I have a new BFF. Allegra. She’s a tough broad, able to vanquish dandelions without breaking a sweat. It’s a tough road for her right now, as The Great Snotting is still running amok, but I have faith in her abilities.

Breathing well has taken on a new urgency as of late.

I have a flute student.

There was great rejoicing in the House of Chaos once the new student was confirmed. Teaching flute lessons, my first love, works so well around homeschooling. And I like being my own boss.

There is one niggling problem, however.

My back. It tingles and goes numb just randomly throughout the day. I’d think it was nerve damage from years of playing, but I haven’t had a marathon practice session for awhile now, at least since having kids. I suspect it has more to do with hours on a computer plus poor posture plus lack of exercise plus the mild scoliosis I’ve rocked my whole life.

Looking back, flute probably wasn’t the best choice for me, strictly from a physical standpoint. Jaw problems, shoulder issues, neck pain…then again, maybe I should just take better care of myself.

No matter. With stretches and patience, my flute and I will have great fun rebuilding a flute studio. And then the tingles will be from the music being made and not the nerves screaming in pain.

We live on what is quite possibly the friendliest block in this village of twenty thousand people. We had barely opened the first PODS last summer before neighbors were coming by to introduce themselves. With the exception of the one dude across the street who keeps cutting through our backyard, everyone here is awesome. Especially the kids.

Our neighborhood in CO had a gazillion kids, but I’m convinced we lived on the one kid-less block in the whole subdivision. The kids were all around the corner or on the next block; the boys could never look out the front window to see who was outside playing. It’s very different here. Lots of kids on the street, and the boys are always out playing. One thing, however. They’re all girls. Yes, my dear boys are the only specks of testosterone on this block. It’s not an issue right now, they’re all still young and get along, we’ll see in a year or so. The girls range in age from 7-11, and are all beautiful inside and out. I’m hoping they teach my boys a thing or two get your mind out of the gutter. My boys need females other than me smacking them upside the metaphorical head.

This afternoon A and I walked down to meet J at the bus. He bounded off, followed by the five girls. Four of them stopped dead, dropped their heads to their knees to grab a handful of hair in a ponytail, and cried out, “A! Watch this! 3…2…1…UNICORN!” They popped up with a unicorn-like handful of hair grasped at the top of their heads.

The boys just stared at them with that look dogs use when they’re just so confused because they don’t know if you’ve thrown the ball or where it went or please just give me a treat rub my belly. Me? Laughing hysterically. When I could finally breathe, I had to ask if they were rainbow farting unicorns. They all affirmed that they were, indeed, unicorns of the rainbow farting variety.

I live on a block with rainbow farting unicorns. Life is good.

Of course I had to show them the lock screen of my iPhone:

I love my block.

The rains came.

And the woman, who saw her former state burn through drought, rejoiced, for there would be green and lushness and no water restrictions.

And the rains continued to bless the woman and her land.

And again.

And still.

And while the rains continued their gloomy raininess, lo the dandelions blossomed. The yellow and the fluffy, they conspired and arose. And arose. And arose some more, until they reached the overly high knee of the woman.

And the woman said, “Hark! The dandelions must be driven from the land! The yellow and the fluffy alike! For I have no beater to raise upon cement blocks to complement this infestation!”

And the woman drove her chariot to The Lowe’s to procure The Fertilizer and The Dispenser and The Sprayer. And she returned to her land with a plan.

The Mowing of the Land commenced.

And it was good.

The woman rejoiced in the clean-cut landscape.  The dandelions, the yellow and the fluffy, had been driven from her land.

But sickness descended upon her house that very evening.

The dandelions, the yellow and the fluffy, called upon The Four Winds to exact revenge upon the woman and her firstborn son.

The Great Snotting began.

The woman and her firstborn son sneezed and snurked and hacked, cursing the dandelions, both the yellow and the fluffy. They raised their kleenex-filled fists at the sky as they swore to take a bloom for every sneeze.

It was a dark day.

But hark! Hear the man return from The Business Trip! The man not afflicted with The Great Snotting!

And lo, the man ventured forth to Fertilize and Dispense and Spray the dandelions, both the yellow and the fluffy.

And it was good.

How are you?

Three little words. A set of words, formed into an innocent question, the answer to which no one really cares to hear.

Is the answer “Fine” or something else?

“Busy.” “Tired.” “Crazed.” “Stressed.” “About to crack over things no one outside my familial walls would understand or even care.”

Has anyone ever answered something positive?

How are you?

We ask the question as a cultural courtesy. We need something to say, you see. Can’t just say, “Hi! So good to see you!” Or “I was thinking about you the other day.” Or “I’m so glad you’re here.”

Could we come up with a different question for those we haven’t seen in awhile, or for acquaintances we barely know?

Maybe “Hey there! What have you done lately that you’re proud of?” or “Dude! What’s the best thing in your life right now?” or ”Hi! How are your bunions?”

Those questions, while a little more probing and honest, are a hell of a lot more likely to get a real answer than the typical “How are you?” That merely puts the weight of how honest an answer do they want on the person about to answer.

Because I’m not fine, I am busy/tired/crazed/stressed/about to crack over things no one outside my familial walls would understand or even care.

But dude, my bunions have never been better.

Sometimes so many things hit all at once with such intensity that you can only hold on and hope for the best. Time flies by, both hours and days disappearing. So it has been for the last two and a half weeks here at the House of Chaos.

• The book is done. Sweet glory hallelujah, yes! It’s done…except it’s not until it’s printed. But! I’m happy anyway.
• A and I have had a couple of Come to Jesus meetings over homeschooling. He seems to think that it’s mostly watching videos on whatever his current obsession is, I disagree. We are still hammering out a compromise.
• Tom and I realized that life is short, dishpan hands crack and bleed, and that we’d rather do damned near anything than a couple hours of dishes every day. Our new dishwasher came on Wednesday and I’ve been doing a happy shake-and-shimmy dance for the last few days.
• Tom resigned from his job of 12 years and began a new one today. Because the internet is very visible and this blog is no longer as anonymous as it once was, I can only say that it’s a good thing for him. He got tired of being Angry Dad, his patience exhausted by the end of the day. He worked his ass off the last two years to make a difficult situation better and finally came to the conclusion that his family and mental health had to come first.
• My high school band director is retiring, and I was thrilled to be at his last concert this week. It was like a mini reunion of my old band friends. He taught at that school for 29 years. Dang.
• I am on the hunt for gainful employment. I am qualified for precisely nada. This does not sit well with my psyche. Or my wallet.
• While I love my dog, I’m about to “take her to the farm.” She used the basement as her private commode again the other day. Several times. Not all times were…ahem…solid. It’s the only carpet in the house, and it’s brown to boot. Halfway through cleaning it up I ran out of Spot Shot. I borrowed my parents super-sucker-wet-dry-kinda like a carpet cleaner-vacuum…and it broke. I think I’m cursed.
• I fell off the crazy wagon and hit my head: I am having a yard sale in a couple weeks. I dare you to ask me how prepared I am.

And that’s only part of the insanity over the last sixteen or so days.

I need a nap.

When you study and work and practice and live in a practice room for years on end, you become quite good at playing an instrument. When you stop playing, all forward momentum stops and it can get hairy. When you go 14 months before even opening the case, it’s not only hairy but needs a full Brazilian, with serious touchups four months later when you give it another try. So you really shouldn’t be surprised that:

*Your lips go numb within the first few minutes.
*The stress canker sores start looking for additional real estate.
*You discover that at least two keys are sticking, you got rid of all your repair tools before moving, and don’t have a flute repair person in this time zone.
*You’re amazed that muscle memory is as strong as it is, because you’re pretty damned certain that that’s the wrong fingering…whoops, no, muscle memory is right and brain memory is seriously screwed up.
*Your left shoulder blade has seen the numb lips, and raised them tingling and oh yeah, that’s right, nerve damage.
*You look at all those teeny tiny notes and wonder what does it all mean?
*Your left hand laughs at the left shoulder and lips and does a full cramptasm that is felt through the body and into the floor, much like a lightning strike, and about as much fun.
*Your entire body rebels as you stumble back to the laptop to type and you wonder if dictating the rest of the book into Siri might not be a bad idea.
*Twenty minutes felt like an eternity.
*It really wasn’t nearly as bad as you thought it would be, you hadn’t lost as many skills as expected, and you’ll do it again soon.

Good things for me to remember.

I’m getting the band back together starting up my flute studio again.

By God, I can’t do this anymore. I just can’t. I’m done, wiped, full-on finished. I cannot handle the arguments, the schoolwork coming home unfinished for the evening’s enjoyment, the backtalk, the whining, and the feeling that I am a complete and utter failure as a parent. Setting fire to my teaching degree is also a thought, given that everything I learned to earn it does not, in any way, apply to the creatures that reside beneath this roof. I thought homeschooling was going to reduce this crap. I was wrong.

I have another son.

You know, it’s not cosmically amusing enough that the universe saw fit to bless me with two boys. Or that they look more like their father than me. But that they both appear to have the same learning challenges is PISSING ME OFF. I just can’t do it. I can’t go through the battles with J that I did with A. I just can’t. I’m operating at DefCon One as a baseline right now and this schoolwork-adding-fuel-to-the-fire crap is making my trigger finger a little twitchy.

This afternoon my darling second child brought home a writing assignment (no, seriously, I can’t make this shit up…same shit we went through with his brother) that did not get finished during class. When asked, his instant and quite panicked reply was, “It’s not my fault!” This is becoming the de facto reply to ANYTHING regarding schoolwork lately and I’m about to wring his neck. His story is that they only had 20 minutes to write a seven sentence paragraph and draw a photo to accompany it. I find that hard to believe, so after a cooling off period on the chilly porch wishing I had a stiff drink with me, I made him sit and finish it. But lo and behold! He forgot his math homework! Again!

All this is new for J. He has been a great student for years, even requesting homework for kindergarten. But the last eighteen months or so he has slipped. I’ve noticed to a certain extent, but have been a little busy with his older and much more intense brother. His teacher and I have agreed to work with him and make him work, something he hasn’t really had to do to this point. If anything gets hard, even a little, he resists because it means he has to work at it. (Yes, I know what this sounds like, hush). I don’t know if it really is a case of not wanting to put forth effort, or of true difficulty (he’s already receiving writing interventions), or if he’s pulling shit so he can be homeschooled too. I just don’t know.

Oh, I won’t be addressing the insanity of how much freaking writing is required of a second grader, simply because state testing begins for them the next year. I think it is too much, I think pushing kids to write when they may not have the motor skills TO write is a bad idea, and I am convinced it does nothing but teach the kid that he’s a failure because he can’t do what he is truly not able to do. That boys suffer from this (slow to advance fine motor skills) only makes it worse. Oh, wait, I did address it. My bad.

I don’t know how I’m going to address this in the future. Right now I can’t think I’m so pissed off, and it’s just thrown on top of the mental laundry pile of crap going on. I cannot homeschool both boys, it is just not possible. I know a gazillion women do, but they’re not living in this house. It just would not work, by any stretch of the imagination. I’d rather stick both of them in school, get a full time job so as to relieve some of the financial fustercluck around here, and just ignore their educational crap until they fail enough to get a freaking clue and do it themselves. Whoa. Yeah, I went there.

Luckily tonight I have a haircut where I am getting my hair entirely chopped off. I will no longer look like any headshot floating around out there and if I had extra coin I’d have her color out the grays. Instead photoshop will do me the favor.

Damn. And things were almost-kinda-sorta going so well.

Nothing accompanies procrastination like a rousing game of For The Love Of All Things Holy What The Hell Is That Smell In The Laundry Room, unless it’s the sequel game Should We Replace The Carpet Or Pray ServPro Has A Coupon?, or maybe the roleplaying game I’d Love My House To Not Smell Like Ass.

For the record, there was nothing in the laundry room to create such a stench unless there is a portal to hell I missed and trust me, I vacuumed long enough in there I would have noticed. A portal to hell would certainly explain the smell. It’s the dog. And while ServPro has deodorization services, I’m afraid this may be past their assistance. The carpet down there was iffy when we moved in, the dog made it worse the last several months, and summer heat is going to make this place a gas chamber without a great deal of intervention.

But procrastination. What doth I procrastinate? Name it. Thinking. Doing. Sending emails. Anything with an “ing” ending and action verbs. I haven’t wanted to <action verb> in any way, shape, or form lately. So today I cleaned and organized the laundry room so I could find that portal to hell and solder it shut do laundry without gagging at the inside of the washer. Yesterday I crashed out on my bed and read a magazine; in my defense, I’d just survived a 2 1/2 hour ALL BOY PARTY OF OVER-SUGARED ACTIVITY (at least it wasn’t last year’s solo hosting of Go The F*ck To Sleep). Perhaps tomorrow I will learn why the inside of the coat closet smells like death. Can’t blame the dog for that one, she doesn’t hang her coat in there.

A little non-computer procrastination is good for the soul. At least my soul. Something in the house is now clean and doesn’t stink much. Perhaps now I have the mental and intestinal fortitude to forge ahead on some action verbs.

Yes. I shall go <action verb> now.

Today A is 11.

I look at that and try to wrap my brain around it and have a hard time. How is it possible that this kid is already 11 years old? I mean, I was convinced that I wasn’t going to let him live past age 4, so 11 is huge. (No, really, his 4th year was bad. Still can’t believe we survived that, AND we had an infant as well.)

Eleven.

Eleven years of high-intensity awesomeness. Eleven years of second-guessing ourselves. Eleven years of conviction that we were totally screwing up this kid.

Things have gotten better since he was an infant. He sleeps now…wait…no, he doesn’t. At least now he doesn’t get me up for the party. And he eats better than he…crap, no to this one too. He also sits…damn! Actually, he hasn’t changed much in the last 11 years, just gotten taller and louder and funnier. Still has incredible blue eyes and a smile to light up a room.

We’re looking at only seven years left with him before he goes out into the world and kicks its ass. That’s just heartbreaking, because in the last four months the kid who has made it his life’s work to drive us batshit crazy has gotten fun. Since leaving traditional school and being allowed to march to the beat of his own drummer homeschooled, A has started to grow into himself. His sense of humor is blossoming, and we’re pleaseGodohpleaseGod starting to see maybe the start of the beginnings of some maturity. It’s as though the parts of him that were lagging behind are running to catch up to his age and mind. You have no idea how wonderful that is, for everyone in this house. Plus the jokes are awesome.

I love this child, so very much. He is the one who made me a mom, who forced me out of my comfort zones, who teaches me daily what it means to step back and trust. I know he’s going to do amazing things, and I can’t wait to see how he turns out.

Happy birthday A. You are one helluva kid.

Have you seen the Caine’s Arcade video that’s gone viral this week? No? Shame, shame. Take ten and watch:

Sorry, probably should have warned you to have tissues handy. Or maybe I’m just a little emotional today.

Kids and cardboard. Two great things that go great together. Give kids basic tools and get the heck out of their way. They can find the solution to any problem (summertime boredom) and have a great time while doing it. Caine is an amazing kid; A and I watched this together, just thrilled to see such a positive story. A wants to be him and go see the arcade (dude, you and Caine are cut from the same cloth, and we’re not heading to California any time soon).

Too bad I dumped all the moving boxes from last summer. We would have had the answer to summertime boredom right there.