Oh my dear goodness, to live a life so very easy and mundane as to be able to blog about the state of the weather…
You already know it. It’s hot. I won’t go on and on about it.
One thing I know from my fifteen (gasp!) years of living here: Summer in this city ain’t for the weak bodied or weak souled. I also should know better than to take my two children over to the farmer’s market on a Saturday morning when the mercury climbs past the three-digit mark before 9:30 am. I ignored that section of my brain. It was blocked out by the section that wanted repeats of all the delicious produce we picked up the week before. I’ve done crazier things for peaches.
Of the two hours that we spent outside of the house that morning, approximately eight minutes of them were delightful. The first was catching the way E was looking at her sister while applying sunscreen to her – very carefully and thoroughly. And sweetly. It was a rare moment of peacefulness between them that day.
A few moments later I watched my heat-limp child submerge her body into the water and hover there for several minutes straight, unmoving. She almost smiled.
That was about it for the joyful moments. There was a lot of screaming (that very loud and demanding little one), sighing (that very put out and annoyed medium one), and some yelling (that very worn out and exasperated big one). We got home, had some lunch and some tears, and then M packed up the girls and headed north to deposit E with grandparents for a week. (This was already planned – not a result of the bad morning, although occasionally we have those moments when we daydream of shipping certain little ones off for a few days, or hours, or even minutes.) I went into work – again – and kept plugging away at the project.that.will.not.end. But it did end. Today. Tonight. And now I sing that old Rolaids jingle in my head as my body spells r-e-l-i-e-f in every movement. Even now I catch myself with tense shoulders. I remind myself to breathe. My night is mine. I don’t have to gear back up for anything other than what I want to put on my agenda. There is work, and there is looming-deadline-work. I’m happy to have just work for awhile. I need the relief.
We have so many things started here, and in various stages of doneness. When my life was all consumed with work or with trying to fit work to family, those various stages were driving me crazy. Tonight they seem exciting, and doable. Completely doable. I feel like I just finished the last of my spring exams and summer break has started. So what if it’s already July? It’s my summer now. I just wish the weather would stop rubbing my nose in it.
