Week 35 and Counting

“Happy Memorial Day!” This is how Mac wakes me this morning. I am beat, bushed, pooped, wiped out, exhausted and just plain old tired. We had a long weekend, beginning with a very bad mood on Saturday morning preceding Mac’s 6th birthday party. But let me go back to Friday night for the full effect.

I have purchased organic ice cream cones so as to make healthy ice cream cone cupcakes for Mac’s party. We are making an ice cream cone art project and my sister has the brilliant idea to make the ice cream cone cupcakes. So I go all out and get healthy stuff from Whole Foods. Not that any of the parents will be in attendance to even notice, but I am becoming that much of a food freak.

So here I am, late Friday night. Baking. I call one of my best friends to keep me company and we talk thru the evening. Meanwhile the banana cupcake batter I whipped up on Thursday afternoon is not quite enough to fill 24 cones. So I go the easy route and whip up a quick batch of a chocolate cake that I have an easy recipe for. Except I am missing a key ingredient (no, not the chocolate) and have to call down to my mom for assistance. I top each cone with chocolate and am excited that they will have a “banana split” flavor. But when I check the oven over and over I continue to find that they are not baking. Make that the banana layer is not baking. The chocolate layer on top is doing well. On most of the cones. But a few cones have begun to fall over and/or ooze out. I am at a loss as to why and am suddenly picturing myself on a Whole Foods run at the crack of dawn on Saturday morning. After an hour I pull out 18 of the 23 cones (the 24th cone was broken out of the box) and per my mom’s suggestion I nuke them, one or two at a time, for 30 seconds at a time. I am soon enveloped by the dual aromas of some weird meat (don’t ask where that one is from) and burned sugar (which has more obvious origins). I curse and swear and declare that I will never bake a birthday cake or cupcakes again! A declaration I am fairly certain my sister made last year at this time when she neglected to add the full amount of whole wheat flour to Mac’s cake and his cake fell. Prompting Mac to thank his Aunt Minny for not screwing up his cake at his birthday dinner this year! This is why it’s easier to be wealthy. If I had money like everyone else I would have just bought my cupcakes like everyone else. But nooooo. I have falling, oozing, burning cupcakes that have cost me so much time and effort I couldn’t pay myself enuf for the time!

Eventually I prop each cone into my rigged box of Dixie cups. I set about frosting them with the pink butter cream frosting I have made and colored with organic, all natural food coloring, which costs $17 for three tiny bottles. Then I swirl on chocolate frosting and top that with a dollop of white butter cream, which I top with organic sprinkles and a cherry that came in a jar but is not fluorescent. These are the most beautiful cupcakes in the world. Martha Stewart, eat your heart out! What I won’t find out until after the party on Saturday is that some of these masterpieces are so hard they could break a tooth. Thank you, Microwave!

Saturday morning I am irritable and cranky for no apparent reason except that I seem always to be talking to the walls. When we are ready to leave I have to swing by a nearby bank on a busy street to drop off a check to pay a bill that is due today. Nothing like leaving things til the absolute last minute. And of course, to my knowledge the bank closes at noon. And I can’t find the check or the bill. We look in the car and go back home. It’s raining and the kids are all decked out and carrying umbrellas. We look in the house again and I call the bank. The automated service won’t give me a live human so I slam down the phone and head back to the car. The check and bill are on the street under the car parked in front of us. Soaking wet. I retrieve it, thank the boys for helping me look, and drive off. We actually find parking a block from the bank. I stomp down the street in my preposterously high but very stylish sandals that feel like walking on stilts. The kids follow carefully and quickly. We enter the bank and are greeted by a pleasant looking young man who is optimistically cheerful. “This is due today,” I say, slapping the soggy envelope on the counter, “and your automated phone service sucks.” I am deadpan. I turn and we exit. But not before I see the greeter pick up the envelope between finger and thumb and hold it up to carry it off to be examined.

Walking back to the car I pick up Sailor. Just to have the hug.

We pick up my sister and head to Mac’s party. We have less than 40 minutes to get it all together. We are good to go when the 1st of 15 guests begin to arrive.

I will say this for the party: it only takes one bratty child to set the mood for 17 children to disobey and misbehave. It only takes one threat to call said bratty child’s mother to get all the kids to settle down, for awhile, anyway. It only matters whether or not the children have fun, not that that the parents do. My sister and I work our asses off for 2 ½ hours with my parents’ assistance. We are wiped out and pissed off by the end. And we are covered in paint because above mentioned bratty child does not pay attention to the instruction that state, “Paint only the canvas, not your friends!”

I invite the whole family out to dinner. Sailor cries in the car because I have allowed Mac to ride the bus home with Nana and GrandDad and also becuz he is very tired, having missed his nap. He protests our dinner plans. “Let’s cancel the restaurant,” he begs me. He is dressed in his t-shirt and a pair of sweats, having spilled milk on his cute dress-up party outfit. And, I might add a side note here that aside from my boys only TWO of the children, both girls, came actually dressed up for Mac’s party. The rest of the children appeared as if they were going to play at the playground, or maybe help their parents do some gardening. I find this appalling! It’s a birthday party. What happened to patent leather and frilly dresses and button down shirts?! But I digress…

“Where will everyone eat dinner if we cancel the restaurant?” I ask Sailor.
“Well, Mac can come home and eat with us. Nana and GradDad can eat at deir house and Aunt Minny can eat at her house.” And then he falls asleep. I drop off my sister so she can change into a paint-free outfit. I bring all the gifts, leftover food (we served milk, strawberries, melon, and pirate booty, as well as the tooth cracking cupcakes), and extra miscellaneous items into the house and then bring a sleeping Sailor in. I re-dress myself and the sleeping Sailor and pick him up and head out to dinner. I treat everyone with the gift certificate Mac won for the best Halloween costume back in October.

Sunday we do nothing. Literally. Well, I do clean out Mac’s closet and start Mac’s thank you notes and finally late in the afternoon I convince the boys to go out and play. Mac chooses roller skates and Sailor chooses his scooter, which after once around the block he trades for his bicycle. It’s nice out so I fill a glass with lemonade and add a shot of vodka and let the kids do some chalking ("drawking" Mac used to call it -- as in drawing with chalk) on the sidewalk outside until we are all starving and then we head inside for some dinner. My mom has donated three of her Seattle Sutton’s Healthy Eating meals for the cause. Sailor gets the “spegli” and meat sauce and Mac gets gnocci and asparagus. I have a pita filled with a huge leaf of lettuce and chick peas. I am still starving when dinner is done and I can see how with these itty bitty portions one would either lose weight or starve to death trying. We are all in bed early. And I channel search long enough to find something about a missing girl and freak myself out so bad I can’t go to sleep for having to check on the boys a couple hundred times.

“Happy Memorial Day!” Our plans to go sandal shopping are delayed because my sister, who we are supposed to pick up at 10:30, has turned a first date into a slumber party. So we wait, except my boys get antsy and they are tearing down the walls.

At Nordstrom, a fancy department store that has actual people to answer its phones, Mac buys a pair of Keen sandals he completely rejected last year and Sailor gets a pair of nice brown leather UMI sandals. This is why I am broke (well, aside from the less-than-$1000 worth of child support we have to live on each month): the shoes cost me $120. But it will be worth every last penny if I no longer have to listen to the cries of “my feet hurt” “I can’t walk anymore!” “I need to wear socks with my sandals.” And besides, I distinctly remember saying last summer that this summer I would not buy my children cheap sandals. I can’t find anything that is in my size that fits and doesn’t hurt my feet or look like they were meant for someone 3 times my age. At one point I ask, “Did you actually go into my grandma’s closet to find these?” And Mac is literally if not figuratively bouncing off the walls, climbing on the mirrors, not staying with me. I am so embarrassed. To say the least!

We spend the afternoon at a party in the suburbs. We sit in the sun and relax. There is watermelon and ice cream and corn on the cob. It’s a nice way to end a long weekend and a crazy long week.

I get the kids to bed after feeding them salmon and spinach. They will be strong and healthy boys!

In the middle of the night Mac comes to me. “I’m scared.” He said this last night too. Only this time I have watched a bit of the Super Nanny before sleep and I am determined if not half asleep. "Go back to your bed." He wines a bit and I roll over. I hear him crying in his room for a couple of minutes and I feel excruciatingly guilty and also tired. Six years worth of tired. Sailor comes in a bit later. He climbs on my feet. I can’t sleep with a child on my feet. I pick him up and place him on the floor. He cries. I recommend he either spend the night in the big comfy chair in the corner or go back to his bed. “I wan’be with you!” he wails. I re-state my recommendation. He lies down on the floor. Again I feel excruciatingly guilty. And also tired. It’s time my children start to sleep in their own beds. I pick up Sailor and bring him to his own bed. He remains asleep just long enough for me to think about it and then he wakes up crying. Not for me. For milk. Seriously. I know! He’ll be 4 in less than 4 months! The good mommy in my wants to go get him a sippy cup of milk and reassure him that I am always here for him. The single mommy who is finally just exhausted beyond reality wants to instill in her children that they are just fine in their own beds, for the whole night, until the sun comes up. And when the sun does come up Mac is snuggled beside me and Sailor is sleeping on my feet. I am the only mom I know whose children, ages 3 ½ and 6, still keep her up half the night!

When Mac was little my parents used to offer to take him so his father and I could have a quiet night and a sleep-in morning. They no longer offer but I am finally willing to accept. Is it too late to say yes?

Sailor has 2 days left of school. And yet, he cries again when I leave him with his teacher this morning. Maybe on Thursday he won’t cry. Or Friday, the day of the preschool “graduation” ceremony. Sailor will be returning in the fall and therefore not graduating this June. Nonetheless, all children are required to attend this most adorable, tear-jerker of a production in which four times the recommended number of people crowd into the little school house to watch teeny tiny children sing standard songs. It’s adorable beyond reason and I cried both years that Mac graduated.

While Sailor is at school today Mac and I share in a very important and MUCH anticipated right of passage. I make Mac is very first bowl of popcorn. When he was little I told him he had to be six to eat popcorn, due to the extreme possibility of small children choking on the buttery movie theatre snack. And now, after all these years (before which I simply could not imagine waiting this long) I allow him to have a bowl of popcorn. At 10:00 in the morning. Complete with a melted pat of butter and all the salt he wanted. My mouth is watering just thinking about it. He enjoys every last kernel and wants more (I don’t make more) and I am full to the point of wanting to puke. He is one happy little clam!

When we pick Sailor up he is wearing a pair of tan sweat pants, an undershirt and the shoes we left for him to wear on snowy days, which happen to be a gymshoe/sandals combo. “Sailor had an accident,” the second teacher whispers, handing me a plastic bag. I don’t even catch this the 1st time she says it and she has to repeat herself. She tells me how upset he was and that she told him never be afraid to get up and go potty. I am certainly not upset but very surprised because Sailor literally never has accidents. “I suppose I need to bring an extra set of clothes for Thursday?” I ask in jest. “It’s a good idea,” the teacher replies in all seriousness. Indeed.

She also hands me the class photo and Sailor’s individual photos. If I do say so myself, my little boy is stunningly gorgeous! The blue in his shirt has made the baby’s blue eyes just pop out of the photo. I try to remember what it was Sailor told me about the photo shoot two weeks ago (or was that seriously just last week?!) “We had to hide behind a tree,” he told me, “Den we had to blow his [the photographer’s] duck. Den we had to laugh.”

We walk home to change Sailor’s clothes. Which he is not happy with. But he looks like he should be watching sports on tv and drinking beer. He is so badly dressed he even earns a few funny looks from passersby on the walk home.

Mac has 12 days left of school. I counted. And then we are free to spend as much time at the beach as we want to. Which is what Mac wants to do today. It’s the perfect beach weather and if I weren’t so tired I would consider indulging his whim to go after school. But I am thinking Saturday might be a more appropriate choice.

In the playground after school one of the stay-home dads comments that Mac looks like he belongs on the lawn of a Jimmy Buffet concert. Having never attended one of Beffet’s concerts myself I admit to this and say he must be right. Mac is wearing a very big patchwork plaid button up shirt, with short sleeves that come below his elbows. He has on long blue shorts. And he is topped off by his signature hat. He does look as if he should be holding a stogey in one hand and a margarita in the other. Except he is doing anything but chilling.

I break up yet another scuffle on the playground, this time offering to escort the offending child inside for a visit to the principal. Once again my children are completely uninvolved. I am the every mother!

Sailor says he has two black eyes and we have to leave the school playground at 4:00. It’s still warm our. I want ice cream. We go home and the boys play while I fix some dinner and clean up a bit.

Their father comes for his weekly visit as we are finishing up dinner. Or I should say as Mac and I are finishing up dinner. Sailor has not touched the noodles and broccoli on his plate. Their dad was in the hospital last week and missed his visit (though he was here on Monday for Mac’s birthday). Tonight’s visit goes as usual. Though I am obliged to forego dinner plans with a friend because my ex feels unwell enough to stay home alone with the boys. He spends the majority of his 2 hours here talking with me and then we take the boys for ice cream. Mac gets a cone and I get a scoop and Sailor wants nothing. Except to go home and play. Which we do. I write. They play. But their dad is in pain and not the best playmate this evening. Yet when he leaves ½ an hour past the time I would normally have the boys in bed, Mac bursts into tears and I have to pry him from his father’s neck. I am perplexed. Last week he told my sister he didn’t want his dad to come to his birthday dinner because he didn’t like him much. And now this.

I carry him to bed and we chat. Seems one of the problems is that Daddy plays with the boys and Mommy generally does not. No, Mommy bathes, feeds, dresses, reads, drives, shops, pay bills, organizes, helps with homework, cleans up, yells, spanks, disciplines, gets no sleep, makes decisions…. Mommy. Daddy plays. Mommy does not play enough. And so Mac wants his dad to come visit more because he PLAYS WITH HIM! G-d help me if this is the most unfair thing to come across my path in a long time.

I make a promise to play with the kids more. “A lot!” Mac amends. Which will mean actual play, not working on the computer and allowing them to play. Or taking them to the beach and watching them play. Mac wants actual play. So I make a last ditch effort to save my sanity and offer up a deal: I will play more if I can get a bit more help around the house. So unfair, I know! But really, folks, how can I be expected to do all of the aforementioned tasks, and also deal with the bills and my own business, and still have time to PLAY! Dammit I don’t even like to PLAY with small children. I like to be with them. I like to do things with them – read, paint, walk. But, no, folks, I am sorry to have to admit that playing StarWars is very low on my "exciting things to do" list. I can’t compete with this. Mac asks if he can have more playdates with his friends. I name the French boy, one of the French girls and the Australian girl as children I am in the process of working out playtimes with for next week. And I make a mental note to be more… what? Fun? Someday I hope Mac and Sailor can understand what I have had to sacrifice to be a good single parent for them. I try so hard not to sacrifice the fun. But I have to be the disciplinarian and sometimes the two just do not go hand-in-hand. It’s so unfair. As unfair as having your dad never be home and then move out right after you turn four. I understand, Baby, really I do. And I will try to do better.

Wednesday morning I wake up alone. Well, almost. At least no one comes to sleep with me until the sun comes up. For the first time in forever. How did I accomplish this major feat, you ask? Simple. I asked the boys to stay in their beds all night. And they did! Perhaps it was a fluke. We’ll see tomorrow morning.

Sailor is giddy. Finds fun in slamming his bedroom door and holding Mac captive. I ask Mac to remind him why we don’t slam doors: “Because once you slammed my thumb and my nail turned black and fell off,” he tells Sailor. And then I ask him to get dressed in his soccer uniform – except I call it his soccer suit because I can never remember the word uniform – and meet me in the kitchen for breakfast. Thirty minutes later, when he is done tantrum-ing and whining about how he is too starving to wait [to get dressed first] and how he can’t put on his undies, he sits down to cold scrambled eggs and toast. Why is this necessary? Anybody?

Lauren is not at soccer today and Sailor has to play without support. And he does a great job. Because I bribe him. With the notion that we will go to Target and buy a toy if he plays without Mac or me. Ah, ya gotta love it: Here Honey, you play a game that you love and I will buy you a toy! Hey, listen, whatever works. And it works! Except the birthday gifts I try to return from Mac’s party are worth a whopping $2.50 each, leaving me with two gifts that I now must re-gift and no money to buy the kids the promised toys. I am not in a good mood scavenging the aisles of Target for the only StarWars toys we don’t have that don’t cost an arm or a leg. And then I convince Sailor to get a cute little soft bow and arrow from the beach toy aisle. Which Mac breaks 2 ½ minutes after we get home.

Not that he has time to be playing when we arrive home just 10 minutes before we have to leave for school. “What do you want for lunch? PBJ or quesadillas?” I ask Mac.
“Quesadillas because they are faster to make.” Not really, but ok. “Look, Mom, a case of ideas!”

I have already carried sleeping Sailor into the house from the car. I now carry sleeping Sailor from the house to the stroller. The parents at school think all he does is sleep.

When he wakes later in the afternoon he wants to play with me. So we play. We do some matching games and some puzzles. It’s fun, I admit it. Tho in the back of my mind are all the phone calls I need to be making and should have been making while he was asleep instead of walking to the park and reading for a few minutes. Oh, well. Life will go on around me, even if I stop to play with my little boy for an hour. Playing with Sailor reminds me of when Mac was little.

After school Mac reprimands me for not helping him with his homework last night and explains the consequences of not turning in your homework on time: "You don’t get a smiley face sticker. And this makes you sad."

I am both consoling and apologetic that I didn’t help him, but I also explain that he cannot tell me about homework at bed time and expect it to get done. I also start to explain that at the kindergarten level, being on time is not all that important, but then I stop myself. I realize that it is important as it sets the tone for the next 16 or more years he will be in school. It’s also important to rally on the side of his enthusiasm for homework!

“So what is your homework tonight?” I ask him. It is hours before bedtime and we should have plenty of time to get it done.
“I have to go outside and look at big trees very close up.”
“Why?”
“I don’t know. Maybe to see the details or the patterins [that’s how he says it] or something.”
“We can do that after dinner. We can look at the apple tree in the back ard,” I suggest, mentioning the tiny tree my mother planted recently.
“No, it has to be a big tree. Like that one.” He points to a tree that is a good solid hundred years old.
“Ok, I think we can do this on the way home.” But I forget.
I look for the assignment in his backpack when we are heading out for ice cream after dinner. It’s in his folder, which has withstood the test of time and is the same folder from the first day of school. It is battered, torn, covered with stickers and tape, stapled closed on the bottom, and folded in half. I wanted to see if it would last all year. It did! The homework inside the folder instructs the children to count to 100 and then to practice counting backward. The illustration is of a girl standing against a tree, covering her eyes, and the caption reads, “98, 99, 100! Ready or not, here I come!” I try not to laugh as I explain the real homework instructions to Mac.

Also in his backpack tonight is his yearbook. Yes, you read that right. Yearbook. From his public school.

Tomorrow is Sailor’s last official day of school. Tho he will go back on Friday for “graduation.” “Mommy, are we moving?” he asks me.
“No.”
“All the kids who are moving get a picture.”
“That’s their diploma. It means they are not coming back to your preschool.”

And despite it being his almost last day tomorrow he still whines and asks, “Why do I have to go to school overdays?!”

He paints three little canvasses to give to his teachers as gifts tomorrow and he paints a large canvas just for fun. “I want to paint like [Curious] George and I want to put my hands in the bath like he did." And so at 8:30 at night he is painting followed by a bath in green water.

Mac has weird baby toes and for 6 years he has cried when I clip them. I am sure they hurt, as I have to work hard to get at them. Tonight he asks me what the doctor told us to do last week. “Clip them after a bath or shower,” I remind him. “
But we always do and it doesn’t help,” he reminds me.
He is right. So tonight I tell him to hold his breath. He does. And he does not cry. We look at each other. We are incredulous. We try the other foot. Nothing. “I didn’t even hold my breath!” he exclaims. It’s a miracle!

Mac’s butt hurts. He is not the best post-poop wiper out there. So even after his shower he wants me to fix it. I look for something appropriate to soothe his little tush. “How about Vaseline?” he suggests. Now why didn’t I think of that? I pop the top off the jar that is exactly one week younger than Mac and still more than half full. “That’s my lipstick!” Mac calls from his bedroom. Indeed, the jar’s contents perform many duties.


Thursday, May 31, 2007. Sailor’s last day of preschool. How did THAT happen? Funny how the winter months drag on at an interminable pace but when the sunshine of spring breaks thru we wonder how it all went by so quickly. He is dressed in a cute pair of plaid shorts, which I realize too late are a bit too short, a navy blue polo and his new overpriced brown leather sandals. He is cute. Cuter than cute. We come to school bearing gifts. And a change of clothes to replace the ones he wore home on Tuesday. Except when we arrive Teacher J is handing out the change-of-clothing boxes to the parents. As in, no one has a change of clothes for today. I remind her that she asked us to bring a new change of clothes. She says she doesn’t know what she was thinking.

Sailor won’t deliver his gifts, which I have nestled in shred and bagged in cello bags and tied with bows and attached to very personal notes. During breakfast. While Mac eats and Sailor refuses yet another warm meal.

Sailor won’t let me take any photos (which turns out to be a good thing as I find out later I have no film in the camera). And when it is time for me to leave, there is a tear running down Sailor’s cheek as he sits on histeacher’s lap, straining to reach me. It’s over, Baby. After this it’s all over (until you’re 4!). I don’t want to leave. It seems like a normal day. But for the nostalgia and the impossible regularity of it.

Mac refuses to help me with the garbage, preferring to stay inside and read rather than hazard a chance meeting with Ratatouille. I can’t blame him.

At 10:00 I take my starving boy on our last date to our nearby sandwich shop. I have enjoyed our year of Thursday lunches with him. It’s been time well spent. Our fave cashier guy gives us free lemonade and chips and we pay for the rest of our food with our own gift cards. Now that’s the way I like to travel. Mac is wearing a brand new shirt today. A polo with light and lighter green stripes.
“You look so handsome,” I told him this morning.
“Thank you. Who got me this shirt?”
“I did,” I say and then immediately see the error of my ways. “I mean, Easter Bunny did, I think, yes, Easter Bunny. But I picked it up for him, because, remember we were talking about this the other day? How the Easter Bunny needs help because he is so little and he doesn’t have a sleigh like Santa so he can only deliver the eggs and the mommies have to do the shopping…”
I know, it’s a stretch, but hey, I was in a pinch! Two bites into lunch and the aforementioned handsome new shirt is now a grease-stained, unattractive, no-one-will-want-this-shirt-as-a-hand-me-down shirt. Mac has yet to master the art of using his napkin. I am rather irritated. But what do I do? How do I teach my boy to use a napkin rather than his shirt? And should he not know this already?

We are too early for lunch but they make it for us anyway. We sit in the comfy seats in the back. Mac has to sign his thank you notes. Just sign them, not even write them. This takes him an hour. Truly. We go to the playground. We meet a boy and his mom who know two separate families we are friends with, both of whom had children at Mac’s party last weekend. Funny. We bump into one of Mac’s classmates on the way out and are once again running late. I am so sick of running late for everything because then I am truly running to get places on time. And no, my butt has not gone back up where it belongs and no, my cellulite has not disappeared and no, my legs don’t look any better than they looked a year ago. Darn it!

At the playground Mac demonstrates that he can finally pump his own swing.

Picking up Sailor at school, on his last day, is anti-climactic. We were late for drop-off, as usual (in direct opposite of Mac’s 1st preschool year when we were chronically early and I quipped on the last day that one would think I should know by now that it only takes 2 minutes to drive to school, not the ten I allow!), and we are one of the last ones to arrive at pick-up, as usual. There is no fanfare. It is simply over. Well, the fanfare is tomorrow, I suppose, the big graduation ceremony.

Halfway to school Sailor asks for pizza, which I have. He eats half a piece and says, “I’m done.” He wants to get out of the stroller and walk. He runs down the block in his cute, happy legs way. He stops, slumps, and walks like a tired man. He stops, readjusts and walks like a scarecrow. And despite the fact that I have my video camera with me, I miss the Kodak moment completely. I push the stroller with my left hand across the three-street intersection and hold Sailor’s hand with my right. Then he wants to push. “But you can’t see over the handlebars,” I point out. I help him steer. My 3 ½-year-old is pushing my 6-year-old. This has to be his last year in the stroller, I realize. I mean, what 7-year-old still rides in a stroller? (I’ll tell you what 7-year-old, Mac a year from now! I tell ya! )

“You’re doing a great job!”
“Now I can push by myself?” he asks in a tiny voice.

Drop-off is drop-off. I ask one of Mac’s classmates if I can see her new glasses. “I lost them.” She just go them two days ago. Is this what it’s going to be like with Mac next year?

Sailor falls asleep after drop-off and I meet my sister for a long, leisurely lunch. I sip a coffee. We chat about relationships. I realize in advising her all the mistakes I have made and why. It’s all good. The sky turns dark. And darker. Or as Sailor would say, “And even!” as in, and even darker. We round the next-to-last corner before school and are suddenly drenched. Hovering under a tree canopy with several others, we contemplate running the last block to school or hailing a taxi that will take me to my car, which I can return with and pick everyone up in less than 15 minutes. I have not taken a taxi since Mac was born. And there are none in sight today. The rain lets up just in time and I sign Mac out of school 5 minutes early.

Mac has a new umbrella. “I waited very patiently for this,” he reminds me. Indeed, he has waited six years. Little brother wants an umbrella now too, as I knew he would. I actually hear myself saying aloud that it is Mac’s choice whether or not Sailor gets an umbrella at 3 ½ even though he had to wait til he turned six.
“It’s my decision? Well then I decide yes.”
“Can we go get it right now?” Sailor asks.

The boys need a few rules about umbrella etiquette. Rule number 1, I begin… The rules are obvious, but to be so kind I ad rule #4: if you see a friend or family member standing in the rain without an umbrella, share your umbrella. Mac’s promptly forgets this rule a mere six minutes after he learns it.

Later we stop by the art studio to look through a few bags of hand-me-downs that have been dropped off for us. There are five full garbage bags of clothes. About as many items of clothing as my children currently own. We go through each bag and the children and I pick a few favorites, including a pair of light-up Buzz Lightyear slippers (“Slippers rhymes with flippers,” Sailor informs us later.), which I approve of because they can only be worn indoors. Mac spies a stack of pajamas and instantly he is cold and wants to put on pajamas right now. How many times does a mom have to say “no” before she is both heard and understood? Sailor tries on some too-big pants and a pair of Spiderman socks and a too-big jean jacket. All at once.

Later we are in the car discussing allergies to cats. “I’m allergic to cats,” Sailor says, “When I smell a cat I get itchy ‘bout a cat.”

Sailor pitches a fit when I leave for dinner with a friend. He is apparently still pitching said fit when I return two hours later. There is a look on my mother’s face that I am loathe to seriously investigate.

My house is a Wednesday mess, but it’s Thursday. I have much to do to prepare for the activities of tomorrow.

I go into the kitchen long past midnight. I need snack. I am sidetracked by Sailor’s dinner, left out by my mom; three to-go cups bearing rained-in lemonade, which now tastes foul, and an overpriced coffee that never tasted that great to begin with; a bowl of blackberries that had better be eaten soon; Mac’s green shirt with stains all down the front; Mac’s backpack, which holds a foul odor, a cup of candy, two water bottles, his yearbook, and a full folder; my purse and low-battery cell phone… I plug the phone into the bathroom, and take the shirt as far as, well, here, my lap. And I still have no snack. But I do have a sore throat.

Friday morning. The kids have been up for a seemingly long time when they finally drag me off the couch at 7:15. There is a lot to do today.

Despite the fact that today is Sailor’s absolute last day of school until September, he still cries at drop off. In fact, he even runs out the door after us today. I just can’t believe it.

Mac and I run home to put away the garbage cans, get the class gift ready for preschool, get ready for Serendipity Day at Mac’s school this afternoon. And while I am at it, I might as well call the insurance company, which I have not had time to do yet this week. I will refrain from quoting the hour-long conversation here. Suffice it to say, nothing is fair, I am screwed and also I am in a very bad mood. And I forget to pack face paints for Mac’s class this afternoon so I can do facepainting.

Sailor is adorable when we get to school. All the children are wearing straw jungle hats with their names on the front. Sailor is also wearing the same shirt Mac wore to preschool graduation 2 years ago, which I had to iron this morning. Yes, iron. I know. Over this green and blue plaid shirt he is wearing his blue and white seersucker jacket, the sleeves rolled up. Khaki shorts. Saddle shoes and white socks. My kid is certainly styling. And way too cute. But in a mood. Clingy. And while we are standing around waiting I catch him unzipping my skirt! Yowza! I scold. He is embarrassed. And angry. And completely uncooperative. And he won’t participate in the class activity of singing in a group. I am so not happy. Instead of crying from sentiment I want to cry out of frustration. I tell my mom to put away the camera.

Mac to the rescue. He mentions to Sailor that we have a gift for him at home. Ding ding ding! He asks if he can have the gift when he gets home. “Not unless you participate,” I say. Sailor is instantly singing along, and happily! Unfortunately he is standing right in front of us so it is very hard to capture these cute moments on film.

When it’s all over I know I should feel some nostalgia. I don’t know what to feel. He didn’t graduate but he did finish out a whole year. One whole whining, fussing, fighting year of preschool. I am proud of him for doing it. I am proud of me for not caving and pulling him out. I can’t believe it’s just suddenly over. Finished. Done. It was painful, those days dropping off my crying baby. Over and over again. And now just like that it’s over. (Until September of course … but that’s going to be a whole ‘nother story).

We have cookies and lemonade outside, give the teachers the gift form Sailor’s class, and say goodbye and thank you for a great year (which I still can’t believe is over). And then I pop Sailor in the stroller, entrust him to my parents and head off with Mac to the big school. Unfortunately I neglect to strap Sailor into the stroller and he gets out and throws a long tantrum all the way home. For my parents.

Mac has Serendipity Day at school today and I am here to volunteer. “After today will I stay home tomorrow because it’s summer break?” Mac has exactly 7 days of kindergarten to go.

I spend the afternoon painting 28 little faces. Most of the girls choose les jolies papillons (pretty butterflies) and I love how well they turn out, if I do say so myself. Mac is a full-faced Spiderman. I paint some of the kids’ faces to match their outfits. I paint a camouflage face and the German boy wants something but he doesn’t know the name of it in English. “Tell me in German,” I say. “Leopard,” he says. I do a couple of tigers, a princess or two. And lots of jolies papillons. It’s fun.

Mac is excited to be able to participate in snack – popcorn! Thankfully he knows better than to imbibe in the orange pop.

With Mac's face painted as Spiderman, we walk home after stopping at the bank to pay a bill that I found late last night, that was due yesterday. The greeter recognizes me from the weekend. I should be embarrassed but I am not.

Mac has goodie bags full of junky toys and crap and he and Sailor share nicely. We are all a little tired and although it is not quite 4pm and it’s very sunny and warm out, rather than take us all to the playground we hang around. Sailor changes clothes – it’s much too warm for the long sleeved, black turtleneck sweater of mine he is wearing when we get home. (He looks very cute in this, however.) He is wearing now his Curious George shirt with a light blue Hawaiian shirt – a jacket, he calls it – over it. At 5:00 I decide to end the day on a quiet note. I pop in the latest DVD to arrive from Netflix: a light film, Anne Frank.

We sit for three hours. Sailor straps no fewer than 5 pens to the neck of his shirt and fills Mac’s backpack with everything including our house phone and my cell phone then dumps it all out. He talks all through the movie. It breaks the mood a little. But not enough. By the time Otto Frank discovers his daughters are not coming back Mac is beside himself and bursts into tears. He is just so sad. I invite him to sit with me and before I know it I am covered in Spiderman and he is only part-Spiderman. We cry together at the inhumanity that is Anne Frank’s death. For the first time this story has truly affected me, not just because it makes me sad or because it is such a tragedy but because we are reminded at the end of the film, which was aired on television the weekend Mac was born, that Anne was just one of several million children to whom this happened. Suddenly it is all too real. It is also again horrifying to see that the world has learned nothing in the 60+ years since World War II ended. Nothing.

And so we end the night. The house is a mess and Sailor actually has the energy to bring things to the kitchen for me and Mac needs a shower to wash off the remainder of Spiderman. He is so sad and scared that he won’t leave my side. I put clean sheets on my bed, finally, after 2 weeks on the sofa, and send him to my bed to sleep while I put Sailor to bed. Am I scared, too? You bet. But I put on such a good face for Mac I convince myself it’s all ok.

Saturday rain is forecast. We cancel our beach plans and take a picnic to the park instead. It is warm and sunny all afternoon. We play our version of soccer. In the zoo we spy a pair of odd-looking ducks.
“I wonder what they are,” I muse aloud.
“That’s an Egyptian Goose,” Mac informs us.
“How do you know?”
“I read the sign.” My boy, who will struggle over “good” and “what” has just read “Egyptian Goose.” We whoop and holler and have a mini-celebration right in the zoo!

On Sunday Mac carries two loads of laundry up the stairs and both boys put away most of their own laundry in our deal: I’ll help you clean up your playroom if you help me clean up the dining room. Our teamwork leaves us enough time for a round of a new Banana Slap game, which would me much better suited to 8-year-olds, and 3 rounds of the Memory Game before I head out for an afternoon of work.