It's just my busyness...

Things have been a bit crazy lately. It seems so hard to get a break from the constant demands of life. Soccer season is over. Abate ended the season being the second highest goal scorer on the team. A senior beat him out by 2 goals. Not bad considering Abate had to miss two games, one because he was sick, the second because he pulled a muscle in the track meet last week. He missed the final soccer game. He did place 2nd on the 3200m – Varsity! The district meet in in another week or so. We are really hoping he will qualify for regionals.
Fantu finally was released for full physical activity nine weeks after her surgery. She was so happy. That was Wednesday, on Monday she will return to the doctor to get an MRI on her right knee to see if she has the same condition as she had in her left knee. We will get the results on Friday, hoping for the best, but if it is bad news then as soon as school is out we will get her in for surgery.
Abate and I have nearly finished redecorating his bedroom. A few touch-ups with the paint and some organizing of his closet and shelves. It is now a teen boys room... a place for all the lads to hang out.
I have spent the past few weekends working in the garden. The drought last year plus the wear and tear of foot traffic across the strip of grass between the driveway and the front walk have left it needing some major landscaping. I've started digging it out and working my way out with new pathways and flower beds. I'll have some low retaining walls to build as I get closer to the street. I'm not quite halfway finished but I can already see an improvement in the appearance. It is and will be taking up a lot of my time to get finished but once it is complete and established it will be lower maintenance than before. Unfortunately with all the time I have been spending on it the housework has suffered and I am really falling behind and the house is in dire need of a major spring cleaning. I also plan to start remodeling the master bedroom soon, a project that will most likely stretch over several months.
Today though we took a break from the yard and the house, I took Fantu, Abate and two of his friends to the Mall in Waco. The boys all split and went out on their own Fantu and I went shopping for a dress for her 8th grade Formal Dance that is at the end of April. This was the second shopping trip we have been on looking for a dress. Today we were successful, adorable dress, shoes and necklace all purchased. I think she has probably tried on close to two dozen dresses over the past month. Luckily it only took one store and 4 pairs of shoes, then one other store and two different necklaces before the perfect combos were purchased. Sorry but no pictures yet as she doesn't want her friends to see before the big night.
My Mom is not doing well. She has had several falls lately, and while she luckily has suffered a serious injury it leaves her bruised, in pain, and not feeling well. I have also noticed lately she is getting very forgetful and gets easily confused. She can't seem to keep the days of the week straight, has trouble operating the TV remote, and thinks she is out of her medication when she still has plenty of pills in the bottle. I know that she really cannot live independently at home any longer and decisions need to be made concerning her care.
Tonight I set aside a bit of time for myself, to watch one of my favorite shows on BBC, to relax, and to finally after several weeks absence to blog. I ignore the mess in the kitchen, I know that piles of laundry await my attention tomorrow. The dogs need baths, winter clothes need to be put away.
It's always just busyness.

The Bubbles Always Burst

Sometimes I feel like my life is enclosed inside a bubble. I am so busy with just the things so close to me it is hard to take in the things that happen outside of it. Work, family, the kids school schedules, health concerns, and running the house, seem to take up not just my time, but my thoughts. I don’t get to watch the news like I used to. Now it’s just quick clips as I pass a home page while signing on to my email, social concerns come by way of friends sharing them on Facebook. I am starting to feel isolated, which feels strange in this world of connectivity.
I have friends I have never met in person, yet we share our lives and interests on Facebook. I have a smart phone that keeps me connected 24/7, even if I may not want to be. Just how difficult is it to turn off? Am I concerned I may miss something? Well that’s a yes and no. Yes I worry when Alan is out on the road. If something were to happen… well I’d rather not think about that. Sometimes Abate will text during the night (even though he is in his room opposite the wall) just to remind me of something that needs doing first thing when I awake. I know too that there are those calls you don’t want to get, the news that you don’t want to hear but must. My cell phone is my only phone, no landlines in our house. I also have the problem turning off my phone as it’s a multistep process that sometimes just doesn’t want to cooperate. Honest, I am not kidding, my phone is a pain to turn off. No simple on/off switch for this smart phone – it’s too smart to want to be disconnected from the world.
Living in this bubble, this sometimes feeling of isolation lends a surreal existence to my life. I see the things going on outside, but yet they don’t touch me, at times they barely affect me on an emotional level. Yesterday while driving to work there was a car headed in the opposite lane coming towards me it drifted off the road, overcorrected and went into a mad spin, zig-zagging on and off the road into the grass, back onto the pavement numerous times. I drove right past, that car and it’s driver spinning right by me. I never braked, just barely slowed down. I didn’t have any kind of emotional response. I thought maybe I should stop, to see if the driver was ok as his car came to rest in the grass. But by then I was well up the road and other cars were drawing closer. It was only moments later when I realized what a close call that had been. He could’ve just as easily spun into my path, I was driving 70mph, what would’ve happened… what if? But there was no “what if”, I was still traveling to work. My morning would continue as before.
Have I become so disconnected because of the demands of my own life? Am I not able to feel empathy towards those outside my bubble. I know it’s there inside me still. I have dreams that someday I will have the time and money to do things to give back to others. I want to volunteer in Ethiopia at the orphanage where Abate and Fantu lived I want to volunteer in my community – to work at the library for a few hours each week. If I had the money I’d love to help start programs to help the youth in our towns. But for now I’m enclosed in my bubble, I am busy, I have a family, a job and a life I chose. Someday my bubble will burst, but this will be a good thing, one I will look forward too.

One of "those" parents

I really try hard not to be “one of those parents” at the soccer game. We all know one of those parents that tries to coach the team from the bleachers (President Obama admitted to this), or the really obnoxious ones that criticize every mistake (no matter how slight) in a booming voice for the world to hear ( yes I know one of these and it's all I can do not to give him a piece of my mind). Then there are the ones like me that hate the referees. I was never bad before soccer season started. I always understood that these guys can't see everything that goes on on the field. That was before several of the games that I have attended this season. Penalties in the box that should have had a penalty kick awarded to the Hornets, ref's ignoring pushing, offsides, and trash talk. Gatesville has lost 3 games because of bad referees. Tonight's game, one of the refs was from the opposing teams town. A small one school town much like G'ville. Lampasas has to be one of the worst teams I've ever seen at trying to get away with handballs. I counted five, three were in the penalty box ( penalty kick) they of course were not called. Abate even saw the ref look straight at one and ignore it. Oh the ref did call two of the handballs – both in mid-field... woo hooooo. It is getting to the point where I have to remind myself it is not proper (nor entirely legal) to wait around after the match for the ref to leave and meet him out in the carpark and give him a piece of my mind (hopefully it would stop there). So for now I limit myself to screaming at the ref from the stands on just how blind he is, where's his glasses, or to clean his glasses if he's already wearing them. I think what I should do is see if I can gather up a bunch of business cards from local Optometrists offices and them on hand to throw at them. After tonights game I left peacefully. Yes I was upset, yes I was giving dirty looks directed towards the refs, but I had a son to cheer up after a 3-2 loss. After arriving home he asks me if I could see the on target kick he had that the goalkeeper caught. Yes I saw the kick. Could I see that it actually went in bounced off the net just inside the crossbar before it was caught (no I couldn't tell that – but I knew it was close). It should have been called a goal. But of course the ref didn't see it.
So on a brighter side yesterday was the first track meet of the season. Abate's first High School meet. His coach wanted him to run the with the JV team for this meet. Abate easily won the 3200m, I didn't get to see this race as it ran before I could get there. I did get to see him run the 1600m. He stayed in second place for the first 3 2/3 laps, I could see he was taking it easy, he hadn't even broken a sweat. He was playing with the leader staying right on his heals. He bided his time until he came out of the final turn, then he picked up his pace. It was as if the other runner just stopped, Abate passed him then just left him in the dust. Abate won by 15-20 yards. A short time later just minutes before the 4x400 was to start Abate was informed he would be running in it too, one of the runners was injured. He would run one lap and pass the baton. He's never done this. They placed 3rd. 3 medals - 1 day. He was a happy kid. I was a happy, proud Mom. Oh and at the track meets, I am that parent that yells for her son everytime he runs past. The one cheering wildly as he approaches the finish line, the one smiling proudly and perhaps a bit smugly with the joy that Abate won and the other kids didn't.