Filing my Federal taxes (waiting until the eleventh hour because in spite of yet another year of unemployment/underemployment and losing our home we still freakin’ owe taxes this year…you’re welcome 1%)?…
I’m looking forward to that nap that she is promising.
This last week’s Focus 52 assignment was all about stacks and stacking it up. As you can see I have stacked up my supplies in preparation for some fun this week…except I forgot the vodka…that’s a clear liquid…right? Oh well. Head on over to Jan’s and check out the stacks.
Here I am busy juggling my life, my career, my kids’ lives and I manage to miss a little bit of dance mom drama at my 4th daughter’s studio. It certainly isn’t the crazy, bat-shit quality drama from the Abby Lee Studios that is depicted on Dance Moms...this show is totally a Big Top guilty pleasure… but I heard it does compare.
And to think I missed it!
Thankfully Jodie’s coach is the on top of craziness and manages to keep it to a minimum so she and the kids can focus on what they are there to do. The takeaway for her coach, for Jodie and the rest of the team was to sit down and assess what do these kids really want from this experience that is competitive dance. I know what Jodie wants. I have asked her every year that she has declared that she wanted to compete. I want to know what she wants from this and the assurance that she is having fun before I sign the check and prepare to schlep with her all over the place for competitions, classes and conventions. I know what she wants from this. Her coach does too. But recent events prompted them to sit down and really talk about what she wants from all this time, blood, sweat and tears that she has given this.
She does have dreams.
She has big dreams.
But her dreams are dosed with a lot of realism. She is a very smart girl…a VERY smart girl. Dance is big in those dreams but so is her education, where she wants to end up and what she eventually wants to do. Sitting down and taking stock of everything with her coach she is inspired all the more. Thankfully she has people…lots of people who are coming alongside of her, pointing her in the right direction and holding up a mirror for the occasional much-needed reality check. All of us are standing beside her as she continues to reach for her dreams, her wishes, her goals. Goals that include this someday.
Yes, someday she will be in that kick line. I’m not the only one who believes this to be so.
Oh and she has me…her biggest fan…the crazy dance mom who is working the extra shifts, sometimes helping with the hair and makeup, trying to avoid the bat-shit crazy dance mom drama and cheering her on all the way because how cool would it be to check off my Life List watching MY DAUGHTER dancing as a Radio City Music Hall Rockette in Radio City Music Hall? That is on my Life List you know…along with visiting the Scarborough Castle and learning how to turn a cartwheel. I guess she and I better start working on our code for “Hi Mom!” before that day comes.
More on my Life List, inspired by Karen Walrond’s inspiration shared at BlogHer 2011 someday soon…I promise!
Bill and I spent Saturday touring some smaller Napa Wineries with our local wine club. Now when we signed up for the wine trip we had no idea how much I needed that respite from my jury duty service. I hadn’t even received the jury summons then. But timing is everything and sometimes it can be oh so perfect like it was this weekend.
Oh, and about that chardonnay in the picture? It was A-MAZING! But at $84 a bottle with our wine club discount it better be! A taste was all I could afford but oh it was worth it.
I surprised myself serving on jury duty. I mean it proved to not be as much of a pain in the ass as I imagined or heard it would be. I even developed an appreciation for the importance of this civic duty. Yeah, I am a political science and civics kind of geek. But what can be wrong with that, really? I see nothing wrong there.
But the whole idea of not talking about the case during the trial with anyone…anyone?! Anyone. That whole idea seemed at the beginning like it would virtually impossible for me. But as the trial began, well, at the end of the day talking about all that I had seen and heard during the course of the day was the last thing I wanted to do. All I wanted to do was be alone and quiet in my thoughts or running or walking. And now that the case is over and we have rendered our judgement I can talk about it and I have with my hubs and Holly but that was enough for me. I guess because of the realization of the impact our decision would have on the parties involved I just don’t feel right talking about someone else’s pain.
And today? Today it is back to the usual juggling act and the catching up around here. Of course there is laundry because oh my god there is ALWAYS laundry but there is a full email box and other correspondences. Why can’t I be like Heather Armstrong and not feel so overwhelmingly guilty when I can’t keep up with returning correspondences? I know it makes me a bad person but honestly somedays it is all I can do just to get the needs of my immediate family taken care of and then when I have a moment of free time I just want to be selfish and savor that for just myself or with one of my circus clowns. If that makes me a horrible bad person in your eyes then I am just going have to live with it because I have a carpets to steam clean this week, a 5K to get myself ready for, a pumpkin fair to prepare for (Jodie will be performing all weekend) and getting back to work now that my civic duty is complete.
Gee whiz, just writing down the short list of things I need to catch up with is making me feel like I need to unwind…perhaps I should have come home with a bottle of that chardonnay!
Excuse me! Can you help me find a special card; a card that say “I’m sorry that your oldest sister is such a loser to miss and forget the biggest moment of your life as you graduate summa cum laude from Seattle Pacific University”?
Do you think I’ll find one here?
I have a pretty good excuse. Really, I think I do. But then I forgot the fact that the commencement came and went during the time that I had a pretty good excuse. And maybe people are getting pretty sick and tired of me playing the I-contracted-meningococcal-meningitis-from-my-13y/o-daughter-who-almost-died-from-it card. I’m thinking that folks are over that lame excuse of mine. So here I am trying to find the perfect card to express to my baby sister (and her mom who I bet is the one who is really pissed) just how sorry I am. Oh, and how proud of my baby sister for being so amazingly, awesome and graduating with distinction. Hopefully she’ll forgive me and remember me with kindness when she rules the world. Trust me, she will someday. Watch out Bill Gates!
Bill and I spent Saturday touring some smaller Napa Wineries with our local wine club. Now when we signed up for the wine trip we had no idea how much I needed that respite from my jury duty service. I hadn’t even received the jury summons then. But timing is everything and sometimes it can be oh so perfect like it was this weekend.
