Well, it's been an interesting week or so--though probably not as interesting as it should have been.
Last Friday we went to Buffalo to celebrate our niece and nephew's 21st birthday. It's hard to believe they've crossed over that last legal milestone and are pretty much full-fledged adults now. They were born right before Craig and I got engaged. At that point it was pretty much a foregone conclusion it was happening, so I was essentially accepted as a part of the family by then--which worked out well because we spent most of Father's Day in the hospital as they were being born six weeks early. They were tiny, about 4.5 and 3.75 pounds if I recall correctly. We didn't know the genders, so finding out it was a boy and a girl was very exciting! A few days later we got to go back and hold them, and they were by far the smallest babies I have ever held! And now they're both taller than me, one by over a foot!
We went to a well-known Buffalo hangout near my in-laws' for the celebration, and I had seen a couple photos of the Buffalo chicken sandwich from there and really wanted to get it. Fortunately it worked out for Craig and me to split it, because this is just insane:
The bun is not small. That chicken breast was a solid 9+ inches long.
I spent most of the evening chatting with my mother-in-law while the boys hung out in the bar, which was just fine with me. We had a wedding (and an early christening) the next day, so I had no need to sabotage that by drinking that night. Of course, Jacob almost got handed a shot, so there's that. Ugh. Thankfully he knows better. We headed to my parents' after that and settled in for the night.
My cousin's baby girl was being baptized at 10am, so we were up and out pretty early. I had been battling a cold for a couple days--I could feel it coming but had been successfully fighting it off with zinc, so I got up extra early to take a COVID test, just in case. It was fine, thankfully. The baptism was short and sweet, but it was good to see some family. I wish we could have gone to the celebratory picnic after--the boys went with my parents--but we had to get to Craig's cousin's wedding and it didn't really make sense for us to drive all the way back to the northtowns in between the ceremony and reception. The wedding was lovely--a little long and with a priest that barely spoke English--but the church was so beautiful. We also went there for our first COVID-era wedding in November 2020, which was the groom's brother's wedding where the reception had to be moved at the last minute and cut into two shifts to accommodate increased COVID restrictions.
After the ceremony we ended up at Panera for some lunch, stopped at the mall so Craig could get a new belt (his suddenly started peeling really bad), and then went to his parents' house for a while since it wasn't far from the reception. I was completely enchanted by this dahlia in their front planter. Isn't it perfect?
The reception was lovely. They had large gourmet popcorn bags as favors, a giant bowl of shrimp cocktail for an appetizer (plus amazing passed appetizers), a different way for doing a guest book (leaving messages on a phone--though I fear the music got too loud for that later in the night), and a "Taste of Buffalo" bar for late night snacks. It was just nice as a whole and we enjoyed catching up with family. We clean up pretty nice...
It clicked in my head in the middle of dinner that the groom was in fact our ring bearer, and our flower girl was there as well, so given that our 20th anniversary was less than two weeks away, it felt appropriate to get a picture of the two of them together!
Throwback to 20 years ago...man, does time fly.
Our flower girl got married five years ago and now has two kids of her own, so it shouldn't be a shocker that they're all grown up, but still...it's hard to believe we've had the same amount of time to age as they have! Then we got a picture of all of us!
For reference...
Crazy, isn't it? It was quite the dose of perspective to realize how quickly 20 years can vaporize before your eyes. In many ways we probably don't feel much different than that bride and groom in the picture (in other ways we are completely different and freaking exhausted), so to realize how much has actually changed--if only based on what those two kids look like now--it's shocking. I'm sure I'll have more thoughts on this for our actual anniversary, but it was quite the visual to look at the pictures side by side.
One cool moment at the wedding was when they did the anniversary dance, where all the married couples go out to dance and slowly get called off the dance floor by years. First the bride and groom, then one year, then five, and so on. My parents gave one a pretty good run at my cousin Lori's wedding last year, but Craig was at a tournament with Jacob so I couldn't do that one. This time, Craig and I lasted a while, although we just fell short of the 20 year mark...by 11 days, darn it. But there were a bunch of seasoned couples out there still, and it took into 35-40 range to whittle them down. Eventually it was down to two couples, Craig's parents and another couple. The DJ started calling off years one by one and as he got around 49 and 50, the other couple walked off, leaving Craig's parents the winners! They just hit 51 years a little over a week earlier. Not too shabby--but very well earned, for sure! Craig's dad raised a fist in celebration and it was cute to see them have a little moment of victory since it definitely hasn't been easy at times.
Oh, and one of the coolest little touches at the wedding was the basket of light-up foam sticks they brought out for dancing. They were just simple white foam with a "Haley & Dennis" sticker on them, and they lit up red, green, and blue with three different light patterns. It was such a fun, festive touch for everyone dancing!
We were just about ready to go when Jacob called and then texted us saying that Carter was sick. I panicked a little knowing he'd just gotten over a stomach bug and that those are my mom's kryptonite, but it turned out he was just super congested. Luckily, by the time we got back to my parents', he seemed to be a bit better. The next morning was Father's Day, and while I wanted to get up and go to church, I was just exhausted. It wasn't like I drank a lot and it wasn't a super late night, but I think a crappy sleep the previous night and a busy day just wiped me out. I guess I'm just not as young as I used to be. Not to mention that I was still using Zicam to fight off the cold, so maybe that was running me down as well. The extra sleep helped, though. The boys went to the outlets for a bit in the morning, and then after everyone got home, we headed out to lunch at Anderson's with my parents and then went back to spend the afternoon with Craig's parents. They were actually alone for a few days starting that day, since the rest of family had left for our sister-in-law's parents' 50th anniversary celebration in Pennsylvania. We had a very nice, low-key day watching baseball and eventually getting some outside time. The boys were in the pool for a while.
I wouldn't normally post this picture but I took this blog off search engine results a while back (at the kids' request) so few people will see this anyway. Jacob was enjoying the warm water on the waterfall and just being silly (and he "had to have" this somewhat short pair of swim trunks), and it cracked me up because the picture made it look like he was modeling...haha.
Then Carter got into perfecting his cannonball. It's hard to do in our pool without a deck (or even a steady ladder), so he was in all his glory trying here.
After many tries, I think we finally got a winner...and Craig's dad was eagerly cheering him on 😁
Fortunately, we had Monday off for Juneteenth so we had an extra day to settle back in for the week. We actually got in some pool time at our house even though it felt pretty chilly still. I did enough yard work--mostly trying to salvage my garden that got raided by an animal that chewed through the fence (!)--that it felt doable. I was lucky enough to find some mature replacement plants at my local nursery, and they were even on sale so I got two cukes, an extra zucchini to go with a tiny one that made a comeback, and even a spaghetti squash since so little was coming up in the rest of my garden. We finally got some rain, too, after about three weeks with nothing, so what's there is now growing well. I mostly just floated on a raft in the pool while the boys played basketball and did a whirlpool, but it was nice to finally get in there after weeks of cold weather. This past week was warmer, at least.
Tuesday was Carter's last full day of school and also Jacob's 15th birthday. I had mentioned previously that he really hadn't given us many gift ideas other than his insistence we go back to Disney, so we really didn't have much for him. He ended up staying home from school that day because he didn't want to go on a field trip to Seabreeze (not sure he is my child!), so we took him out to lunch (Chipotle) and dinner, which ended up being steak *and* lobster at Outback because they had a good deal running. Lucky kid. We'll make it up to him by buying random things he likes in the coming weeks, but we ended up with no pictures and the day was definitely a bit lower key than normal. Unfortunately, by that night it was clear that the cold I'd successfully battled for days was coming back, and this time it wouldn't be stopped. Darn it.
I woke up feeling pretty terrible on Wednesday. I was really congested and tired. I had a pre-scheduled doctor's appointment that morning that I really wanted to go to, so I pushed through to get to that. It was Carter's last day, a half day, and since the timing of my appointment was better to take Jacob to school, I had to do that and leave the picture taking to Craig.
Jacob only had Field Day on Wednesday and he didn't want to go, but since he skipped the field trip the previous day, we wanted him to go and just be supportive. We encouraged him to take his doctor's note to stay out of activities, but of course he didn't listen and the whole morning ended up being a mess, between him refusing to get up, being extra late, spilling breakfast on himself, and just generally making things difficult. It was horrible. He was super late to school and I was late to my doctor's appointment as a result. And of course, he ended up aggravating his injuries (mostly a sore knee he's been dealing with) because they did some long walk scavenger hunt. So he was pretty furious with us after that, even though we had told him how to avoid it and he chose not to listen or advocate for himself. We can't win sometimes. I only ended working about half a day that day because I felt so terrible, and I was really trying to rest up to feel better for an event I had the next day.
Thursday Jacob just had a moving up ceremony, which he also wasn't excited to attend, but we felt he should be a part of it. Craig went with him. He didn't have to be there until late morning, but somehow still ended up in a rush to get out the door. As a result, we forgot to take the official last day picture. So clearly I was just #momfailing all over the place with him this week. Two major milestones and neither got documented! I woke up feeling a little bit better and fortunately medicine finally started working for me. I was nervous about making my event--I had to feel good enough by about 1:30 to do it--but the medicine came through and I was able to go. It was a work event in Syracuse with my two bosses, and I was supposed to be driving all three of us. But it was for LOBSTER. All you can eat, in fact. I hadn't made it to this event since probably 2018 because of COVID and one year when Jacob's birthday fell on the day. But it was always amazing--go through a tour of our printer's facility, then eat lobster and steak and have drinks of choice. They used to have root beer floats where you could keep the glass, but that didn't happen this year. But we did get an amazing fuzzy blanket in our swag bag, and I also won a $25 gift card! We had such a good time just chatting in the car and at the event, and the printer employees are so fun and friendly at this event that it's almost impossible to not have a wonderful time. We left full and happy, and there was even a lovely sunset to watch on the way home.
My cold was so much better the next day that I no longer needed medicine. I'm still a little congested, but it's minimal and nose blowings are productive, so I'm good for now, I guess. We were originally supposed to be in Pennsylvania this weekend for basketball, but we've officially called it quits on this year so Jacob can get healthy. It's been such a mess. We've had him checked and there doesn't appear to be structural damage to his knee, but he just keeps aggravating it. It's a tough balance between staying conditioned and giving it rest. We had a pretty quiet weekend, in part because the weather was unpredictable and it was tough to do anything. We did a lot of work in the yard, the boys got haircuts and hit baseballs for a bit, and we hopped in the pool for a bit before thunderstorms came through on Sunday. Oh, and I finally took Jacob's picture...
Next weekend things get interesting again, but for this week we navigate having both boys home for summer vacation and my last week of my work's fiscal year, which is always a little crazy. I'm still woefully behind on finding ways to keep Carter occupied this summer. He should be getting his summer school laptop later this week, and I need to make a list of things for him to do other than screens, starting with sorting all of his school stuff. He can practice his viola, build things, practice writing...we just need some structure. We're just winging it for this summer, I guess, and I'm thinking my annoyance will up the urgency to find something--anything--to get one kid out of the house at any given time. The next step is figuring out how to get Jacob working papers and to see if we can find anything to get him gainfully employed for a few hours a week this summer. Next week my brother and his kids are back east and I'm off work all week, so we are definitely looking forward to that.
Summer is officially here and now to just figure out (as usual) how to make the most of it without wishing it away. On we go...
A decade and a half. Man...a decade seemed like a big deal and now here we are halfway through another one. This one was quite a roller coaster of a year. You've never really allowed things to get dull, but this one might have taken it to a new level of white-knuckle action.
So...last year's letter talked about the new school situation, and I guess I could just copy and paste a lot of that, because here we are again! It's too bad the Northstar leap of faith didn't work out. As guarded as I was about that change, for a lot of reasons, I was hopeful it might work out to be an unlikely fit--that even though on paper it didn't look perfect, that between basketball and the smaller community, the stars might align in just a way that would have worked for you. Sadly, that was not the case, in really any form. Academically, there were a lot of struggles. Socially, it just wasn't a fit. And while basketball showed a lot of promise and ended with a couple really awesome moments, even that wasn't quite what we thought it would be.
Academically, it became clear pretty quickly that the daily full courseload was going to be a challenge. You had grown used to the every-other-day schedule and that breathing room for assignments clearly fit you better than a daily dumping of homework from every class. Ninth grade work proved challenging, and the manner in which it was taught was...less than ideal. I never thought I'd get grumpy about a Christian education, but here we are. Part of being a Christian in the world is understanding how our beliefs differ and how we can still be a light when we're different, and I feel like so much of what was taught was stuck in its own little world where there isn't room to question or compare in a fair manner. The entire setup just seemed to highlight your struggles with school work--between having issues with what you were learning and the way it was being taught, to the volume of work (especially "busy" work) you were receiving. It put your motivation pretty low and made our job tougher, too, since you never wanted us to hassle you, but we felt compelled because we knew you probably weren't calculating properly how much time things would take. That is one skill that ADHD has made very difficult for you.
Socially, I don't know that things could have been much worse. This was definitely the straw that broke the camel's back and forced you out, because it was clear that every day was a mental struggle for you. I knew that being in a school full of kids with a different ideology might be tough, and while it might not have been an issue initially, I think the compounding effect over the course of the year might have been too much. But the low maturity level and the lack of respect you saw and experienced was surprising. I wish you could have had more frequent school-day interaction with your basketball teammates because I think that might have helped you belong a bit more on a day-to-day basis, but that just didn't work out.
Speaking of basketball, well...that was quite a ride. The coach situation was unfortunate, that you were stuck playing for a coach that didn't respect your skills or style. You were somewhat validated when you finally got to play and made it count, but then we were right back to square one when you were taken out early and sat for huge chunks, and especially when you lost your starting spot. I admired your patience--at least when you were on the bench; home was a different story sometimes--and I think you really showed what was possible when you had some of those pivotal late-season and sectional contributions to the team. I was really hopeful that would set the stage for next year when you would have to be a big part of the offense after the seniors were gone, but I guess now we'll never know. And I know the sectional championship still doesn't feel important or special to you--and I get that it validated a coach that mishandled a ton of things during the season--BUT I hope some day you appreciate all that you and your teammates overcame to win. That sportsmanship award was a nice bonus, too. I sincerely hope we see more of those runs in the coming years at your new school, and I hope this time it feels more like a team effort.
So, here we are, on to a new school...and not just the one you're in for these few weeks to finish out the year, but yet another new building in the fall. It means learning alongside another set of kids that are generally different from you, but you seem to think it's already better so I'm hopeful it will stay that way. Academics will remain to be seen, and basketball should be good, but I'm not sure we've ever had a season go completely according to plan, so I'm keeping my fingers crossed. We'll just buckle in for the newest part of this ride and see how it goes. It's funny, though--between two rounds of 8th grade and now another school change, this whole moving up to high school thing almost feels like an afterthought. On one hand it's about time (haha), and on the other you've only been at this school for a few weeks so there's no history there to look back on, which leaves me oddly unemotional about this milestone. As your overly nostalgic mother, I think you for that, I think--I thought I'd be a weepy mess at this point but I guess that will have to wait for your brother's 8th grade graduation, which should follow a more conventional path and will be our last on top of it.
You and I definitely had an interesting spring. Even though our travels weren't easy and mostly didn't turn out the way we'd hoped, I'm still grateful I had that time with you. It's rare, and I think we did have some positive memories. I had fun seeing a different part of the country with you, and even though some of the touristy stuff didn't happen quite as pleasantly as planned, I'm thankful for those experiences too. Even if you don't understand or appreciate them, I do, and I will always savor the good parts of those moments and that they're tied to you. I hope someday you learn to find some extra joy in your "business trips" because life is too short to be all business all the time. There's so much to see and do in the world, and you might as well make the most of it when you have the chance. I'm sorry that our differences also meant that the Disney trip last year wasn't exactly your cup of tea, but hopefully we can find a good compromise this year.
I'm super sad that it's been such a frustrating basketball run for you these past few months. A series of injuries was the last thing you wanted or needed when you were SO ready to break out with this team. You were finally with the organization you wanted to be with, playing with guys you liked and believed in, and everything pretty much went to crap after one game. As frustrating as that was by itself, I feel like that set a lot of dominoes in motion that carried the frustration over to other areas in life. You couldn't play so you didn't have that outlet, you couldn't get yourself conditioned the way you expected to which makes it harder to play at the level you want to, and then you had to spend time doing extra stretches and training that cannibalized your time to do school work and sleep, which led to a lot of frustrations around the house, and more than likely made the odds of you getting healthy even harder by adding to your sleep deprivation and stress. It's been a whole mess of fights and excuses and roadblocks all spring, and I know we're all pretty darn ready for a break. It's coming, thankfully--at least summer break will take a couple things off the agenda for a bit. But I don't want us to live like this, so I hope we can find a system that works for all of us by next September.
I saw a random reel last week that illustrated a real-life scenario of something called Pathological Demand Avoidance. It's where someone's request or suggestion to do something causes a disproportionate negative response that makes that person illogically opposed to doing that thing. I honestly think that's what we have had going on. It would explain why you told us repeatedly this year that you were going to do your homework until we asked you to do it and now you're not. Or why you purposely stay in bed after we check in on you in the morning despite you being halfway out of bed already when we got there. It would explain a lot of why you bristle at our suggestions to clean up the empty bottles in your room or the snack bags by the couch, even though those are necessary and reasonable asks. I'm trying to keep that in mind when we have those issues, that it's essentially an involuntary reflex...but one that we need to work on, for sure! But I hope someday you understand the challenge that it is to keep you accountable and do our parental duty without overstepping into this reactionary zone. I've been learning a lot of casual little nuggets about ADHD lately through social media, and while it doesn't necessarily give me answers, it does help me understand why things sometimes feel really hard from your perspective. I'm trying to be patient, I promise.
I read a thoughtful essay on social media the other day that encouraged parents to think about how we're spending time with our older children with whom we have such limited time left. Are we just nagging and arguing all the time? (Yes.) Or are we trying to just "be" and be supportive, so you know we always have your back and there's always love to come back to no matter what? I have probably failed at this time and time again, and said as much when I shared it. I do need to do better at trying to tame the arguments--though laying off your brother and being at least a little cooperative would help a ton since I can't let you grow into a feral, rude human--because I want you to know you're loved and supported even as we're trying to mold you into a quality person. I had people comment about how it's clear we're doing a good job (clearly they don't live with us), and even had one person message me assuring me that in working for a school district they see a lot of failed parenting and we're not it. I get it, but your perspective matters, maybe more than anything, and I'm pretty sure you don't think we're doing too fantastic of a job most of the time. Now, teenage perspective is honestly always a little skewed from reality--trust me on that, all of us adults were much the same once upon a time--but I hope that once your brain is fully developed and you come out the other side you can see all we've done, or at least tried to do. This stage of parenting has challenged me as much as when your behavior issues started when you were five, and I worry a lot that I don't know how to help you through some of your struggles. Most teenagers don't listen to advice or reason, but you're chemically programmed to reject it even more than most, and that sucks. For all of us, honestly--it's hard for us but maybe even harder for you since it may mean a lot of hard lessons to learn on your own terms.
You definitely have a focus and a plan for yourself, which is admirable and impressive for someone your age. I had no clue about a lot of things in life right up through college. I might have had a vague idea, but you have the goal and the path in mind already. Whether or not it turns out to be doable remains to be seen, but I give you credit for getting that far. I just urge you to have some flexibility and maybe a backup plan just in case things don't go according to plan, because life is sneaky like that. I feel like you should know that by now given how some of your basketball and school experiences have gone, but you keep insisting it will work out. For your sake, I hope it does. And if it doesn't, just know we'll be here to help. We may not always agree on things, but we are always in your corner, and we're excited to see where you go in the coming years. Just keep your head on straight and don't always just assume we're clueless, because we have lived through these stages before ourselves. It may not look the same, but a lot still applies.
I'm sorry that your actual day today probably won't be the most exciting one you've had, but hopefully we can continue to celebrate you as the late-requested gifts arrive and we finally figure out how to get you the vacation you're craving so badly right now. Big kid birthdays definitely look a little different. I don't miss the fear of fitting more toys into the living room--fitting clothes in your closet is much simpler--but a lot of what we do now feels insufficient to celebrate what is still a momentous day. It's the day you were born and the day you made us parents. It changed our lives--and brains and hearts--forever, and it's hard to believe we're already getting to the home stretch of your time under our domain. In some ways that day seems like not that long ago, and in others it is a literal lifetime ago. So much has changed, and yet much of the fear and cluelessness is still there, just a bit evolved. We can't imagine our lives without you and can't wait to see where you go in the years to come. I'll just keep praying for patience for all of us! Happy 15th Birthday, Jacob.
As I alluded to in my last post, we finally got back to some action this weekend. Craig and Jacob went to Massachusetts for a basketball tournament. Carter and I could have gone along, but we didn't expect much sightseeing so we opted to stay home and have our own fun. Craig and Jacob did get into Boston for a bit to enjoy some Wahlburgers and check out Harvard, but I think we made a good choice to stay home. We finally got to break in our Darien Lake season passes! It boggled my mind a little the other day because I thought back to those failed attempts to get Carter on Ride of Steel in August and October and how sad he was that he had to wait nine (and later seven) more months to ride it. While I'm sure it didn't feel short to him, I can't believe all that time has passed already. I guess we kept pretty busy this winter and time moved right along! I kept getting nervous something else would crop up to delay his first ride, but we finally made it!
I was hoping to get there closer to lunch time, but between trying to squeeze in a workout, having to run to Wegmans so we weren't totally out of milk for Sunday, packing our bags, and getting our lunches made and car-ready, we didn't get on the road until just before 1pm, which meant a 2pm arrival. Our plan was to go directly to Ride of Steel before anything else could go wrong, and then work through anything else important before heading to the water park for a bit. Luckily the line was pretty short--right up into the station--and although it was still a wait because Darien Lake seems to be anti-two-trains on all their coasters, we probably only waited 15-20 minutes before it was our turn! Carter was nervous, but excited as the train chugged up the hill. We enjoyed the view, eyed up some lines at the water park, and got ready for the big drop. I had forgotten the terror/thrill of a drop that big and definitely screamed myself! I looked over at him as we went up the large second hill and he had a big smile on his face! In the end, of course he loved it! We almost rode again right away, but the line had gotten a little longer and I suggested we conquer a couple other things before we did it again.
We hit up the drop tower next, which we almost rode in August but it broke down while we were in line. I did the math and it seems like this one was about a 60-70 foot upgrade from the one in Ocean City, and the one at Cedar Point will be about the same upgrade from this one! Funny to think Cedar Point was my first one like this (with compressed air as opposed to the less gentle Demon Drop), and everything since has been a disappointment--haha! He was nervous as we waited for the fast shot up, and it was indeed crazy, but I assured him the first drop was more fun, and he agreed! But again, he liked it! And just like that, two of our last-year fails were redeemed!
As we headed to the water park, I had to get a picture of this gorgeous flower! They were all over the park and were so pretty!
The water park was a bit of a risk. It was only about a mid-70s day with filtered sun, so it wasn't super warm, and the nights have been cool so the water was quite chilly! In the end it was just warm enough, but between the cold water and the breeze, the waits were borderline chilly! But I suppose it beat roasting and burning! We headed first to the Tornado, which is our favorite--it's the one that has a sideways funnel that you shoot down into from a giant tunnel and do a bit of a half pipe kind of swishing back and forth before shooting through the base into the pool. It is always a thrill and always hilariously terrifying! The water was indeed chilly, especially as we got splashed and then went into the pool, but at least our wait was a fraction of our usual wait!
Next we went to the Swirl City slides. There are four slides on one platform, all different. There are two lines (for no reason--I think you used to pick which two slides you wanted to pick from at the top, but that hasn't been the case for us) and it turned out they only had one lifeguard at the top so the lines were SLOW. We probably waited close to an hour, but chatted a bit with the father and son in front of us and debated which slide we were going to do. Last time we did Mr. Twister, which had fun swirly pods along the way down the slide. We loved that and were tempted to do it again, but figured we'd try the "toilet bowl" this time. Carter had only done one before, at the indoor waterpark, because he wasn't tall enough for Seabreeze's last time we were there. The cold splashes of water ended up a bit uncomfortable as we spun around the bowl, and that pool was extra cold, but it was fun and now we know that we love Mr. Twister better or could try one of the other two next time.
Next door was Brain Drain, the infamous slide where the floor drops out. The wait was super fast compared to the last time we did it, so I consented. We chatted with a family in line where one kid was terrified and the parents were unsure but willing to try. I was dreading it a bit but persevered! The drop on the slide I did this time was a bit longer than my last one, but I think I got less face splashes this time. It was super fast and cold but we immediately turned our attention to watching the other family come down. The mom looked shellshocked but amused and the non-scared brother loved it. We would have stayed for the dad and scared brother but we weren't sure they were going to make it down and we were freezing so we moved on. Carter did a quick stop at the kiddie slide in Hook's Lagoon, and then our last stop was the Wahoo Wave, the newer slide that we waited forever for last time. The line was super short this time, which was great, but it proved challenging carrying the giant quad raft up by myself. Luckily a guy from the next group behind us helped me a bit. They really need a better system there! But we enjoyed that one as well, and that wrapped up our water park time.
I should add here that the best part of having the season pass was feeling like we didn't have to do everything on this trip. We had our goals, for sure, but we knew we could hit up any misses next time. For example, one of our favorites, Motocoaster, hasn't opened yet this year. Waiting on parts, perhaps? I would have been bummed to miss it on a single trip, but knowing we can catch it later was nice. Same with the waterpark racing slides or even the other quad slides, or some of the flat rides we never seem to have time for. That less-stress experience was so much more pleasant, and I will dizzy myself later this summer, for sure!
Our next stop was Tantrum, which we loved last time, but wanted to be in the front for this time. It's such a crazy flippy coaster with a vertical lift and beyond vertical drop. Despite being smooth it always rocks my brain a little and leaves me a little dizzy, but it was super fun! And while we were rocking my brain, we moved on to Mind Eraser. We ran out of time for Mind Eraser in August, and it was closed in October. I actually swore off Mind Eraser 20-some years ago. After ending up with headaches after riding it and a similar one at Canada's Wonderland, I was done with any in that format by that manufacturer, at least at Six Flags parks where they tended to be clones. Well...never say never because you will have a child who deserves a chance to try it once. The slow line (still maybe only 30 minutes) gave me plenty of time to think through my questionable life choices, but eventually we were on and I was bracing myself. I did not scream and I mostly just cringed, but in the end the brain rocking was minimal. Definitely there, but minimal all things considered. It is a fun, different format--a new one for Carter, with the suspended track and dangling legs--so getting back to something like that had its upside. He liked it a lot and I consented to ride it again later in the summer, so he was happy. I'd just rather go ride Raptor at Cedar Point or Great Bear at Hersheypark!
By this point the sun was starting to go down and turn the sky pretty colors.
Mind Eraser on the left, Tantrum on the right
We definitely needed to eat by this point, but we figured we should ride the Viper first, and we made a short detour at a ride I've wanted to go on since it was installed many years ago. Moose on the Loose is sort of a kiddie ride--or maybe an adult-friendly step-up from one. It's cheesy, but the line was short and I wanted to try it once! You ride your own moose along a track and it bounces up and down a bit. It's got a little themed scenery and a soundtrack of clomping hooves and someone saying "Moose on the Loose!" It was silly but I'm glad we did it!
Viper was next and the wait was tolerable. Unfortunately, the ride was not. It really hurt both of us this time. I don't know if it was the car position or something else, but OUCH. It has never really been comfortable since I was a kid, but this ride was bad--much like the October one that I thought was the cold's fault. Boo.
It was finally time to eat and we settled on splitting an order of poutine. It ended up being really good and just the right amount to fill our stomachs without making us sick on our next ride.
Our first post-food ride ended up being the Predator, which we thought would be a longer wait than it was. But that one doesn't really make my stomach flip anyway, so it was fine. They re-tracked another section this year and now I can really tell what section needs to be next! The re-tracked sections are so much better and capture the original non-abusive, runaway train experience of the ride, but there's still one rough section. Still overall enjoyable, though! I caught this shot on the exit ramp.
We still wanted to do another Ride of Steel ride, but the line was still longer so we opted to wander over toward Boomerang. I hate that ride. I ride it because Carter loves it, but oh, it was also rough again. And that on top of the Viper roughness made me a little worried. I was managing, but I may start sending Carter on that one alone. After that we debated a few different options of non-coaster rides, but opted to go to Sleigh Ride and then hit up Ride of Steel right before closing. But first I needed to take pretty pictures of the still-wildfire-affected sunset.
Sleigh Ride was one of my favorites as a kid. It's like the Musik Express at a lot of other parks, but is more of a swinging sleigh than a fixed car on the end of an undulating arm. There's some nice swing and it's still fast, but it's not the same kind of crushing slide from the G-forces that you get on Musik Express. The theming is still basically the same as it was when I was a kid so it always gives me the warm fuzzies--especially because its old neighbors, the spinning boat-themed Raging Seas and the Scrambler-on-a-slope Crazy Quilt, are no longer around.
Oh, and somewhere around this time I showed Carter the game Fascination. It's like a BINGO table--you roll balls toward a grid of holes and try to get five in a row. I have fond memories of getting to play that a couple times over our season pass summer when I was a kid. It hasn't changed, and I love that about it. Maybe one of these times we'll play!
We made our way back over to Ride of Steel and got in line for our last ride of the day. We got on right around 9pm, when it was getting a bit darker, and I think Carter enjoyed the second time more because he knew what to expect and could just enjoy it!
Since we were there at closing time, I suggested we stick around for the Laser Light Spectacular. I had never been there to see it and I figured if we did it that night we wouldn't have to worry about it for the rest of the summer. Carter wasn't exactly thrilled, but tolerated it. We had seen the location of the show while we were on the Boomerang but we weren't sure what it was at the time. But after Googling the show I realized where it was and we headed back over that way after Ride of Steel. We sat there for about 10 minutes or so before the show got started.
It was actually pretty neat. They had a fun and varied soundtrack--everything from "If You're Happy and You Know It" and the Bluey theme to 80s and 90s hits and modern stuff. I thought they did a good job appealing to everyone.
Each song had a variety of animations on a screen coupled with laser effects. Some just looked like lines and some had almost like a smoke or cloudy sky look.
They even had this weird effect at ground level that seemed to be made with water spray and looked like a dancing woman. It was a little creepy, but cool.
I love the song "Blinding Lights" by The Weeknd, so I took videos of that one:
There was also a patriotic section - they honored Canada first but that prominently featured a Tim Hortons logo so my guess is that was a sponsored thing - and then they moved on to the US with the "Proud to be an American" song.
The Iwo Jima animation on the screen was cool
After the show ended, we walked into the Magical Garden nearby. The canopy of lights was so pretty.
They also had these interesting circles around the garden that had 3-D animations of animals. The video I took doesn't really do it justice, but here's a dinosaur.
After that we headed out. We were both a little hungry, but the remaining park food that was still available was mostly overpriced candy so we headed to the Speedway gas station near the Thruway. This time (unlike last time) they had plenty of hot chocolate! We grabbed our drink and snack and waited in a super long line--must be a busy spot when everyone leaves the park at once--before finally getting back on the road. It's an easy highway drive, thankfully. I offered to have Carter sleep in our room on his "bad dream" mattress, which he sometimes appreciates because it's like a slumber party. I think he was out like a light pretty quickly, but I stayed up a little later to catch up on things.
Unfortunately, the rest of the weekend was a bit of a dud. I woke up exhausted on Sunday. I think my body is getting to an age where it's starting to protest when I overdo it. Saturday was a crazy day--I did a strength training workout before Darien Lake, and my watch ended up at 146 minutes of exercise (about 50 of that was my workout, so I guess walking and waterpark stairs made up the rest), 887 move calories (usually I struggle to hit my goal of 390), almost 19,500 steps, more than 8.8 miles, and 11 flights climbed. Despite a good night of sleep, I think my body was just done for the weekend because I was tired and lazy all day and just couldn't seem to snap out of it. The weather was cloudy so it didn't inspire me to go out, and I just couldn't get myself moving beyond a few pesky inside to-do list items that would have bugged me all week had I not gotten to them. And then it all went down the tubes even more because Carter got sick. He was complaining about being hungry as I was trying to figure out dinner. The big boys were on their way back and we had debated waiting for them, but he was too hungry so I was trying to settle on a plan for us. One second he was whining about how hungry he was, the next second his face changed, and a second after that he puked on the living room floor. Seriously?! This kid has always had issues distinguishing hunger from a sour stomach, and I guess since he hadn't been sick in years he forgot the feeling yet again. He got sick one more time in the bathroom about 20 minutes later. He had some dry toast and water very slowly in the evening and seemed like he was doing okay, but he puked all over himself and his comforter setup in the bathroom around midnight. Apparently he barely woke up because this stomach bug did not come complete with cramps and panicked nausea like I always seem to have! That was really unfortunate and frustrating since I had finally gotten to sleep just before, and there was a lot of cleanup--including more laundry than would fit in the washer. The rest of the night was uneventful, thankfully, and some water, toast, and plain pasta later he seems to be on the mend.
As for Jacob, he was back on the court for a game for the first time since Oklahoma City. He eased back into game play slowly and did sink a three in one of his games, but he ended up tweaking his bad ankle AGAIN in the second game, so that was it for the weekend and likely for the season. There was another tournament or two he could have played in, but it looks like he just needs to take a break and focus primarily on his training with school. His body is just a mess and he needs a reset. It stinks, but hopefully he can work on his conditioning and maybe work into his body that I would guess has grown quicker than he's really been able to keep up with. I think maybe every muscle, ligament, tendon, and bone is still trying to wrangle the fact he's grown more than a foot over the past three years or so. I could be wrong, but it seems like he's been having so many issues lately, likely partly from overuse and partly from bad luck. At least the ankle brace saved him this time. It's definitely not the way we expected this season to go, but hopefully he can find his way back soon. By the way, he's happier at his new school, for sure, which is a big victory itself.
In the end the weekend was a bit of a mixed bag, but it definitely had some high points. The kids now have a mere handful of school days left--four days this week plus two and a half for Jacob and one and a half for Carter next week. Jacob is finally wrapping up middle school (for real this time) and Carter will be a year away from finishing elementary school. Wow. Add in a weekend family wedding and coming up and we've still got more action ahead.
It feels a little funny to say we've been in a lull when we have basketball almost every day and soccer three nights a week and Jacob just started a new school and Carter is wrapping up his year with all the things, but that's what it feels like. We had almost three weeks without travel or any major adventure, and that's probably a really good thing, even if downshifting from adventure is still causing me a bit of angst.
The one thing that was notable over these last weeks was Carter getting to sing the national anthem at the Red Wings game over last weekend.
The band and orchestra accompanied them (off to the right)
They did a great job, not that you can tell from my camera work below. I was trying to record on two devices so I could post from my phone and have some zoomed shots from my real camera, but it did not work. I apologize for the mess, but at least you can hear them!
While waiting for the action to return, I tried to take joy in sprouting seeds and a slowly-coming-along-but-stunted garden, which was such a joy during the height of the pandemic. But we're in that slow, in-between point where things are starting to grow but will still take weeks to get truly impressive. And wishing that time away is no good because then it'll be July and the peak of summer and I always hate knowing that summer is on the downslope. I haven't even been able to effectively pull weeds or expect any sort of amazingness because it's been about three weeks since it's rained anything of significance. We've had a few drops here and there--not even enough to wash the pollen off the patio table. Things always seem to explode once we get real rain--the hose water only goes so far--but usually it's far later into the summer when we have this problem. The hose water keeps them alive, but the real growing comes from the rain, I swear. While the pleasant, sunny weather for a solid couple weeks was nice, it's too early for everything to be so brown!
Notice I said "was". For much of this past week, our weather was dominated by Canadian wildfire smoke. Orange-red ball sunsets have been the norm for a few weeks, and lately we've had some air quality warnings, too. A few days this week were downright crazy, the worst I've ever seen here. It was at a point where it was dangerous to everyone, not just people with respiratory issues. You could even smell it, apparently--not that I would know. Sometimes even the view across the street looked hazy. Normally I love the view of downtown Rochester from the new highway flyover, but that was completely obscured on Wednesday, and the sun was a dull red ball during that commute, too. I'm glad Carter's class got in their Jr. Olympics on Monday because they started keeping the kids inside on Tuesday. It closed zoos and canceled sports, too. Soccer was canceled for three days and even high school lacrosse playoffs got moved. Jacob heard rumors his school could get canceled because so many kids walk to school, but no such luck for him. It's really shocking to have this happen here. I've always heard about the orange glow from fires, and while we didn't quite have that, it was definitely yellow. New York City was full-on orange, though. Off-the-charts bad. Even when it was less thick, it casted such a weird glow on everything. Very filtered, almost imperceptible sunlight casted orange rays through in the windows all day, which is something you usually only get at sunrise or sunset. It was eerie and a little scary to think about what we were breathing. I looked at a webcam in Ottawa on Tuesday, much nearer to the source and on a purple "hazardous air quality" level, and it was shocking how bad it looked. That severity moved to Western New York by Wednesday. Say what you will about climate change, but the presence of wildfire smoke has gotten worse in recent years around here and this was as bad as I've seen it. It seems to be getting much better now, though it's still not great.
In the next couple weeks, the kids will finish up school and Jacob will turn 15. Hard to fathom--a decade and a half. A year from driving. Technically old enough to start working. When you have that first baby you can't even fathom what your life will look like when they become a teenager, and I definitely can't say I imagined we'd be here, going on middle school #3 and sending our kid off to what is essentially a city high school next year. For starters, in my vision we would have been finishing up that first year of high school right now, but I can't say much of this school journey has gone according to plan! Not to mention I have this giant six-foot elite basketball player, which probably would not have been my first (lacrosse) or second (baseball) guess, especially given my height. But here we are. He insists he doesn't want anything for his birthday except for us to go to Disney for our vacation. Sigh. I'm just not sure how to make this work. For one, Disney (even without park tickets) is expensive. Two, we know it's oppressively hot (and thunderstormy) in the summer and I'm not sure I want to do that again. Three, there has to be a way to do what he wants to do at a lower price point. He really just wants a bunch of resort time with a basketball hoop, pool, and significant downtime. Not that Carter and I couldn't go off and do fun stuff while we're there, but he would not want that to be an expectation of him. I'm mostly fine with that, but it also needs to be relatively tropical and feel "special". He wants to be able to take the boat to Disney Springs. He wants Dole Whip at the ready. He wants good food, which admittedly would be a challenge elsewhere. But is it really feasible? Ehhhhh. We spent a lot on basketball travel. Not that we wouldn't do anything as a result of that--Carter deserves some adventure, too--but that feels like a lot again so soon. So, we keep trying to think through what might work. It's not going well.
Speaking of not going well, I still don't have a summer plan for Carter. His school district camp booked up way earlier than usual and I'm struggling right now with sitting down to tackle the mess that is filling up a summer week-by-week. With being hybrid and Craig having some flexibility, it's not terrible, but it's also not ideal. I know we wouldn't need anything until after 4th of July week since my brother and his kids will be in town and I took off, so at least I have a little time beyond these last couple weeks of school. But I really need to get on tracking down options now. I really feel like I'm struggling with big things like that right now, almost an ADHD-worthy level of procrastination where I'm unfocused and anxiety-ridden about anything of significance. I've found myself struggling with writing email drafts or starting big projects at work, organizing Carter's room, posting all of our no-longer-needed stuff on a Buy Nothing page or bagging up donations, plus the aforementioned travel and camp issues. I'm guessing this is some sort of brain cycle (I've started noticing some of that lately) and I'm hoping it will snap and I'll get back on a productive streak again soon.
I'll admit I'm missing all the travel and adventure a bit. I don't miss the aftermath of those busy periods or the stress of planning or execution, yet I find myself aimlessly scrolling through my phone photos looking back on good memories and bemoaning the lack of new photos. When I go into "dry" periods like this, it always bums me out a bit. It's fine; things can't always be exciting. But with the spring we had it's hard to downshift sometimes. I'm grateful for all I've gotten to do, though. I just wish I could drop myself back in time in those settings again for a little bit because the day-to-day at home is lacking right now.
I don't know if it's just my brain cycling, or anxiety about our summer setup, or concern with vacation plans, or frustration over Jacob's school and basketball situation, but it's been a bit of a challenging few weeks on the energy and motivation front. I think I realized when I was doing all of that traveling how much I tended to put things off because of the travel, and once it was over I had to face reality and start working through everything I put off. I think that's been part of my challenge--feeling guilty that I need to be working on the boring stuff but haven't really been in the mood to do it. I am probably longing for more travel just because my brain prefers that as a distraction compared to the mundane things of life. Unfortunately, Jacob seems to have inherited that trait because that's part of why he's been fixated on the vacation thing--he wants to go now to avoid school and basketball and just get a break. That's definitely not possible so he's going to need to suck it up--as do I--but just because I understand his frustration doesn't mean we get to do anything about it. We have another week and a half of school, and I have another couple weeks of work before I get a break. Then maybe we'll start figuring some things out.
Anyway, we got back to some action this weekend--for better and for worse. More on that in the next post...
Our Memorial Day weekend was a solid mix of stuff. I had a whole to-do list for myself that necessitated taking a four-day weekend. I knew I would need it to get through it all, and thankfully my workload cooperated to take the day. The outside yard work alone was a lot to accomplish, let alone the inside stuff--changing over the house decor to patriotic/summer, finally changing out the rest of my closet to summer attire, and changing over our bedding because I was starting to sweat under our quilt at night and needed the lighter blanket I put on in the summer. I also needed to pick a dish to pass for a Saturday picnic, go to Wegmans and get those items plus some other ones, and take care of a couple other nagging things. And I wanted to get back on the workout wagon because that had fallen off a bit between our trip and a busy set of evenings that included Carter's soccer and final chorus concert of the year. It all felt like a lot, and it was. Before I get to that, speaking of soccer and chorus...
Carter had his first soccer game the previous Wednesday. Of course
it was one absolutely chilly day in the midst of otherwise pleasant
weather, but a few layers later, we made it through.
It was a beautiful, sunny day...if it was not a high of 50. Hoodie dress, fleece leggings, a winter coat, and a blanket to the rescue.
He did well and got a
couple of assists, but was sad that they lost despite a really strong
effort. I think the team has a lot of potential, though, so I'm hopeful
this will be a more enjoyable season than last year.
Carter SO wanted
to score a goal, and even threatened to quit soccer if he didn't score this season. Thankfully, this week in game two, not only did they pull out a win, but Carter scored! His team had taken a 2-0 lead but the other team came back and tied it. We scored two more only to have them cut the deficit to one. We knew the game should almost be over and worried every time the other team came down to our end, but Carter iced it a minute or two before the final whistle finally blew! We were happy to see him rewarded since he's definitely been playing more in between games
and practices with the net he got for his birthday. The net is a bit of a
bear to put up and take down, but I'm getting quicker at it and he loves it. He still needs to work on his footwork and speed, but he'll get there.
Thursday
was his chorus concert. The program also included the continuing
orchestra and band performances (5th graders--more advanced than Carter's concert pieces, but not much less painful, honestly!), but chorus did a bunch of songs and
they did well. Carter took a while to spot me in the crowd (Jacob had
basketball practice so it was just me) and he definitely seemed to relax
more after that. Here's a snippet from one of the songs, where they added a cool effect:
He still has a national anthem performance at the Red
Wings baseball game this weekend to wrap up the year. I'm so
proud of all his hard work and early mornings this year to make all of
these music pursuits possible. I'm eager to get him set up with some
viola lessons over the summer because I can't wait to see how good he
can get!
Getting back to last weekend, the outside stuff was a huge thing to check off the list. I had already done my garden before we left for St. Louis, but only managed to temporarily throw most of my annual plants in pots before we left to keep them alive while we were gone. I needed to get those out and planted, so on Friday I repotted my new dahlia, did two hanging baskets, one pot, one long planter, and one giant, three-tiered planter I bought on clearance at Aldi last year that took an entire giant bag of potting soil. I did a mix of established flowers and seeds in all but one of them. The big planter looks pretty great already with a mix of impatiens, portulaca, and marigolds, and I'm just getting my first sprouts in the all-seed planter that's usually full of my zinnias (but will hopefully have a bit more this year). My garden is coming along rather slowly, as is my hydrangea. I think the garden fell victim to a lot of dry weather the last couple weeks--we haven't gotten any rain since a day or two while we were gone, and I was probably a little too busy last week to keep up proper watering. A couple things popped through this week, but I replanted some lettuce, beans, and peas last night in case they never show up. My hydrangea seems to have fallen victim to a spring cold snap. It had a ton of buds early in the spring but those all crapped out and there's only a limited amount of foliage along the base and not much on the "sticks" from last year. I've seen a couple other people's look similar so I guess we all got duped into thinking our plants could handle the late freeze. I also did some fertilizing of my fungus-prone plants, did a bunch of weeding, transplanted an out-of-place plant, and tried out the vinegar-borax-soap method of weed killing on our patio weeds. I discovered a really bad aphid infestation on one burning bush (and mild ones on the other ones) so I did a bunch of spraying that led to a full bush trimming on Monday to take off the remains of the infested parts. That was exhausting and led to the discovery of another infestation on our boxwoods. I also ended up cleaning up some of the dead patio weeds and helping Craig with the massive trim of our out-of-control-but-too-giant-to-fix evergreen bushes. I came out of Monday sunburned and tired, but happy with the progress. But just like housework, just when you get it to the point where you think you can maintain it, somehow it still gets out of control before you know it.
Saturday was my every-five-year Geneseo InterVarsity Reunion picnic. I wasn't as excited as normal because I wasn't confident many people I knew would be there, but I felt it was important to go if only to see Pastor Dave, who was like my "college dad" and means the world to me. Sure enough, not many people from my era were there. There were a few that were a couple years ahead of me, so it was great to see them, but not many had little kids so Carter was very complain-y at first. Luckily, someone that I barely remembered at first but slowly recalled, brought two boys right around his age. That saved the day, even if Carter did still come in to complain about how tired he was a couple times! He did play outside a LOT! I was able to have some wonderful conversations with people I hadn't seen in a while, including one friend who was younger than me and has struggled with her faith and church life for the past few years because of how the church has handled certain areas that impact her life. And yes, seeing Pastor Dave and his sweet wife Babs was truly wonderful. She also LOVED the salad I brought and she sent me the sweetest message when I sent her the recipe. It was so wonderful to be with them again, especially as they get older and reality sets in they won't be around forever. But being in that setting again, despite the way my own faith has meandered through the 20+ years since I graduated, was just a reminder of how lucky I was to have that kind of a group to get me through those four years that changed my life in incredible ways. Those bonds and friendships are really unique, and that time was a very clear reminder of that.
Monday night we went to the Amerks playoff game. They were in the conference finals for the first time since I worked there, and it was fun to see a fully sold-out arena. See all those seats at the end? I've almost never seen them full like that. Even back in the days when we'd have big nights around holidays or Knighthawk playoff games, it almost never looked like that. This was a legit sellout.
From our seats we had a prime view of the team's banners, and those last six represent my time there (and Craig's, too), starting with the Calder Cup final loss when I was an intern, to a solid regular season and very disappointing playoff my first year. The last banners were from my last full year, the year the NHL canceled the season and we had an amazing team with all the guys who stuck around for an extra year. We won the regular season but proceeded to have a bunch of injuries from the end of the season into the playoffs, which led to an early exit in round two. That was such a disappointment because we looked unstoppable all season. But the season prior to that, we didn't have any banners to show for it, but we had such an exciting playoff run. We came back from 3-1 down in our first round series to win game 7 in overtime. Then we swept the second round. We moved on to the third round but the circus came to town and we were stuck playing games in Buffalo. That didn't seem to do us any favors, and we had a crushing loss in five games that felt closer than the final win count indicated. That had been the season I hosted our TV show, so I knew all the players to some degree and I never wanted to see them succeed so badly. A bunch of the guys from those two years went on to Buffalo and were a part of teams that suffered similar fates--an overachieving playoff team that went to the conference finals and should have won it all if not for some bad luck, and then an amazing season the next year that ended far too early in the second round. It was crushing then as well, and I'm still sad that group never won it all in one spot or another.
Watching the full crowd brought back memories of full arenas past and when playoff games gave me anxiety for days on end. Even if sports didn't work out exactly like I thought it would, I'm still so grateful for the journey I went on for those six years, not to mention the 17 years since where I've done it in the wife role. Sports really did set the stage for the rest of my life, so there's always a respect for where I've come from and those amazing experiences I wouldn't trade. This time around went about as well as most of those past playoff runs--the Amerks went out to a 2-0 lead, but blew it in the last 10 minutes of the third period and lost 4-2. They did win the next game so the series came back to Rochester for Game Six, but they lost 1-0 and the season is over. It was a bummer to witness the loss that night, though, even if it doesn't crush my heart and soul like it once did. Looking at those banners made me realize they're past due for making some new history there and I really hoped this might be part of it.
The next day was Jacob's last day at his old school, and Wednesday was the first at the new school (for the next three weeks, anyway--he'll be in a different building in the fall). It didn't start out particularly well--there was a lack of communication about the first day. For one, somehow we never clarified the start time and ended up late, and then we were never told it was a field trip day and he could have dressed down. It was to a Red Wings game on an 80 degree day and he was wearing uniform pants and had no sunscreen. So, not the best start. But the girls already think he's cute and the gym teacher (former basketball coach) was all excited about him being there, so I guess that's something. But then his old school wanted him to take finals and we had to work through scenarios to make sure we were OK not having him do that. Because he technically has 8th grade credit (with better grades) from last year, and this year can't really transfer over to the new school because the classes don't match up (he'll retake 9th grade classes next year, but on a Regents track), it doesn't really make sense. He's also missing work this week that would drive down his grade, and he turned in most of his stuff anyway, so we're not sure how he'd study. According to everyone Craig has asked, it doesn't make sense, but we also don't want to piss anyone off, so...it's been a little weird..
I had a moment while driving to work that first morning where I realized that the spot where I usually go straight to take Jacob to school will almost never be a straight drive anymore. That route that we'd become so accustomed to (and thankful for, being so short) is suddenly not a thing anymore. For now he essentially goes into the city with us as we drive to work, and next year, it will be an out-of-the-way but tolerable drive north. It's fine, of course--we've done worse--but all of this happened so weird and so suddenly and I'm finding myself having an odd mourning period for what once was. Today the old school posted a video of the seniors doing a "walk" through the school hallways in their caps and senior shirts. They were high-fiving the kids and hugging their non-senior friends and teachers. Jacob probably would have been in that video, or at least been happy to high-five his two senior teammates, so I felt yet another weird sting from that. We're going to drop off his uniform shirts with some other things he didn't get to turn in, and even that is a bit of a sting because we bought those a little big so he could wear them again next year, and now that investment and pre-planning was pointless. There was a lot of hope and promise when we bought those last summer, and now...who knows. I know he wasn't happy there, so this represents a fresh start, but I guess now I'm worried that this promising start will find a way to crash and burn, too.
Last year when he had his moving up ceremony, it felt weird because we knew he was leaving the school and repeating 8th grade, unlike his friends who were all staying and moving up to high school. This year, I don't even know if the school was doing any sort of ceremony, but now we won't be there for it anyway, and the one his new school will do won't exactly mean the same since he will have only been there for a couple weeks. It's strange. Although, knowing him, maybe he will make friends and insist he knows and likes them better than anyone he was with at his old school for the last nine months. Wouldn't surprise me...and I hope that's the case, but based on a couple days in, I'm not sure. He says that these kids are weird in a different way than the kids at his old school were weird--better weird, he insists--but that doesn't exactly instill me with a lot of hope that he's making connections yet. I wanted a good start so we had a good summer. It makes me think of my college orientation, which happened the week after my high school graduation. It went terribly--my roommate never showed up at the dorm, so I was either alone or an awkward third wheel, and trying to figure out registration or placement exams was confusing. I came out of it feeling intimidated and lonely, and I was dreading going back. As a result, I dreaded anything that had to do with college for the rest of the summer. I was a brat when we went dorm room shopping. I was grouchy the morning we left. That one two-day span ruined so much of what should have been an exciting time. I don't want that for him. I think he's cool with the basketball guys, which should help since he's already doing things with them, but it still makes me nervous. He's already falling back into a couple bad habits--bad mornings and resisting assignments--so it's not quite the resurgence I was hoping for.
Even still...I guess I just didn't expect all of this now, before the end of the year, so it's
hitting a little differently. I didn't take any last day/first day
pictures from this transition because I'm just not sure how I feel about it all--it doesn't feel celebratory like it usually would. It's not
ideal to be switching again, but if this is a good spot for him, it
could be a great thing. But for now it just feels awkward. I haven't yet mentioned it on social media, so I'm not sure I needed photo
documentation. I hate limbo and gray areas and incompleteness, but oh,
parenthood gives you a hefty dose of all of the above sometimes.
So, now it's June and we're into the home stretch. I can barely believe it. It's been almost an entire school year since our Disney trip, Carter has run the gamut this year between struggling and excelling, and Jacob isn't even at the same school. Jacob is (finally) almost done with middle school and Carter has only one more year before going there himself. Oh, and Jacob turns 15 in less than three weeks. What?! It's all so hard to fathom. We have one relatively relaxing weekend before a few (possibly) busy ones, so I'm going to do what I can to enjoy it and use it to my advantage. It never really does slow down, does it?
I left off as we were walking to the game from the Arch. It was a beautiful day but we were thankful to hear that our seats were under cover and shaded, which actually turned out to be absolutely perfect. It could have been extra hot out in the sun, but the shade temperature was amazing. As we approached the stadium, we could see the rooftop patio we saw from the Arch view, and started working our way around the stadium.
We had a vague idea of where we needed to go to get our tickets, but not
exactly! We were looking for the third base side, but I guess the
outfield side felt extra long so I started to second guess myself! We wandered past closed ticket windows,
a bunch of statues, and finally an entrance. Just outside was a cool Stan Musial statue, which despite our rush I had to get a picture of in case we came out a different way!
We had to ask a couple people but finally found the late-arrival will call tickets. First priority once we were in was to find a bathroom (!), and as we were doing that, I could hear the seventh inning stretch being announced. Ugh, we had missed a lot! Oh, well, we were there and it was cool. We snapped a pic with the giant (functional) bobblehead before we headed upstairs.
Our seats were amazing. With the shade and the great view, I was going to soak it up for as long as we could. At least the tickets ended up being pretty cheap so weren't wasting too much money by missing most of the game. I was thankful for the chance to see another stadium. Comparing MLB stadiums is always fun.
Reunited at last!
Carter and I hadn't eaten lunch yet so Craig got us some food to enjoy as we watched what was left of the game. I had been running on such adrenaline I hadn't even been hungry until that point. A pretzel helped!
Once again I played around with the zoom on my camera, and could get this close to the batter!
I caught this shot of the mascot after the big win!
I wish the game could have gone on a little longer, but it was fun while it lasted. It was such a nice day, and being at a baseball game is always nice. As we headed out, I wanted to get a shot of the outfield with the Arch in view!
We also caught a glimpse of this cool mural in one of the stadium bars. Love all the old cards!
They had the American and National League scoreboards from their old stadium in the concourse, just as they stood for the last game before it was replaced. That was pretty neat!
The atmosphere around the stadium was amazing. There were outside bars and balconies rimming the stadium that were full of fans, and after the game we saw there was live music at another venue and they had screens to see what was happening in the stadium. I assume most of these places have screens for fans that don't want to go into the stadium but want to enjoy the atmosphere. There were high school kids playing in the stadium postgame and people could watch it from there!
We stopped in the store (and then another one across the street) on our way out because we had some gift shopping to do!
I was happy we got to see inside that stadium after driving by it a few times. By the time we got back to the van and started our trek home, I felt like we had truly conquered St. Louis in a big way. I mean, if we ever go back there are still things left on our list--the aquarium, a soccer game, and the zoo for starters--but we maximized our time and really did a LOT! The bad news is we were getting on the road really late which meant that our drive home was going to be a bit more of a challenge, but I think it was worth it!
We drove a bit into Illinois before stopping for dinner at the first reasonably-sized city. Then it was a later haul into Indianapolis than we would have liked. I was bummed that was as far as we got because that left the same long haul home as we had on the 15-hour trip. And as on that trip, by the time we finally got going in the morning it was later than would have been ideal. Everyone needed to sleep in a little, then we had to get ready and grab breakfast (just before it closed), and then stop at Starbucks to supplement Jacob's breakfast. We stopped for lunch somewhere around Columbus, which was not nearly as far along as Jacob and I were on our trip when we stopped for lunch. We had made it closer to Cleveland. We split up to each get our preferred lunches across the parking lot from one another, then hopped back in the van and kept going. We got through the rest of Ohio pretty uneventfully and then ended up in Pennsylvania construction hell. The road was closed for a stretch and the super slow traffic leading up to that was awful. When we were finally forced off the highway, we had to take back roads for a while and tried to keep ourselves occupied with a politically-oriented I Spy kind of game, which was funny despite the added annoyance. We finally made it back to the highway somewhere before the state border and pushed on toward Buffalo. I had been relegated to the back seat for a good portion of that leg and was feeling a little blah by that point--maybe too much sugar or road food? Anyway, we stopped at a Mighty Taco in Cheektowaga for a late dinner, and finally made it through the last leg. We got home far later than would have been ideal for heading back to work and school on Tuesday, but at least we were home with lots of stories to tell. And at least it was a short week since we all skipped school and work for the extra day, plus Jacob was off Friday (and as it turned out, Thursday due to a doctor appointment and a field day he couldn't participate in anyway), and I took off Friday for my own sanity (more on that in the next post). Not too shabby heading into a holiday weekend on top of it! But given how tired we were, we needed it! But anyway, mission accomplished in St. Louis!
