Back to School and Balmy Days

It’s a beautiful day out there today. We’ve finally broken our heat and humidity streak and the weather is positively beautiful.

It made it incredibly hard to be inside at work today. It’s going to be even harder tomorrow since it not only is supposed to be equally as gorgeous but also, it’s Friday and it’s never easy to concentrate on Fridays anyway.

Still, I’ll give it my best shot. Of course, I’m already a little preoccupied with preparing for the Great Garage Sale of 2011 but I’m making progress. Except for those random strolls through the house- both mental and physical- where I try to find other items to sell, everything is priced and ready to go. It took a while but I think I’m ready. There’s a lot of things to do tomorrow night to be ready for setup on Saturday but I think that I’ll just make a list.

Of course, there is a chance of rain on Saturday. I’m dearly hoping it holds off until the afternoon. I’m selling and awful lot of items that wouldn’t really do well in the rain.

However, I’m very much keeping my fingers crossed that this lovely weather continues. I think sitting outside in 84 degree weather with a light breeze will be rather nice. Given that a week ago we were up near 100 degrees with stifling humidity, things could be much worse.

These are typically the Dog Days of Summer. It’s unusual for us to have the hot weather in July and cooler weather in August. I can’t remember the amount of back-to-school first days where we’d dress in our new clothes which were really designed for more autumnal weather and we’d be hot and sticky as soon as we stepped outside.

It’s strange that it’s already that time of year. The stores are all full of school supplies and the aisles full of sulky kids who clearly don’t find joy in having to buy new pens, notebooks and the like because it means their freedom is over.

I remember this time of year too. I always liked school but was never terribly fond of the social aspect of school. I was one of the kids who cared what people thought so I’d worry about trivial stuff like where my locker would be, would I get it open, what if I dressed wrong on the first day and what if I didn’t have any of my friends in my classes. Now I look back, it really does seem a little silly because the things seem so minor. Yet they weren’t minor to me back then. They’d be the kind of silly things that I’d think about and not be able to sleep or, worse, I’d wake up in the night and start thinking about them and couldn’t get back to sleep.

It’s amazing how our perspective changes with experience. Not getting my locker open or wearing the wrong shirt used to matter to me because I wanted to fit in. I used to pretend I wanted to be a rebel but, deep down, like so many other kids, I just wanted to be accepted. Looking back, I now know that it was a pretty common fear and probably at least half the kids I wanted to be accepted by probably felt the same way I did.
Yet I didn’t know that back then. I was stuck in the awkwardness of my teenage years, trying to find self-confidence and self-esteem and trying to hold onto them. As I’ve grown older, I do still struggle with these things but never the way I did back then. It’s just not as important as it used to be. What is important now wasn’t even on my radar back then: having a job to pay the bills, being able to provide for myself and the dogs, being able to find time to see my family regularly and just generally finding contentment in the small things.

I do still remember the days of having to go back to school though. They’re not quite distant enough to be foggy and blurred in my mind. Thus, I do still have sympathy for all those students I see having to go back-to-school shopping. For the mob of kids in my neighbourhood who ride their bikes and run around until it starts to get dark, their reign of freedom is drawing to an end. It won’t be long until they’re no longer running around shirtless or in swimsuits up and down the street, yelling and, instead, they’re dressed and waiting for the school bus in the morning, sluggish and miserable and dreaming faintly of the carefree summer that’s just slipped out of their fingers.

I do remember those days and the cloud of commitment that rises up at the beginning of August and stays there until somewhere at the end of September when school has become a familiar routine, it vanishes and the summer is but a distant memory.

Of course, even though I do remember those days, the adult in me has to admit, I quite prefer it when the kids are back in school. There are far less near-misses as one of the kids zooms out into the road on his/her bike without looking even though I’m watching for them anyway. It also means far less yelling and screaming outside my house and kids running across my lawn to take a shortcut. Yes, I know…I’m getting old.

But at least I don’t have to go back to school. I can just enjoy the sales on school supplies and use them for fun purposes at home.

Being an adult definitely has its advantages.

Happy Friday and have a great weekend!

Monday Musings

Weekends go by way too quickly. Somehow, I left my office on Friday and passed through a time warp because here I am again on Monday morning, feeling as though I didn't have a weekend even though I did and it was good.

Still, I shouldn't complain too much. This morning, on the way out of my neighbourhood, I saw a line of sleepy, grumpy looking kids waiting for the school bus. I might not be happy about coming to work after a nice weekend but at least I'm not coming back after three months away like those kids. I always hated the first weeks back. For some reason, I thought that because we were back in school, summer was over. However, the nasty, sticky, humidity of August/September betrayed my beliefs. School, to me, was supposed to be beginning of Autumn and I'd wait for the leaves to start changing, a crispness to slowly emerge in the night air. It never happened that way and at the end of the school day, we'd emerge from the chilly over-airconditioned building and be hit with that wall of stickiness that told me that it really was still summer.

I don't know how those kids that I saw this morning feeling but I can tell you that I didn't see any of them doing a dance of joy or for that matter, even looking slightly happy. They looked weary, tired, apprehensive and just plain annoyed.

Me, I was just sleepy this morning as I left for work. My weekend was great but it was tiring. I went to a Herb Festival in Wabash, Indiana this weekend. I love things like that. When I moved back to the Midwest, I promised myself that I'd try to do more things like that, local activities that salute the charm of the area.

The Herb Festival was a lot of fun. Having just planted my herb garden and being a big fan of herbs in general, it seemed like a perfect time to go. I went with my mother and we had a lovely time walking around, exploring all the booths, talking each other into making purchases and just enjoying the fact that it was a beautiful, not too hot day. I left with a new pot of sage, a little 'pesto garden' and some assorted spices for cooking.

After that, I got to do a more nervewracking thing...show my mother my house for the first time since I moved in. She came to stay with me on Saturday and I was a little nervous. I'm a firm believer that no matter how old we get, we're still going to feel like we need our parent's approval in everything we do, even subconsciously. So, I was a little nervous to show her my furnished and decorated abode.

Fortunately, she seemed to like it. I like it too. Those frustrating cranberry walls actually look pretty good with my furniture and the paintings I've hung. My grass was fairly recently mowed so the back yard looked pretty decent. Of course, my mother being an avid and talented gardener, zeroed in on my lovely weed collection but she did grant me forbearance because I have, after all, just moved in and do have other things to do.

My sister, niece and brother-in-law came down on Sunday to see my new house and visit Jungle Jim's. My niece is three. She is just the greatest little kid and I enjoy getting to spend time with her. She has a lot of energy though and by the time she left, I had to admire my sister and brother-in-law for being able to deal with her every day. She has a very good imagination and at the moment, she's carrying an imaginary...creature...in the palm of her hand called "Baby Wendy." Unfortunately, as she's the only one who can see Baby Wendy, it leads to all sorts of problems. Her mother apparently isn't very nice to Baby Wendy because she accidentally shut her in the pantry the other night. I believe she's also stepped on Baby Wendy a few times.

Baby Wendy aside, it's fun to spend time with my family like that. It was so nice to be able to show them my new house and go to Jungle Jim's with them. When they left, my house was quiet and slightly lonely.

Now the weekend is over, it's time to look ahead to the week. It's actually a short week for me; my plans to go to Las Vegas finally came together and I'll be flying out Thursday night. It should be a fun trip, if a little brief. Then again, while I enjoy the glitz and tackiness of Vegas, two days is probably enough. I haven't checked the weather yet but given that Vegas is in the middle of the desert, this time of year, it's pretty much an inferno of heat only differentiated by the reading on the thermometer. Once it gets that hot, the thermometer reading doesn't really matter- it's more a question of whether it's tolerable to be outside or if you should plan your down the strip by winding your way through the casinos, venturing outside only to cross to the next casino.

Thus, it's going to be a busy week. It seems to be that life is busier lately for me than it's been for a while. When I get back from this trip, I'm putting a moratorium on traveling for a while. I need to get more settled in my house, I need to take charge of being a homeowner instead of coasting off the novelty of being able to dabble around with a little of this and a little of that. I need to figure out what I want to do to the house, to the garden. I need to finish unpacking.

However, for now, the week lies ahead, the berth between now and the next weekend the widest it will be all week. On the plus side, at least I'm not going back to school like those kids I passed this morning. It might be a Monday but for us non-school goers, it's just another Monday. For those kids, it's as though the reins of freedom have been taken away and a clamp of obligation clamped on their leg instead. They're probably already counting down to Labour Day, their first long weekend.

Then again, I'm also counting down to Labour Day. So maybe there's not quite so much difference after all.

Happy Monday.

Back to School is More Fun When You Don't Actually Have to Go to School....

This week seems to have gone quite fast- at least for me. I have a feeling it probably it went fast for a lot of people, especially the generations younger than me.

It's that time of year again: Back to School time. I remember the days well, a heavy weight in my stomach as I realized that not only was the blissful freedom of long, lazy summer days over but it also meant starting over. It got a little easier towards the end of high school but before that, it would always be a stressful time. I was a nerdy student, one who actually cared about school so I would worry about what classes I'd have to take and who my teachers were. I'd worry about who was going to be in my classes. It would inevitably result in a phone call or two to my friends and we'd pore over our schedules, checking to see which classes we shared.

The one thing I did enjoy was the back-to-school shopping. The clothes part was ok though I never strived to be very trendy- it was pointless. Even to this day, I consider myself to avoid fashion. I like to think of myself as a timeless dresser, wearing the basics that never go out of style but making sure the height of my waistband and the heels of my shoes are not out-of-date. That's as far as I go to make sure I'm fashionable and that's only because I don't want to be the woman 'stuck in the '80's'. I find that to be a rather shocking time, especially as the fashions are making a comeback. Compared to the low waistband of jeans today, the fashions in my youth made us look like ninety year-old grandmothers with our trousers up to the middle of the chests. I did used to wear trends when I was much younger: Yes, I owned legwarmers, stirrup pants and long blouses with a belt around the middle. I've seen those fashions in the pages of Glamour and Entertainment Weekly again recently and I'm a little scared. Didn't we warn the youth of today how NOT to dress? I mean, just look back at the feathered hair, stiff with hairspray, baggy tops with skinny leggings and ankle boots with our leggings. Wasn't that enough to STOP the trends from coming back?

I don't mind being a child of the 1980's, actually. I think "Fame" was probably better the first time than it's going to be in remake and the same with "Footloose" and "Nightmare on Elm Street". I mean, there's just something delightful in watching Kevin Bacon dance his little heart out in an abandoned warehouse and say things like "Jump Back" that's just not going to be captured in the remake. We were a lot more innocent back then, I think.

I digress. I was talking about back-to-school shopping so I probably should get back to that.

The part I did like was when we moved to the U.S. and we had to get 'school supplies.' In the UK, we had most of our stuff given to us; as children it was a special day when we were allowed to write in ink rather than with our pencils. When our pen died, we'd have to go to our teacher and ask for a new one. We'd try all manner of things to get a new pen, chewing off the caps, making the tips wet so they didn't work and losing them. Most of the time we got a new one. We had glue and coloured pencils provided to the class so we shared them as a community. If we needed paint, it was there. When we got older and went to 'senior school', we had to bring our own pens and pencils but we were still given notebooks to write in and textbooks from the storage closet. We didn't use much glue then though in art class, we still had our paint provided to us.

So, when we moved here and my younger siblings had 'school supply lists', we were mystified. What was this "Trapper Keeper" thing? Why did they need two-pocket folders? Why were spiral notebooks not allowed? What, exactly, was a spiral notebook? Our notebooks in England had been paperback journals with floppy covers and a place to print our names, class number and year. Why did they have to buy two kinds of glue?

After a couple of years, it became entirely natural for us to go to K-Mart and buy the stuff we needed. The older we were, the less complicated the supplies that were necessary. In high school, we just had to have notebooks for each class and writing implements. Anything else was our choice.

I admit, I liked buying school supplies. I love the feel of a new pencil, a pen that has not yet written anything. I loved to buy my two-pocket folders for each class with a matching notebook, colour-coordinated so I could pair them together easily as I grabbed them from my locker between classes. I would love the feel of that new bag or backpack, crisp and unfamiliar with its pockets and hiding places.

To this day, I feel a rush of happiness when I go to Office Depot or Staples. I love that 'new pencil' smell. Ironically, even though as a child I was very excited when I got to write in pen, I prefer pencils. I love to sharpen them and I love their flexibility. Pencils allow you to be indecisive, they allow you to change your mind with a simple sweep of the eraser. Erasable pens are just not the same.

Nowadays, the "Back to School" period in shops is fun, I don't have the gloom that I see in the kids who know that they're having to go back to structure, to getting up early to get on the bus. I get the low prices without the inconvenience of having to go to school.

Of course, most of the time, I do only visit the 'back to school' sections at strange hours. Late at night or early morning is best. Otherwise, the once-peaceful aisles become zoos with irate parent's snapping at their kids for wanting the folders with the Twilight actors on them that cost $1.49 each instead of the plain folders that are currently six for a dollar. The back-to-schoolers turn nice orderly stores into chaos, leaving nothing but a trail of rubble in their wake. These are the times when you find the strangest things in the strangest places when people change their minds and refuse to reshelve. I accidentally went to Walmart a couple of years back during the prime 'back to school' time. To this day, I have never done it again. It was terrifying; almost worse than the day after Thanksgiving. There was no quiet place in the store and I got hit and cajoled by more shopping carts than I can even count. As a non-parent with no kids in tow, I felt as though I was commiting a crime by trying to reach for the 10 cent spiral notebooks.

I do like those bargains though which is why I still visit Walmart and Target during this time of year. Mostly I do it on Sunday mornings when they first open or late in the evenings when the tired parents have trundled home after a hard day of back-to-school shopping. One of my favourite television commercials is the one for, I think, Staples where the Christmas Song, "The Most Wonderful Time of the Year" plays and the father dances with glee down the aisles, his children watching with misery and gloom. Now I have friends who are parents, I get the other side of back-to-school. While the kids are losing their freedom, the parents are gaining a little of theirs back. It's a different perspective nowadays for me.

But it's a fun one.

Happy Friday and have a good weekend.