Simply Summer

Summer is in full swing and yet it seems almost impossible that next week we will celebrate July 4th. There really is no predictable routine to many of our days these days, but I'm trying and mostly succeeding at embracing the unexpected, the unplanned, the unforeseen. That freedom is the glowing gift that is summer.

It's striking how different my erstwhile childhood summers are when compared to those of my children today. As I dropped T. Bone off at camp Monday morning at the elementary school I myself attended, I honed in on the playgrounds already filled with boys and girls. Many a free day I made my way to these same stomping grounds via bicycle for games of kickball or tennis or capture the flag all loosely organized and very well attended. When I rode off without a helmet on my head, I went home to make lunch for myself and my younger brother. If we were lucky, the house across the boulevard would put the flag out that signaled open swim, and friends for a several block radius would convene and cool off for a lazy afternoon. I was 11 and my Mom was at work. Most moms were at work. We didn't have a glut of organized activities, calendars with inked in play dates, chauffeurs or cell phones, and truth be told...we didn't need them.

I guess it's fair to say that I'm nostalgic for that simpler life I seem to so fondly remember. I have friends who are already complaining that their kids are bored with summer. I'm sorry, but I just don't know what to say to that. I know that I'm blessed that my two have not spoken that surprising sentiment. But is it really surprising when we look through an honest lens at the lives we lead? How we are always on the go? Multi-tasking? Plugged in? Tuned out? Waiting to be entertained and amused? Faster, louder, bigger, better, more, more, more.

This week Miss Bit is attending theater camp and she's a bit flummoxed and not entirely happy that she's committed to camp all 5 days...Monday through Friday folks...that's Monday and Tuesday and Wednesday and Thursday and Friday. That girl of mine is so very much digging her down time. I am too so I feel her pain just not as poignantly perhaps.

But that being said...I've enjoyed some quality one on one time with T. Bone (when he's been home that is to say.) He's more my mover and shaker. Tuesday morning we spent some time shopping for new cleats and such and then had lunch before his presence was requested at the club with his friends for a swim, followed by a must-see semi-final ball game, followed by a spur of the moment sleepover. Today I had much fun playing "ball mama" on the tennis court. We played a little round robin with one of his friends and they were so impressed by my skills that they questioned whether or not I ever played at Wimbledon. I surmise they didn't see the cob webs attached like super glue to my faded racket cover or the grip literally disintegrating in my hands. Silly boys. That fine flattery earned them butter burgers and malts for lunch with sides of fries. Smart boys.

Miss Bit and I managed to steal away for a couple exclusive dates this week too. I knew she so needed them when she sobbed on the way to camp each morning about how much she was going to miss me, and how she would try to focus on all the happy times we have had, and did I have a Kleenex or 5 to spare. And just for the record...she is very much loving this acting camp. Her enhanced dramatic flair is the finest evidence that we are getting our money's worth out of this week. The truth is my girl would rather be eating ice-cream on a shady park bench, making new friends on the playground whose names she cannot for the life of her remember and probably will never see again so it doesn't really matter, figuring out new monkey bar challenges, and rooting through the shelves at the library for books she hasn't read but wants to than working on inflection and improv and expression.

At Casa Wags we're all about finding the balance. Next week there will be no camp or work or have tos. We won't be going anywhere or doing anything special either, and I'd be willing to bet it will go down as one of the best weeks of the summer. A jewel, a nugget, a treasure.