to sit out in the sun, and listen

If it exists, the America I love may be on the ball field and in the choir room.

And if there are answers in poetry, Hoagland's "The Word" suggests we find the time to do both, that among our duties, pleasure is a thing that needs accomplishing.

don't blink

The ground is wet, finally, and the air smells of marigolds. It is officially fall but the zinnias have not given up their shades of sunset. The boys are underslept and overschooled and it is not even October. There is so much to do, and such a fine line between being better - at being a student or being a parent - and being happy.

Out front the boys inspect each other's eyeballs, comparing colors and laughing at their own reflections. Out back they refill bowls with taco soup and talk about the books they're reading, about the genetic incompatibility of hares to breed with rabbits. Andy seems to have had strong ink in the printer, eye pigment and appetite and interest in biology all around.

There are so many household particulars to sort, college visits and halloween costumes, computer repairs and pants that fit for homecoming. Things go from feeling logistically impossible to emotionally brutal to financially chaotic, until I find myself studying the irises of my boys. Are they amber or hazel or that color the poets call bistre? My usual inclination is to iron out all the details, but I'm wondering more about resting in the complexity some too.

enough

I am mostly dealing with a frayed nervous system by reading poetry and taking walks, closing tabs and opening windows. Except this morning there are two hawks hunting in the side yard and the level of chipmunk distress is more than I can bear.

Turns out our bodies are not wired to swallow the whole planet's screams.

Aside from a voodoo doll costume project and lots of time at the harp, Hank has been primarily occupied with a spontaneous and mysterious shrine to slime, like the saline and the shaving cream have lit a fire inside him. The constant production, tupperware full of mostly sea foam shades, leave a literal trail of unfinished business out back.

It's a fraught MO, soothing anxiety by clinging to something I think I can control. But cleaning the sticky patio table feels far easier than standing in the breach against those who preach the gospel of blood and power.

People say reading novels builds empathy, and science backs this up. Studies show that when we immerse ourselves in fictional worlds, we become more prosocial in the real world — more likely to help, share, and be kind. 

One of my recent favorites was Growing Home. Isn't every good children's book a work of philosophy in disguise?

Last night the boys were up past bedtime, working on pentatonic scales. It's hard to enforce the clock when the activity tethers them to something ancient, to each other, when it serves as a counterbalance to the day, to the country. Could their music be communion from a different alter?

I read a parenting advice column recently that offered alternatives to How was your day?

For example, Is there anything you've been holding onto that you kind of want to say out loud?

I kind of wish someone would ask me this question.

I am mostly just guessing at how to grow children. Borrow books and buy sheet music. Apologize for the horrors of the world and talk about love. Point at the moon and the men who speak in complete sentences with civility. Serve lemonade and listening ears and cinnamon toast.

There's a world of worry out there. Here at home three boys sleep soundly under a sea of quilts and tented novels, and for today that might be enough.

shade and sunshine

There's a Longfellow poem with a line that says 

Life is checkered shade and sunshine

and I can't stop thinking about that truth...

what a weekend

The long weekend began with Friday night Bobcat football and led into a Buckeye game, after which we squeezed in time with friends along the Ohio River before ending things at Buckeye Lake, driving home late Monday night with a homemade root beer float.

After tailgate Saturday we headed south to a little riverfront plot where kindness congregates. RiverFam gathers regularly in Grandview but there's something special about being away, on the water. Grownups moved effortlessly between kid duties and meal prep, from heavy conversation to silly jokes, pausing more than once to note how happy we were to be together. In addition to boat rides and the annual talent show, we harvested paw paws and Hank had his first water ski lesson!

Time in the car meant more Ted Lasso and after a few episodes Hank asked what "wanker" meant. Tuck explained in mere seconds, with a fairly accurate (fairly graphic) hand gesture. No one batted an eye. We've been trying, for years, to make the whole puberty ride feel ordinary and transparent, and this gave me faith in at least some moderate success.

The boys all genuinely enjoy words, fascinated by the sorcery of a well-chosen one. Of course there is nuance and etiquette, cursing as both a small way to try on power but also impolite or offensive to some. Our house doesn't sound like a convention of dumpster-mouthed sailors, but the boys are free to say what they think and feel. 

Speaking of uncensored, Hank is reading the Hunger Game series and plans to watch the movies. I don't read aloud often, so miss that chance to talk about vocabulary. Instead of reading picture books or singing lullabies, I find myself mostly buying more tortilla chips and bleaching white socks. But what I had not anticipated was how much my children would fill the house with words and music - a boy on the third or fourth round of saying the exact same thing only louder, trying on foul language or singing in the shower, the regularity of tunes picked out on the guitar. There are also times when all I get is a three syllable response equivalent to the shrug emoji. I'm here for it, offering the gift of listening, an always audience.

This weekend also brought doubly good audition news for Tucker, cast in the GHHS fall play, Radium Girls, and selected for OMEA's All State Choir. We are proud and thrilled and aiming to say so carefully, without putting an enormous premium on his potential. He loves being on stage, and we love seeing him there. And that's enough.

After a lovely, full weekend we are basking in the deep luck that makes us feel like it's all divine. And looking, always, to spend more time with friends or with Ted Lasso, for an opportunity to hang with family or hit the next RBF *

(root beer float)