Sunday, October 6, 2013

My Half-hearted Return

Hello, again. It's been awhile, and I'm sorry for that. I've had a rather introspective couple of months, and when I'm in the kind of funk I've been in since last spring, my writing isn't really fit for public consumption. Nobody wants to read that shit.

Heck, with the backlash against mommy blogs, nobody really wants to read this shit, either. But here I am.

Little Miss turned seven in June. SEVEN. When she was an infant, my dad was holding her, and said to me, "I can't wait until she's seven." At the time, I was horrified and chastised him for wishing my baby's babyhood away. And while I stand by my policy of trying to appreciate my children's ages and stages as they happen and not longing for some other version of them... part of me gets what he was trying to say. She is really fun right now - up for just about anything, old enough and well behaved enough to take out into the world and do really cool things with, and she's just really growing into someone I can have a conversation with and enjoy her company. We have been reading The Secret Garden together before bedtime, and reliving the books I adored in my childhood with her has been everything I hoped it would be. It does my bookworm, daughter-of-a-librarian heart good to see her just as eager to fall into those worlds.
At four, my little guy vacillates rapidly between "tender" and "terror." He has incredible, endless energy and I'm always looking for new ways to direct it. I am acutely aware that in less than a year, he will be in full day kindergarten, and life as we've known it for the last few years will change dramatically. It has been 29 months since I left my job, which means he has now spent just over half his life home with me. He just started his second year of preschool, which has been wonderful for both of us, but there is a huge difference between a few mornings a week and kindergarten. I am trying very hard to savor this time with him, because I know how quickly it's going to slip away from us.

Summer simultaneously passes too quickly and not quickly enough. It was a blur of baseball games, library workshops, day camps, and park dates. It felt both busier and lonelier than I anticipated, and honestly, I was glad to see September get here. It's nice to get back to a regular routine.