pool and picked her up and brought her home.

The Boy was supposed to be done at his practice at 8:30, but they are notorious for keeping the kids longer, so I drove back to pick him up about 8:45.  And waited for him another 15 minutes.  Then I drove him home.

Figuring that the high school and/or the pool are about 1.3 miles from our house, one way, and I traveled that distance 22 times on Tuesday, I figure I drove 28.6 miles carting kids back and forth.  My Durango was averaging 10 MPG in town lately, so I figured I used about 2.86 gallons of gas.  With gas costing me about $3.59 a gallon, it cost me $10.27 on Tuesday alone to just cart kids around town.

The Girl cannot get her driver's license soon enough for my taste!

The Legendary Potato Salad Escapade

It might not be legendary yet, but some day it will be.  I'm sure of it.  But to truly understand this weekend's Potato Salad Escapade, you must first know the back story.

When Genius Golfer and I married, I began to understand I joined a family of women who were great cooks, sewed beautifully, and were creative and crafty and amazing.  Immediately I felt I was in over my head.  One of the first family events I attended as a newlywed was a family BBQ for some reason or another.  My good mother-in-law asked if I'd like to bring something.  I said "Sure," wanting to show my enthusiasm for my new family and my competancy in preparing a side dish which everyone would enjoy.  I told her my mom made the best potato salad, so I'd love to bring that.

Being so excited to do this, and thus looking for acceptance by my in-laws, and holding, deep in my heart, out hope that they would love my mom's potato salad as much as I did, I made a vat of the stuff.  I filled the biggest bowl I owned.  It was perfect.  I had, of course, the requisite potatoes, eggs, mayo and mustard plus a pile of diced pickles, onions, celery, carrot and radishes.  It was colorful and flavorful and beautiful.

No one ate any of it.

Actually, I think my mother-in-law had a tablespoon of it, just to be polite.  But I returned home that evening with the whole vat still nearly compete, save only the polite tablespoon and the heaping spoonful I devoured.  I ate the rest of that salad for the next week at least. I later learned that because of the colorful look, the others in the family weren't interested.  It wasn't what they were used to, so they didn't even try it.  And several years later, I learned that generally this family doesn't even really like potato salad at all, much less potato salad that was so different from what they were used to.

I haven't really been asked to bring potato salad to anything since.  I usually get the chips and drinks request in stead. That has been the case for the last nineteen years.  Until this weekend.

Monday night, the Fourth of July, we planned on getting together for our monthly family birthday dinner, this time to celebrate my mother-in-law's birthday later this month.  Plus five teenage boy cousins and fireworks and you have a pretty raucous crowd.  A summer party, to be sure!

In planning for the family birthday dinner, MIL told me she was bringing fried chicken--which is delicious--and the rest of the girls (read: her daughters and me) were bringing salads.  Now, she did leave it wide open here, and I was kind of craving some mid-summer potato salad, and with delicious fried chicken there is nothing better, really.  So I told her I'd love to bring some potato salad.

Over the phone I could hear the concern in her voice. She was polite as ever on the subject, but she happened to mention to me to remember that it would probably be just her and I and my brother-in-law who would eat it, so don't make too much.  Okie dokie, I assured her.

A few days later, a couple of details had changed, so MIL called me again.  While I chatted with her about the changes in the plan, she mentioned, again, very politely "You know, the ingredients in potato salad as a lot like my macaroni salad that everyone just loves.  Maybe you would rather bring that instead?"  I reassured her that I'd prefer some potato salad and it would be no problem.  She still sounded worried as we hung up the phones.

The more I thought about it, the funnier it was to me.  And I finally figured that I would pull a fast one.  I headed down to our local favorite grocery store and bought a bucket of deli potato salad and then for Monday's BBQ I arranged it in my own covered bowl and sprinkled paprika on it whole thing.  It looked lovely, but very normal.  I brought it to the party.

We gathered that night at the home of our married niece, so her 2 year old can stay on her schedule, in her own bed, and miss the raucous crowd once her bedtime came. Genius Golfer was, well, golfing in a tournament that day so he didn't show up until almost 7 PM.  The rest of the family was at least 45 minutes late, and I had to get The Girl back to our neighborhood for her to help take down the flags the Young Women put up in the yards of our ward members for their fundraiser.  She and I were hoping to eat early enough to then sit around and visit until she had to go home.

Once everyone started showing up, EVERYONE showed up.  Our extended family and the niece's husband's family.  Come to find out, the niece's husband's extended family was invited for a BBQ and volleyball party and fireworks. No coordination for food was worked out.  We didn't know the other side was coming over. We were all celebrating at the same location--but we were celebrating two different family events.


Awkward. That is all I can say about that.

But the meal was laid out and blessing was said, and the loading of plates began.  I got looks of acceptance and appreciation for the potato salad we brought.  I even heard a great-grandma from the opposite family even ask about the potato salad to which my MIL cheerfully replied "My daughter-in-law made that."  The Great-Grandma seemed to imply it was really very tasty.

I ended up with just a couple of serving of potato salad left--perfect for my lunches this week, as still no one at my house will eat it.  I just miss the radishes, pickles and celery.  But the story will be worth that in a few more years, I think.

Resentment Issues

Last week I mentioned that I had resentment about this Camaro.  I purposely did not write about them at the moment, because I was feeling pretty hotheaded and the resentment  felt very fresh again.  I figured it was better to simmer down first and then vent about this issue.

I don't know if the extra time will benefit my message today, or not.  Probably not.

Last week I "got" to drive the Camaro while my Durango was in the shop.  Lucky for me it was nice weather, so I could have the top down, as this is the only way for me to see out of this car.  In bad weather it feels like trying to maneuver a submarine...with just one little porthole window out the back.  Lucky for me we have an "extra" vehicle so I wasn't without wheels while the shop kept mine.  And lucky for me, the Camaro is a 6-speed stick--which is always more fun to drive, especially with that little more powerful motor behind the shifting clutch.

So, lucky me...what is my problem?!

Here's the deal.  I really don't like this car.  Genius Golfer bought it new in 1998 in California following a wreck of our traditional family car, which at the time was a four door purple Ford Taurus.  In my heart of hearts, I think he was really glad to be done with that purple Taurus.  But with two little kids, the Taurus was a good vehicle for us.  Plus my parents had found it on a good deal too, so we should have just been happy with it.

When he bought it, I don't recall having much input...like none.  He was so excited about it, there wasn't much I could have said anyways.  Besides, my unofficial role in this family is "Dream Killer".  Even if I pointed out things that would make this car a difficult-to-use-well choice, he wasn't going to want to hear them.  Things like:  It's a convertible, and we live where it snows for four or five months a year.  It is rear-wheel drive, and we live where the snow can accumulate on the roads throughout the winter.  It technically has four seats, but the back two seats are made for leg-less midgets and we are four full-legged, full-size (and plus some) humans.

Now for many years GG drove it to work, so it wasn't a big deal.  He knew it's limitations and worked around them.  There were only a very few times when it was snowing too badly that he swapped me cars for the day--meaning I didn't leave the house and he took my 4 wheel drive car to work.  But that didn't happen very often.  His golf clubs fit nicely in the trunk and he didn't have a problem seeing out the pothole window with the top up.  And I, happily, had something else to drive.

Well, since summer of 2008 when we picked up the little smug CNG Honda Civic, the Camaro stays parked in the garage--it's own garage--surrounded with tools and equipment and golfing stuff and more tools.  It's garage is so full of stuff that some of it now seems to be spilling into the big garage where two other cars rest, as well as a bike in the summer, and the freezers and water storage barrels.  I hate the idea of turning into a storage unit, where there is no room for a vehicle.  I know many families use their garage for just that but I won't.  A car lives in it's garage.  Stuff needs to be put away, where it belongs.  So I have some building resentment about this hunk of metal taking up the space in the garage where otherwise all the stuff spilling into the main garage should actually go.

Driving the Camaro last week, while it was kind of fun to feel the wind in my hair, and the sun on my face (also sunburning my neck in the process) I can't enjoy it enough to ever want to really drive the car.  In fact, the biggest resentment I feel about it is that the Camaro--bright fire engine red and topless--seems so ostentatious to me.  It screams "LOOK AT ME!"  And I guess I don't like that kind of attention.  Maybe if I had big, fake 80s hair and/or huge plastic boobs and dressed like a hoochie-mama that kind of attention would be right up my alley.  But it isn't me, and I guess I resent feeling that is the kind of person who would drive a car like this.

There is no solution to this issue for me.  We'll have the Camaro for some time.  In fact, The Boy believes he will drive it someday.  Uh, NOT!  But until GG is gone or I am gone the Camaro will likely still rest in it's own garage and demand undue attention. 

At least, this is cheaper than talking it out with a therapist.  And the solution is essentially the same.  Thanks for listening.  I'll call again when I need to reschedule another appointment, doctor.

Happy Independence Day!

Oh say, can you see, by the dawn’s early light,
What so proudly we hailed at the twilight’s last gleaming,

Whose broad stripes and bright stars, through the perilous fight,

O’er the ramparts we watched, were so gallantly streaming?

And the rockets’ red glare, the bombs bursting in air,

Gave proof thru the night that our flag was still there.

Oh say, does that star-spangled banner yet wave

O’er the land of the free and the home of the brave?

On the shore, dimly seen thru the mists of the deep,

Where the foe’s haughty host in dread silence reposes,

What is that which the breeze, o’er the towering steep,

As it fitfully blows, half conceals, half discloses?

Now it catches the gleam of the morning’s first beam,

In full glory reflected now shines on the stream;

’Tis the star-spangled banner! Oh, long may it wave

O’er the land of the free and the home of the brave!

Oh, thus be it ever, when free men shall stand

Between their loved homes and the war’s desolation!

Blest with vict’ry and peace, may the heav’n-rescued land

Praise the Pow’r that hath made and preserved us a nation!

Then conquer we must, when our cause it is just,

And this be our motto: “In God is our trust!”

And the star-spangled banner in triumph shall wave

O’er the land of the free and the home of the brave!

--Francis Scott Key, 1779–1843



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