On the Same Note

Yesterday after a visit with my best friend, Pam (that is in visiting from California) had left with her tiny 11lb, 2 month old son, Tucker; I started thinking about all the things swirling and clogging up the plumbing in my brain.

Mostly, it came down to this.

Life is gaining momentum as I get older.

Remember when we were kids....and even though in our little 8, 9 or 10 year old minds summer "FLEW BY" it didn't. You'd wake every day to play in the hot sun..and the next day seemed a million years away.

Well my kids are growing up...and although Casey is getting more independent and her first 2 years have indeed "FLOWN BY" for Jeff and I; it's Kyle I notice more.

He'll be gone in just a few short years, off to some college lucky enough to have him, making new friends and starting his "adult" life. The time when he'll start longing for these crazy summers of playing ball, squeezing in the beach and sleepovers with little responsibilities. I think he'll look back and realize that the sacrifices he made like giving up camping trips or vacations because of baseball were the right thing to do. He loves baseball, his teams mean everything to him and he's dedicated that way. Sometimes I wonder if he'll regret not having a summer with less commitments. The kind of summer that most adults look back fondly on.

It isn't that I want to go BACK and relive my life.

I want to start LIVING that kind of life now. Even for the short 30 minutes squeezed in between switching the laundry and starting dinner.

So yesterday, I gave it up.

I decided Thursday nights are now "Sandwich Night" at our house. I wasn't going to make any dinner. I didn't take anything from the freezer, I didn't put anything in the crock pot. Instead I put Casey down for a nap, took a shower, packed Kyle's uniform for his game and surprised him by picking him up from school.

From there I took him out for an after school snack. We ended up at an A &W restaurant. He had cheese fries and a float. We started talking...Casey was singing, we were all laughing. The kind of after school excursion I wished MY Mom could/would have ever surprised me with and maybe she did...but if she did...it wasn't frequent enough for me to have any memory of it.

Kyle and I talked about how he's been having trouble batting lately and he feels as though his old bat was too light...Did I stop to think..."Where in the heck do I have money for a new bat?" NOPE

Instead we headed across the street to MC Sports. 40 minutes later he had a new bat. Then we headed to the game. His team lost 8-6 but ya know what...Kyle had 2 huge hits and scored 3 runs. He came off that field beaming from ear to ear..even with the loss.

He said..."I'm glad we bought the bat. Can I have HOOTERS for dinner?"

A short discussion about how money doesn't grow on trees, etc. ensued but we compromised on hot wings from the local "hotdog/burger/gyro" joint that were much cheaper.

Again, I threw my normal over planning, control freak habit out the window.

Jeff and I had sandwiches and Kyle had hot wings.

Does any of this make sense? (Now that I've written a novel?)

What I'm trying to say is....I don't make the hour drive to have lunch with my sister. I don't call up and ask my Dad if I can stop by, I don't take time to just leave the house and window shop at the mall on any given Saturday.

How many of us do these things?

• "We'll start hosting game night when we paint the living room/re carpet the hallway/upgrade the bathroom."
• "We'll take that family vacation after we pay off that one credit card."
• "We'll visit the grandparents when the kids stop teething and sleep through the night."
• "We'll start date night after the busy season at work is over."

Etc..etc...etc...

Host game night...enjoy your friends. Buy a cheap area rug and trust me as long as you have a WORKING bathroom, your REAL friends aren't going to care what it looks like.

You don't have to go to away for 14 days. Find a couple hundred bucks, do a little research and take a short weekend camping trip. Find a neat little hotel near a water park. Whatever it is...find ways to make it fun for your kids.

Grandparents are so important to a child's identity. They are Grandparents because obviously they've had kids at some point. they are going to understand if you have a cranky fussy toddler. I promise. Enjoy them while they are still around.

Date NIGHT sounds like something you'd "initiate" and start doing on a regular basis..and ya know what sometimes financial and work obligations don't allow for that. Find a night...put the kids to bed, get takeout and sit in a room as far from the children as possible, light some candles, no tv, no answering the phone, no shop talk...just BE together.

Sometimes we seem to start just going through the motions..and not living life. I think on some level we just think of all of our responsibilities and we get overwhelmed at them and we forget what an enjoyable ride this can be.

For me, yesterday I realized that I don't want any regrets and the only way to be sure I don't have any is to start living...even the little moments.