Tuesday, April 29, 2008
Friday, April 04, 2008
Weekly Address - April 4, 2007
(ha ha, I have to laugh at calling this the weekly address, since it's been, oh...maybe six months since I've updated. But, whatever...)
Musings on control and lack thereof....
First of all, I'm sorry for not posting more frequently. My daughter and my mother have been nagging me about it. Seems they actually enjoy reading my blog. Go figure...
Those of you who know what's up in my life lately know I've been just a little bit stressed. It's been a struggle just to get up in the morning...Things have at least temporarily calmed down a bit. Better living through chemistry and all that. Plus work is more tolerable, although we'll see how long that lasts. We announced a settlement of our lawsuit. I'm not totally sure that I'll still have a job in July, but I'm starting to accept that the whole thing is out of my control. Accepting that I don't run the universe (my mom does, ha ha) is a hard thing for me to do, but I'm getting better at it.
I'm also starting to come to grips with the whole idea that come September I will officially have an "empty nest." How the hell did that happen? When you spend almost 23 years doing one thing, letting go of it is tough. I have to keep reminding myself that this is the whole point of parenting, right? It's not like I didn't know that eventually they'd leave me.
I'm still sad, though. I actually like my kids. They're the kind of people I'd choose to hang out with, even if we weren't related. It was bad enough when Ivy went off to college, but at least she wasn't all that far and Oli was still around so I was able to prolong the inevitable. Now I have to face it-I have semi-successfully raised two amazing daughters. (I say semi-successfully because I'm not all that sure I can take any of the credit, other than genetic input. They are simply incredible girls.)
So now what? The good news is, I still have a few good years left in me, ha ha. It's one benefit to having your kids early, I guess. Also, we won't have to watch "Degrassi." Our microwave popcorn bill should dramatically decrease. That's pretty cool. I'm thinking I can finally get that nose piercing. (I haven't done it yet, because who wants to be that mom?) But now's my big chance!
So, anyway...lots going on here at Big Sandy Bottom this "week." Olivia is under the gun to decide on a college. She's narrowed her list to 3 schools. We have to somehow fit in visits to all three by May 1. This would be challenging enough, but is nearly impossible due to Olivia's complicated social life, plus we are all going to Disneyland at the end of the month. So next weekend, Olivia and I are flying to LA for the day, to visit LMU. The following weekend, Olivia will go to her prom and then spend the rest of the weekend in Davis, hopefully crashing with Carolyn. We extended our trip to Disneyland by a day, in hopes of visiting UC Santa Barbara. Should be a whirlwind month.
Speaking of proms, remember when you were in high school and if you wanted to ask someone to the prom, you called them up and said "hey, will you go to the prom with me?" Ha! How provincial! If you did this now, you'd be sitting home on prom night. Now it is necessary to develop an elaborate scheme, complete with props. Olivia procured her date via an altered comic book, enlisting comic book store employees to help her out. (I'm pretty sure this was a first for comic book stores everywhere, by the way-a real live girl asking someone on a date....)
Proms are getting more elaborate in other ways. For instance, Olivia and her friends submitted a four-page color proposal to the parents, outlining their plans and requesting that a yacht be rented for after prom festivities. This is what comes with sending your kid to private school with a bunch of rich girls, I guess. The sense of entitlement is strong. And even parents are subject to peer pressure, as Eric and I agreed to the proposal.
Since this post seems to be Olivia-centric, I'll close with a post to a video made by her friend, the always adorable L'il Sherbet. For a class assignment, she had to make a tribute to her hero. Apparently, L'il Sherbet's values are all messed up, since she chose Olivia!
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=i8EpHAtyKm4
Musings on control and lack thereof....
First of all, I'm sorry for not posting more frequently. My daughter and my mother have been nagging me about it. Seems they actually enjoy reading my blog. Go figure...
Those of you who know what's up in my life lately know I've been just a little bit stressed. It's been a struggle just to get up in the morning...Things have at least temporarily calmed down a bit. Better living through chemistry and all that. Plus work is more tolerable, although we'll see how long that lasts. We announced a settlement of our lawsuit. I'm not totally sure that I'll still have a job in July, but I'm starting to accept that the whole thing is out of my control. Accepting that I don't run the universe (my mom does, ha ha) is a hard thing for me to do, but I'm getting better at it.
I'm also starting to come to grips with the whole idea that come September I will officially have an "empty nest." How the hell did that happen? When you spend almost 23 years doing one thing, letting go of it is tough. I have to keep reminding myself that this is the whole point of parenting, right? It's not like I didn't know that eventually they'd leave me.
I'm still sad, though. I actually like my kids. They're the kind of people I'd choose to hang out with, even if we weren't related. It was bad enough when Ivy went off to college, but at least she wasn't all that far and Oli was still around so I was able to prolong the inevitable. Now I have to face it-I have semi-successfully raised two amazing daughters. (I say semi-successfully because I'm not all that sure I can take any of the credit, other than genetic input. They are simply incredible girls.)
So now what? The good news is, I still have a few good years left in me, ha ha. It's one benefit to having your kids early, I guess. Also, we won't have to watch "Degrassi." Our microwave popcorn bill should dramatically decrease. That's pretty cool. I'm thinking I can finally get that nose piercing. (I haven't done it yet, because who wants to be that mom?) But now's my big chance!
So, anyway...lots going on here at Big Sandy Bottom this "week." Olivia is under the gun to decide on a college. She's narrowed her list to 3 schools. We have to somehow fit in visits to all three by May 1. This would be challenging enough, but is nearly impossible due to Olivia's complicated social life, plus we are all going to Disneyland at the end of the month. So next weekend, Olivia and I are flying to LA for the day, to visit LMU. The following weekend, Olivia will go to her prom and then spend the rest of the weekend in Davis, hopefully crashing with Carolyn. We extended our trip to Disneyland by a day, in hopes of visiting UC Santa Barbara. Should be a whirlwind month.
Speaking of proms, remember when you were in high school and if you wanted to ask someone to the prom, you called them up and said "hey, will you go to the prom with me?" Ha! How provincial! If you did this now, you'd be sitting home on prom night. Now it is necessary to develop an elaborate scheme, complete with props. Olivia procured her date via an altered comic book, enlisting comic book store employees to help her out. (I'm pretty sure this was a first for comic book stores everywhere, by the way-a real live girl asking someone on a date....)
Proms are getting more elaborate in other ways. For instance, Olivia and her friends submitted a four-page color proposal to the parents, outlining their plans and requesting that a yacht be rented for after prom festivities. This is what comes with sending your kid to private school with a bunch of rich girls, I guess. The sense of entitlement is strong. And even parents are subject to peer pressure, as Eric and I agreed to the proposal.
Since this post seems to be Olivia-centric, I'll close with a post to a video made by her friend, the always adorable L'il Sherbet. For a class assignment, she had to make a tribute to her hero. Apparently, L'il Sherbet's values are all messed up, since she chose Olivia!
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=i8EpHAtyKm4
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