Enjoying Summer

Now that the first full month of my summer vacation is almost over, I really feel like I am "into" it! (Especially since the sun decided to come out for two whole days in a row! Very strange to have had such cloudy and cold weather for so long!) We did our traditional weekend in Chula Vista and had a great time. It was really relaxing! The kids are getting easier every year and Andy and I are loving the time spent with them.

The kids went to Broadoaks Science Academy for the first two weeks of summer while I was still working. It was really cool to be on the same campus, but I am even firmer in my belief that it is good for us to be at different schools. Gavin took tennis lessons (and even walked across the college campus by himself to come to academy! Wow! What a big kid!) and the kids had swim lessons at a new pool this year. They learned a lot and had fun (except for the first week that was super cold). We did the summer reading program, went to the Farmer's Market, saw a free movie, went bowling, had the a/c fan replaced, did some home repairs, attended a birthday party, went to a baseball game, hung out with the Arizona Huffakers, swam in the pool, went to the Santa Ana Discovery Center and played at Jumpin' Jammin'. Whew!

I also worked with each kid to do a full room clean out! Each one took two days and from each bedroom we got two bags of trash and one big bag for our next yard sale. Whew! Clean and organized! Not the most fun you can have ... but needed nonetheless! I have also cleaned out several closets and the vacuum cleaner.. gross.

Last weekend Ella performed in her first real dance recital! She was in "Little Miss Muffet" and did a GREAT job. She has proclaimed that she wants to dance forever and Gavin is insisting on signing up for the hip hop class that the studio offers!

This week the kids have been back at Science Academy for dissection week and have looked at brains, hearts, lungs and eyeballs! Strange that Gavin's class is also doing Cooking Academy this week... kind of gross, really! They are also working on acts for the Talent Show! I am home alone and have found time to shop and relax and clean and SCRAPBOOK! I was hoping to "catch up" on Ella's book, but I am still terribly behind. I have had a nice time, but it is getting a bit lonely.
Not to worry, I will not be lonely tomorrow and Saturday when I have a class! Yup... back to school! Just for two days though! I am going to a "Step Up To Writing" class that the rest of my teaching team will also be attending. It will be fun, but feels a bit intrusive during my time of relaxation!

This weekend we will head out for our vacation! Andy is finally going to be done with work for the summer and we are headed north! Pismo, Monterey, Santa Cruz.... and then way down south to San Diego! Can't wait, but should probably get back to the laundry so that we all have clean clothes to wear!

Is your life turning out the way you thought it would?

Hmmmmm..... Someone posed that question to me about a month ago and it caused me to pause and think. Has it? Will it? Did I ever think about what might life would or could be like?

I think, that when we are children, we don't think about this much. We wake up and see what the day has in store for us. At the end of the day, we can decide whether it was a good day, or a bad day. Then, we go to sleep and start all over again. At what age, do we start to "plan" for tomorrow? When do we go from living in the moment to planning every second?

Did you ever dream about your life? Did you think about having kids? Did you envision your wedding? When did it start? Do you think about your future now? Do you plan for it? Do you spend most of your day looking back, instead of looking forward?

I know that I hoped that I would have kids someday. That is about as far as I ever got in making a plan! I know that when I hear people say, "I always imagined my husband/wedding day/wedding dress..." I think to myself, "I never did that!" I never imagined my wedding day! I never pictured myself in a white dress! I thought about getting married and hoped that I would meet someone to spend my life with, but I certainly never spent hours fantasizing about it! That was good, and bad when it came down to planning! I had no vision or expectation to meet, but... I had no vision or expectation to meet. Do you see the problem? It left all possibilities open to me, but I really had to start from scratch and the ladies at the dress shop (and the cake shop and the reception facility) could not believe that I had NO IDEA what I wanted! I don't remember ever playing dress up as a child (except on Halloween and then I was usually an animal - or a cocktail olive as my turtle costume was mistaken for.) I don't know if this was because of a lack of interest, or a lack of available dress up clothes. Either way, I didn't do it. My wedding was beautiful and incredible and I could not have imagined it any better! Was this because I had no vision? Maybe.

This kind of open minded attitude works well for some situations (like weddings and finding mates) but not always. In trying to decide on a career path I have found that not having a plan or a vision has been really tough. I don't think that I thought about "what I want to be when I grow up" unless the issue was forced by a school teacher. I do remember having to write a "career" report in Jr. High. I chose: "cartoonist", "bus driver" and "teacher". (don't ask about the bus driver.. it had more to do with available interviewees and a funny sketch of a witch driving a buss than a true desire) As a child, I always thought that I would be a teacher. I didn't plan for it but I just thought that I would be.

Sometimes I wonder if I just thought that I would be at school forever. Maybe I didn't think that I would teach, but just that I would never have to leave school....never have to choose, never have to grow up? Was this really a vision, or was it just the childish way of thinking that leads us from one day to the next? Was this healthy? Was it helpful? Is it now? I wish that I had developed some kind of plan for my life...but then again....

My life has been one heck of an adventure! I have had jobs working with kids, in a library, stocking shelves, selling and painting hand painted clothing, doing inventory, teaching archery, coordinating weddings, bookkeeping, data entry, planning events at a night club, being a research assistant for a professor, acting as a personal assistant, teaching, parking cars and introducing people to Mr. Lincoln! I don't think that ANY of that was planned! I went to Whittier College and met the most amazing people (one of whom I am now married to), I have traveled to Oregon, Washington, Arizona, Utah, N and S Dakota, Wyoming, Nevada, Idaho, Louisiana, Massachusetts, New York, Connecticut, Maine, D.C., India, England, Holland, Belgium, Mexico, the Cayman Islands, Jamaica and all over California. NONE of that had any more planning than a month (maybe a few more to go to India). I have lived in several apartments and houses and currently hold a mortgage on one. No advanced planning.... bought a motorhome, found a great job, became a godparent.. nope... no planning!

Those of you who know me well, might find this entertaining. I am a planner! I make long lists and elaborate plans. But, what I have come to realize is that these are all about the little things. I make plans for the weekend, I write out menus and shopping lists and to-do lists. I plan parties- the food, the layout, the gifts, the music, the decor. I choose my clothes for the next day (and sometimes the entire week) ahead of time. The little things. The big things I seem to be able to let happen. I have let my life unfold before me and what I see amazes me!

The one exception was my babies. They were planned. Very well planned. But, then again having babies (as I said earlier) was the only vision that I ever had! I see how difficult it was to have a vision! I was completely neurotic about conception, diet, documentation of all things pregnancy and baby related. I had to have the decor in the nursery "just so". Ask my mom! She shopped with me for bedding for Gavin's room. I must have gone to 5 different stores and looked at 100 different options before deciding on the one that was PERFECT. Same for Ella's, but I spent hours on line shopping. I kept amazing pregnancy journals and baby books for both kids and I agonized over their first birthday parties. Having a vision, was exhausting and frequently disappointing.

So then, I wonder... how do I guide my children? How do I give them enough structure to build a plan without leading them to construct their entire life before it even begins? How do I teach them to plan, a little bit? Do I encourage them to think of their future and question themselves about what they want, what they feel passionate about, and what their vision might look like? Or do I set them loose and let them wander and see where they end up? I hope that I can find a way to do a little of both.

The fact that I never really had a plan led me to an amazing place but it was not an easy place to get to. I took a great deal of wrong turns, drove down dirt roads, found dead ends, met obstacles and "hitch hiking ghosts", ran out of gas, got flat tires and became desperately lost without a map. I found my way. I wish that I had been given a map. At least with a map, you know what is possible. You know what choices you can make. You can see where you are going and where you might end up. You can decide where it is you are headed and see where you have been. You can look up a highway when there is construction on the back road that you've been traveling on.....or.... you can just crumple it up and drive whichever way your heart leads you.

I guess I will try to help my children create a map for their lives. In it we will detail the possible routes and roads to take them to their desired destinations. We will figure out how many miles each trip might be, how long it might take to get there and what they might need along the way. After we finish the map and they are happy with it... I will tell them, that it is o.k. to leave it in the glove box, sometimes.