The Clock is Ticking...

Caleb is in Manila this week for the varsity basketball tournament that concludes this season. Scott and I were able to join him in the fall for the final volleyball tournament in Hong Kong, but couldn't make it work to be a part of this basketball tournament. So for days now we've been texting other parents who are in Manila with the team, trying to get as much of a play-by-play report as we can. It's amounted to just a couple of texts a game, really. Not enough.

Scott, who isn't in Shanghai this week but rather on a business trip in Hong Kong, has emailed Caleb a few times as well. He forwarded one of those email exchanges to me last night with his thoughts about this week with Caleb playing b-ball in Manila, thousands of miles away from us, included. Scott said that he's seeing flashes of little league baseball and junior basketball going through his mind. Back then, we felt like there were hundreds of games ahead of Caleb, more than we could count, really. I remember those days vividly, loving watching our boy from my chair on the sidelines but sometimes feeling that we'd been to SO MANY of these very amateur sporting contests, and wasn't it time to go home?

Well, now the season is over. Caleb has one season of his high school career left to play basketball. One season. Sure, he'll probably play intramural ball in college, and maybe join a men's league's later, but it won't be with the fanfare and crowd support of high school varsity ball. As his parents, we won't likely be there watching. So now the number of games that started in the hundreds have dwindled down to one season. How many games is that? Twenty? Maybe a few more, with tournaments. But it's a finite number, one we can clearly see the end of.

There's the rub. We can see the end. Ten years ago or so when this all started, we had games and seasons stretching ahead of us, and now we don't. We have one season left with this guy.

Can someone stop the clock, please?

A Moment

Scott and I were having one of those days with the kids where we felt like we were managing things badly and no one was getting along... more like a zoo than a family. Then we had this sweet little moment happen. Ahh, there is hope! :-)

Blink

It's Friday night in northeast Ohio. Varsity basketball in the high school gym. Cheering, foot stomping, clapping, yelling with the crowd. Seems like the whole school is here- teachers, parents, students. Middle schoolers huddled together on the bleachers and elementary children running back and forth from the concession stand. Watching my boyfriend driving down the court for a break away lay up.

Blink.

It's Friday night in Shanghai. Varsity basketball in the high school gym. Cheering, foot stomping, clapping, yelling with the crowd. Seems like the whole school is here. It's my son driving down the court. My boyfriend is my husband now and we're in the crowd on the bleachers, cheering for the varsity team.

Twenty five years later- can it be? Here I am, back in the high school gym on a Friday night, watching a guy I love play basketball.

Sky Scrapers and Home School's End

Yesterday at out home school co-op, the kids completed a unit taught by my dear friend Lisa (pictured here with all the co-op kids) on skyscrapers. They were each assigned a Shanghai tower to research and then draw, at a scale of 20 feet to 1 centimeter. Yesterday they presented to each other what they had learned, and then all posed for this picture with their drawings. If you've been to Shanghai or seen any photos, you might even recognize a couple of these structures! Madelyn's tower is the King Tower, located just a block from where we live here in Jinqiao.

Madelyn and I are coming down to the last few weeks of home schooling, so taking this photo of our co-op friends yesterday was bittersweet. She will be starting at Concordia for the last quarter of this school year, beginning April 6th. It's been an interesting road with her, to know what is the right fit for her education, and God has been so gracious to give us these last couple years together at home, just the two of us. She is incredibly excited to start school, but apprehensive at the same time. "Do you think my teacher will like me?" has been asked on several ocassions. Scott's answer has been, "Of course she will like you! How could she not? But maybe not quite as much as your current teacher does." :-)

Boy, do I ever. I'm going to miss this girl like crazy. I am so thankful for God's clear direction for us, for the timing and situations for our children's learning. I'm also excited to begin a new stage in my own life. A year ago the thought of not home schooling, which has been my life for nearly the past eleven years, would have been really sad and overwhelming. But now I feel like I'm ready to do new things. I'm not sure what they will be, but I look forward to exploring the options.

Flying A Little Farther From the Nest

I dropped Caleb and Seth off at the airport today. They were flying alone to San Diego, to visit friends from our first year in Shanghai. Although they've done a fair amount of traveling, it's always been with us. And although they've been away from us on school trips, and just recently been at camp for a couple of weeks, and even taken taxis around Shanghai by themselves, they've never flown alone, without any adult supervision. They had a layover on the way to San Diego, where they'd have to find the next gate on time to make the flight.

So this felt different. But we'd gone over all the details. The boys felt confident. I felt confident. They had a cell phone. They had their boarding passes already printed out. They weren't checking any luggage. They were being met at the airport in San Diego by our friends. And they were together. Everything would be just fine.

When we got to the airport, I pulled up to the curb. They were going to go in alone, without me. So we got their backpacks with skateboards strapped onto the back out of the trunk, then I took a quick picture and gave them each a hug and got back in the car. I didn't look back. I felt good.

Why was it then, that as soon as I pulled away from the curb and breathed a prayer for them, I suddenly burst into tears? I cried hard for about 20 seconds. I imagined them walking into the airport together. I imagined them as blond preschoolers. I prayed some more.

Then I got onto the freeway and headed home. Another step in letting them grow up accomplished for now.

P.S. They called me after the first leg of their trip, when they got to the gate in Las Vegas for their connecting flight to San Diego with 40 minutes to spare. And my friend called me a few hours later to say that her husband and sons had picked up the boys from the airport, and she was busy making them a "Welcome" cake. :-)

Fate of a House with Boys

Why does it seem that food is flying out of my kitchen these days? Can't seem to keep the refrigerator stocked...

Slow Learner

I have been a mom for more than fourteen years. Why is it that I am so slow to learn the lesson of Time Alone?

I was talking with a friend the other day who told me that she had gone to a movie and out for a sandwich by herself after exhausting herself giving a big birthday party for one of her children. I was amazed... I don't think to do this kind of thing, and I told her so. She said, "What do you do for yourself?"

Hmmm.

I am in my tenth year of homeschooling. Only one child this year, which is a fairly light load, especially compared to other years when I had four kids at home all day. Or compared to other moms I know who work full time and then come home to parent and take care of all their home tasks. Or compared to single parents I know who are responsible for everything.

Why should I complain?

I'm not complaining. I know I have it good. But I do think that sometimes I forget to take time for myself. I have one child, if not two or three or four, with me pretty much every hour of the day. Yes, there is that scant time between when I've left the last one's bedroom at night (it's 10:10 pm right now and he's still floating around the house) and when I go to bed, but it's not the same as Time Alone.

By dinner time tonight I had had about enough. Little One has been home from school this week with an unexplainable fever and general unpleasantness, which added to my need for escape. When Scott walked in the door at 7, I said hello and walked out.

It doesn't matter what I did, although it involved a honey orange latte from Starbucks and a walk in the cool,dark evening with my iPod, among other things, but as I neared home at the end of my several hours away, I realized how wise my friend is.

Thanks, Maribel, for reminding me of what I should have learned by now. Home and family look so much more appealing when you are coming back to them after Time Alone to recharge.

That's Final

Yes, even here in our rental house in China, I have started marking the kids' growth on the wall in one of the doorways. I had a spot in our storage closet in our apartment last year. Caleb is growing really fast these days and is wanting to be measured more often than seems necessary. Of course since he passed me last summer, he's a little calmer about it all. However, Scott is still ahead of him. The other day we did some marking of heights on the wall, and Seth began to see that he is gaining on me. He decided I should have a mark on the wall. Once it was penciled in, he labeled it. Not with the date, you will notice in the darkish photo above, but with the word FOREVER. Ha, ha. Then I marked Scott's height, also with FOREVER. Scott pointed out to all of us that actually, he and I will probably begin to shrink at some point.

Not if I keep taking my calcium. :-)

At the Basketball Game with the Other Woman

I got there a little late, but stayed for the entire game.

She came in the third quarter, and left before the game was over.

I watched the game with rapt attention.

She watched intermittently, messaging a friend on her laptop while she watched.

Why did he spring into action, playing ten times more energetically, when she arrived?


Pondering how this female, not a decade and a half old, who offered my son only slight attention to my full attention, can have this amazing affect on him.

Update to "Dilemma"

They used 64 rolls, he says.

I did not buy any toilet paper. They managed that themselves.

I may take a little bike ride tomorrow morning to check it out.

Dilemma

One of my sons wants to t.p. a house tomorrow night with some friends. You know, throw rolls of toilet paper up into trees so that it unrolls all through the branches, creating a lovely party-like atmosphere in the yard that is quite difficult to clean up, especially if it should happen to rain.

Hmmm.

I know that this type is prank is all in good fun. It is common in the US. It is relatively harmless. Scott did this with his friends when we were in high school.

Here's the thing... my son (who at this point I shall keep anonymous, if you haven't already guessed which one I am talking about) has told me he wants to do this, that he has plans with his friends to do this deed to a certain girl's house tomorrow, and would I please buy the toilet paper for them? He promises he will give me the money, and I know he is good for it.

Hmmm.

Somehow this makes me feel like an accomplice. I feel like if I buy the toilet paper, I am somehow condoning and even encouraging this activity.

Does it matter if I am an accomplice? Is toilet papering a house just harmless fun? My boy isn't trying to hide it from me, I'll give him that.

Any opinions?

Passage of Time and Place

The other night I was thinking of other places we've lived, and I started feeling nostalgic for the locations of the past. I even got tearful, thinking of what I had then that I don't have now. Never a good idea, to start down that road.

I was thinking of the amazingly thick, lush lawn we had in Medina. The greenest lawn on the block, because Scott always watered. I thought of times when we played in the back yard on that green lawn, little boys in diapers running through the sprinkler, while I picked tomatoes and beans from the garden and Scott mowed the lawn. I could almost smell those summer evenings... and I felt cheated that I don't have that setting anymore.

I thought also of fall afternoons in the woods, when the kids would have stayed until dark if it were up to them, so intent on their little adventures with sticks and other forest stuff. I remember lying on my back in the yellow leaves, looking up at the autumn sky. I thought of baby Madelyn, sitting contentedly in the leaves, crunching them in her fists. As I remembered, I felt sad that I don't have any woods to go hang out in for the afternoon, in Shanghai.

Do you see where this train of thought took me? Definitely to discontent.

The next day, as I relived my sad thoughts from the night before, I had a revelation. The times and places I was missing were nothing more than double page spreads in my photo album. They were little moments in time when my kids were little, and real everyday life wasn't nearly as idyllic as my daydreams of the previous day recollected. They looked so good in the photos... and they were good. But they had their own frustrations, I'm sure of it. All I remember now are what's captured between the pages of my album... and that's not what reality was. Those photos show it all in the best light... preschoolers tattling isn't pictured, nor is the frustration of having to mow the lawn at the end of a long day, nor the child whining all the way home from the woods.

I'm in a different place now, literally. My kids are older. I've written here before about the "hang out in the woods with mom" thing... that time is fleeting, and even gone for several of my brood. We're doing new things in a new place.

In some ways, I'd give anything to go back to my green backyard in Medina, or my perennial garden beside the garage in Aurora. But they wouldn't be the same places anymore, even if I did. Life has moved on.

Good thing I've got those photos... moments in time captured on a double page spread. At least I can pull the albums off the shelf and remember. The times and the places, in the most positive light.

And then move on to reality, today.

Preschool

I just got a call this morning that a space has opened up in a Mandarin immersion preschool that I had put Gwen on the waiting list for late last spring. There is a parent and child orientation this Friday morning, and school starts Monday.

Whoa.

None of my other children have attended preschool. I love preschool, in fact I directed and taught a church preschool program for the year before Caleb was born. I still have my lesson plan book from that year, tucked safely away in my files. But I didn't send Caleb, or Seth, or Madelyn. We were busy at home, learning together, and that seemed good.

Then there is Gwen. She is a full four years plus younger than Madelyn, which has made homeschooling Madelyn a challenge. I know so many people successfully homeschool a myriad of ages of children at the same time, while also keeping several toddlers busy. But I struggled with this last year. The girls had lots of fun together when we weren't schooling, but when we were, I felt like I didn't do a good job of being a kind and happy mommy and providing a good learning environment. I was frustrated often.

So I considered preschool for Gwen for this year. Madelyn and I need to buckle down and work hard on some things together this year, and I thought that maybe Gwen would do well in a different environment with lots of activities to keep her busy self engaged. Add in the immersion Mandarin... well, it may be frustrating at first, but what an opportunity for her.

But now that she's in, I'm second guessing myself. It is a lot of hours away from home. I've never done this with a preschooler before. Will it be too much for her? Will she and Madelyn miss their time together? Am I doing what's easy over what is best? I didn't expect this call so soon. I thought I had more time to consider it and prepare us all mentally.

Lord, calm my anxious heart.

Youth's Opinion

Comment from a certain son in church~

"This slow music hurts my ears."

Animal Anatomy

"Mom, can I ride your piggy back?"

Why does the childish wording of this innocent request cause me to bristle just a little? I don't really have a piggish back, do I?

Pulled

Bedtime.

One is on the couch with a fever, needing Tylenol and comfort.

One is needing a little extra prodding and discipline to actually remain in quietly in bed rather than calling for Mommy fifteen times with various requests.

One is seeming a little unsettled, needing extra snuggles and reassurance and back rubbing.

One wants to me to come sit with him to watch one more of his recently filmed skate videos.


You can probably peg each of my children from these descriptions of their bedtime needs tonight. How about yourself? Can you identify with the continual process of dying to your own needs in order to meet the needs of others? All I wanted to do was look at my pictures from our weekend at the beach... it took such a long time tonight to get to the point where I could. I know the day is coming where I'll be mourning the empty nest.

Or will I be basking in it?!

Park Days

Hanging out at a park on a beautiful day... climbing on rocks, spotting tiny turtles sunning themselves, fishing for leaves in the pond with a stick, playing frisbee in the grass, walking under towering coniferous trees on a carpet of pine needles, marveling over the colors of azeleas and the scent of wisteria, clambering up the slide and then sliding down again on your belly, swinging really high, relaxing under a tree with a good book to read aloud, picnicking in the shade, hunting for jack-in-the-pulpits and tiny striped spring beauties growing among dry oak leaves in the spring, and walking through the golden forest of yellow maples in the fall.

All these things combine to make what is for me a perfect way to spend an afternoon with my children. I have loved this sort of outing with them pretty much above all others. The problem is, spending the afternoon with Mom at the park is no longer top of the list for some of my crew. Those days that at one time seemed as endless as the sands of the sea and as numerous as the stars... well, the clock is ticking on them.

And really, I don't want to drag them kicking and screaming. Not that they would really kick and scream, you understand. But I want them to want to just hang out at the park all afternoon, like we did in the old days, when a little fish net and a bucket at a creek with minnows and crayfish was all we needed to keep two little boys happy.

Yesterday I requested that the boys give me the day. They had both Thursday and Friday off school this week for conferences, and they had spent Wednesday night sleeping over at their friends' house, and then spent all of Thursday with a group of friends. So it wasn't an unreasonable request, for them to come to check out a new park with the girls and I on Friday for a few hours. Just us, no extra kids. Sometimes I want to just be with my own children... not too much to ask, I don't think.

It was an amazingly beautiful day. We found the park. It was in the middle of the city, an oasis in the concrete jungle. It was small, but packed full of places to explore. I fell in love with it immediately. It had all the necessary elements... the pond, the rocks, the trees, the sunshine, the benches in the shade, pine needles, wisteria, a small playground, paths through tall trees, even a little turtle sunning himself on a rock in the middle of the pond. We had a lunch, books, a Frisbee... we had it all.

And the boys rose to the occasion. They were underwhelmed by the park at first, but then they saw the possibilities in the rocks around the pond. They could jump from rock to rock. Rocks that were far apart. Rocks that were dangerously far apart. Suddenly the park was a sort of okay place to be, even if there weren't any friends with us. We all climbed around the rocks for a while, ending up at the far end of the pond. Caleb asked for a drink, which I produced from my backpack. Then I suggested that maybe we eat our lunch right here on these rocks. "You brought lunch?" he asked, surprised. "Of course I did," I answered.

Don't you remember, little boy? Mom brings lunch when we go play at parks. Remember that little park with your favorite creek, way back when we lived in Ohio? Remember how we'd lunch on graham crackers and peanut butter at that park? Just something quick to eat before you had to hurry back to the water and find that elusive crawdad who hung out under the rocks.

So we ate lunch on the big rocks by the pond, and somehow during lunch one of Gwen's shoes fell in the water. It was so much fun to fish it out that it ended up in the water several more times, and then both the shoes were in and being rescued. Caleb and Seth played catch with her shoes across the pond... whoops, one is in the water again! Who will fish it out this time?


After the lunch and the shoes in the water, we walked through the trees on a raised wooden walkway, watched one of the ever-present card games found in Chinese parks, played Frisbee a little, slid down the slide, climbed on the rocks a little more, took a few pictures, smelled the wisteria, bought some Gatorade. The boys shot around a little on the basketball court, and then we were ready to go. I would have settled down under a tree with a book to read aloud, but it had been enough. I didn't want to press my luck, and anyway, it was a bit of a drive to get home and we had places to be later in the day.

I remember a time when I was in my early teens when my mom took us all to a park for lunch, one day in the summer. I remember that going to that park that day was not high on my list. We were all a little too old to really enjoy the playground equipment, but I know there was a picture taken of my sister and I at the top of the slide. I think we walked on the path in the woods there a little that day after our lunch. Even though I didn't really want to be there, I could sense that my mom really wanted it to be a fun day for us all. Now I know why. That park was just down the street from the house we had moved away from the summer I was four years old. So it was a place my mom probably remembered with fondness, a place she took her toddlers to. Back in the time when the park days were for her as endless as the sands of the sea and as numerous as the stars.

I get it now, Mom. I hope I wasn't sullen and bored that day. I hope I rose to the occasion. I hope I gave you that day.

I thanked Caleb yesterday, for coming to the park and having fun. I told him how important it was to me. Someday I think he will understand why.

Why

Gwen is definitely in the questioning stage. I have a very hard time answering all her "Why?" queries. Frankly, they exhaust me. I usually try to answer the first few of a series, but as the "whys" continue, I tend to start just answering "I don't know".

This morning she was on a "Why?" rampage. I answered a few, and then I said, "I don't know all the whys." She was right back at me with this question, "But what are you going to do with all the whys?"

I don't know what to do with them. I am hoping that some of them will come clear on their own.

Discovery

The threat of a monetary fine has amazing effectiveness in helping boys remember to pick up clothes and towels from their bedroom floor.

Progress

So just now Seth left. Just got on the elevator outside our door, to go get on the school bus alone (Caleb is on his trip) to head to school where he will get on another bus to travel to another part of China (Nanbeihu) for three days. As I hugged him good-bye and the elevator door closed, I marveled at what he is doing... and how I am handling it. I've met his teacher several times and really like him. I attended the parent meeting about the trip several weeks ago, and a friend of ours was a chaperone for the sixth grade trip last week, which was to the same place, so I heard about it from him. But basically, I have sent Seth away with people I hardly know, to a place I've never been, in a foreign country where we happen to live, to do things that will challenge both his body and mind.

Having homeschooled the boys for the years that we did, control is a big thing for me. I realized it more as the years went by, that part of the reason I wanted to homeschool was not only for the extra time with them and the individualized academic options, but also so that I would have more control over what they learned, who influenced them, what they heard, who they played with. I remember one time perhaps four years ago pondering sending Caleb to school and almost physically shuddering at the thought of losing that much control over his days. I really had it bad, didn't I?! But at that same time, as I thought about the school option, I prayed that God would show me very clearly when the time was right for him to go to school. I felt that day like God challenged me with the question..."Don't you think I can take care of him? I love him so much more than even you do." Ahhhh. At the time it was a wonderful revelation for me, but the time wasn't right yet for traditional school. I tucked the thought away and saved it.

And so now we fast forward to today. Caleb is a several hour flight away, in southern China, and the elevator doors have just closed on Seth who is heading off to his own adventure. And me, well, I feel pretty good about the whole thing. I'd say that's progress. But I'll still be praying.