This way, that way

There are many things you do as a parent in the hopes of fun and creativity that come back to bite you in the rear when you least expect it.

Last Monday, a bunch of ice led to delayed federal government and daycare openings. And since Chad's sports car doesn't do anything on ice but slide around, we all carpooled to work together. Jackson's daycare didn't open until 11 and I had to be at the office for a meeting at 10:30. So Chad, wearing his creative parenting hat, decided to kill the half-hour in between by driving around the city and letting Jackson choose the direction in which they went. They had a jolly old time, and he thought it was hilarious.

Fast-forward to Tuesday. I picked Jackson up from school and he was ready to tell me how to get home. (Keep in mind he does know most of how to get places, and if you ever divert from that due to traffic or whatever else he'll start opining from the back seat: "Wrong way! Wrong way!")

In typical toddler fashion, Jackson wanted to take me on a joy ride when all I really wanted to do was get home from work. I swear he'd been planning this all day. And when I didn't oblige...here came the exasperation. The drama. The t-e-a-r-s! For the entire 45-minute drive home (because traffic is always particularly bad on the evenings your child decides to have a meltdown), Jackson was pointing and yelling, "Other way! Other waaay! I want other way!!!" ... except for the very rare occurrence when we were going to turn in the direction he was expecting.

I do love my child, but I could not get him to bed fast enough that night.

Fast forward to later that week, when I went out to lunch with a potential business partner. She mentioned that she had an 18-year-old son, and in the next breath talked about an upcoming vacation. I asked if she was bringing her son with her to the Caribbean. "No," she says. "He lives with his father. I don't see him. Sometimes he sends me a text."

I squinted my eyes and wrinkled my nose, which is what I always do when I'm trying to figure out if people are joking. She wasn't. I went on to hear about how there comes a time when your kids just don't want to spend time with you and that it comes faster than you think. Then I start thinking about how I could never in a million years imagine what I'd do if this happened to me. I might very well turn into a stalker.

After that uplifting conversation I counted the minutes until I went straight to daycare, and said a little "thank-you-and-I'm-sorry" prayer to the Man Upstairs when, at the sight of me, Jackson literally dropped everything he was doing and started jumping up and down with his daily exclamation of, "That's MY mama!" I was the highlight of his day, and he was mine.

I gave him an extra-long hug. And let him stay up late, too.

Stomp, stomp, stomp

I'm just not even going to apologize for the delay in these posts. And I'm not going to try to catch up on the last five months of happenings because there was WAY too much and that's the reason for the delay in the first place. So let's just pretend that didn't happen, ok? Ok.

Last weekend we took a very much needed trip to the Shenandoah and brought along a birthday gift Jackson got from his Uncle Evan: a stomp rocket. Now this is a gift that I never would have thought to buy anyone, but this just goes to show that only boys know boys. As you can tell, Jackson had a blast.

 

It's raining...

We've been getting some nice rain out here, which is a welcome relief to the parched yards and dying flowers. (Parched yards and dying flowers are no strangers to our family in the Midwest, either.) Last Sunday we got a really nice rainstorm right after Jackson got up from his nap - which is the reason for the lack of pants. But he sure was excited to watch it rain! And he sure wanted one of us to take him out to play in it.

Before and after

When we moved into our new house last fall, there were a number of things we loved. But there were lots of things that we didn't.

First there was the retaining wall that was falling over on itself.

And the dilapidated shed.

And the bricks falling off the front steps.

And - ugh - the seafoam green shutters. I don't like seafoam green.

And, and, and...But we're making progress.

Here's the house we bought. We liked it, but it wasn't perfect. Nothing is. (Note there are no photos of the backyard.)

This winter, we replaced the retaining wall. And put in a new fence.

New wall, old fence. And really old shed. Oh, and a weird little garden next to it that wouldn't grow things.

Chad took this down in a matter of hours. (Note new fence.)

Then Nick built us a shed (covered with a tarp).

We roofed it. And painted it. We still need to organize it.

Our front steps were another story.

They were patchy and holey, and my high heels loved to get stuck in them. We're lucky we never fell down these with Jackson.

So we got our steps fixed.

And then we spruced up the shutters, the door and all the trim. I spent a long, long time at the paint store. This just makes me happy.

You may think I'm done, and we are - for now. But wait til I get started with the landscaping.

Lessons from the old guys on the field

More than ten years ago when Chad started his DC softball career, he was on the very best teams around. Over a dozen 20-year-old guys. Young. Nimble. In peak physical condition. Took the game seriously.

But they could never get to the championship because of all the old dudes. Old people ruin everything.

I remember back then, when I used to play in the occasional co-ed Saturday game, getting so frustrated when we'd consistently lose to the same group of old folks. They were sloppy. Out of shape. They showed up five minutes before game time and it was clear their bag hadn't been opened since the previous week's game ended. It wasn't out of the question for one of them to pull a hamstring, or need to sit down because they got too hot. They were a disaster! But they were unbeatable.

It's funny how things come full circle. Last night Chad's very-old team (by DC standards) won the Arlington men's softball championship with a two-run homer in extra innings.(That's Chad in the red hat - not wearing his knee braces, I see.)

Much like all those "old" teams in the past, they shouldn't have won. They've got 15 years on some of those players. Half of them have families. Most of them don't go to the gym every day. And all of their lives are consumed by something other than Tuesday night softball.

But they've been playing together a long, long time. They know the quirks of their own team and how to work around them. They know in advance how to compensate for the guy who tends to throw too short over to first base, and how to cajole their pitcher to lift his spirits if he's having a rough game. And they see the opportunities: how to place a hit right in the middle of a hole in the outfield, or when to stretch a double into a triple because that right fielder hasn't proven to be accurate and they don't think he would be again.

Maybe this season's champions weren't the most athletic. But you can be sure they were the smartest. So they eked out a win over those 20-somethings, proof that maybe there is something to be said for this aging thing.

Funny what age, and softball, and the importance of really knowing your team can teach us sometimes.

Dance, Dance, Dance

There are some days my spirited child just exhausts the hell out of me. There are many other days that this energy and enthusiasm gives me a boost that I need to bring a smile to my face when I get frustrated or makes me push the gas pedal a little harder when I'm heading to daycare in the afternoons.

When we were back in Illinois over July 4, Jackson demonstrated his love for the King by busting a move every time my mom would turn on her Elvis tunes. (Further proof that this child is a Shragal through and through - that side of the family has had Elvis jokes going back 25 years.)

And ever since then, Jackson will walk up to a radio or an iPhone, proclaim "DANCE!" and put his hands into fists then wait for the music. Sometimes when there is no music, he'll just sway side to side singing, "Dance, Dance, Dance..." in the hopes that he can carry himself through with the thoughts in his head.

Let me preface, I have no idea where these moves come from - the spinning, the gestures, the rhythm...no idea. But, oh man, this little dude makes me laugh. As one of my good friends said, "Save that one for the wedding video."

Choose Life

I know I haven't blogged for almost two months despite promises to the contrary. But sometimes life happens and you find yourself faced with things you'd really rather not deal with, with people who would rather not talk about them. So even though my mind has been overflowing with things I need to write about, I haven't really said a word.

I am lucky enough to have all four of my grandparents still living. Lucky seems like a meager word choice given that I'm 33 years old and they're all at or nearing 90, but suffice it to say I realize I am blessed beyond measure to have both incredible, wonderful memories of my grandparents growing up and the thrill of having them all in my life today. Jackson actually has seven of eight great-grandparents still living, and Chad and I were hardly spring chickens when he arrived, so that's notable.

I have a hard time imagining my life without my grandparents. And I think it's because, no matter what was happening that was important to me, they were always there. Every school play, choir concert, graduation, wedding, Christmas...seriously, they haven't missed one.

No question about it, this situation is rare. I knew this as early as junior high, when many of my friends started attending their grandparents' funerals. And even as a teenager, I often thought to myself, "I wonder if this is the last Christmas/New Year's/fall/fill-in-the-blank I would be able to spend with all my grandparents."

Two decades later, I'm still thinking about those things. What can I say? I'm a planner.

As several of my grandparents went through health issues - colon cancer and heart stints and gallbladder surgery and broken bones and a whole host of other things I don't remember that I probably couldn't legally disclose anyway - one grandparent of mine seemed completely immune: Grandpa Howard.

It's no wonder he's a picture of health. This is the guy who eats cucumbers for dessert. His weight hasn't vacillated five pounds in the 30 years I can remember knowing him. I've never seen him roll out of a buffet, pants unbuttoned, proclaiming in his most boisterous voice, "Now THAT was a good meal!" Grandpa Howard doesn't overdo...well, anything. If you look up "level-headed" in the dictionary, I swear you'll find his picture.

Rumor has it that last year, when Grandpa was diagnosed with bladder cancer, one of his nurses at the Mayo Clinic asked him what medicines he takes on a regular basis. "None," he replied. Ok, she said, trying to kindly jog his memory. How about prescriptions for high blood pressure, cholesterol, diabetes? Nothing. I'm not sure if he's ever even taken Advil.

So there was no question he'd bounce back from bladder cancer. Call it a momentary setback, maybe. A little discomfort, probably. But he'd be good as new in no time. It didn't even faze me. Because Grandpa Howard doesn't get sick.

But a routine check-up earlier this summer found something weird going on in his lungs. They tested again. And again. More appointments. More tests. More consultations. His bladder cancer, which we all thought was gone for good, had spread to his lungs.

Grandpa Howard couldn't be sick. Yet, he is. Very sick. Doctors said the mass in his lungs gave him a life expectancy of 6 months, maybe 12. Chemo might extend this to 18-24 months, but the prognosis just is not good. The cancer is very aggressive.

If faced with this dilemma, I would have weighed the options, given it careful thought, and likely said "sayonara" to life while spending my kids' inheritance on an around-the-world cruise. And no one would have blamed me, just as we wouldn't have blamed him for making peace with this diagnosis and using his final days to reflect on a joy-filled life.

But Grandpa Howard is taking a different path. At the age of 89, despite assurances of countless rotten side effects and no real promises, he's decided to fight this. He starts chemo next week. Maybe that gives him another Christmas, or another harvest, or another birth of a great-grandchild (hope he's not counting on me for that one right now because that ain't happening). Or maybe he just doesn't feel like his days here are done. I don't know, and I haven't asked.

Regardless of the reason behind it, I can't help but feel like there's something so admirable in choosing life when it's hardly the easy option. Even if the chemo proves too much and he needs to stop treatment, which we would all support and understand, he took a stand. He chose life. And that tells me that - clearly - our family patriarch, after decades of nobleness and dignity and a legacy that will live long after any of us are around, still has something to teach us.