A Pretty Nice Day

Woke up. Got out of bed. Dragged a comb across my head.

Beatles moment - sorry.

This morning I awoke all on my own. No "Mama, it's morning time!" today. My girlie slept in later than I did! Woo hoo!

After shuttling Rose back and forth from ballet and doing a few things around the house, I was off. I dropped of Richard at fencing and "aaahhhh" almost three solid hours all on my own! Did I use this time to sit quietly and meditate? Did I take a hike through the redwoods pondering the meaning of life? NO! I went SHOPPING!

I finally found and purchased a trainer for my bike. Now, I can ride, ride, ride to my heart's content with out going anywhere! I just hitch up my spiffy new bike on this thing and pedal away. Too rainy to ride? No problem! Don't feel like dealing with all those hills? No worries! Just hop on my trainer, crank up the tunes and pump. I'm mostly excited because last winter I rode my bike about, well, three times maybe. But not this year! I'll be spinning away in our lovely garage whilst the kids rid real bikes and scooters in front of my house. Nice.

In addition to that exciting purchase, I found some new and needed clothes for Richard on big time sale at Old Navy. It is very strange that my eleven year old son wears men's medium. When he hugs me now, his chin goes over my shoulder. And I am almost 6 feet tall. He is huge. But then we all are (except Joe). When I see my girl Rosie next to the tiny sticks at ballet, well, I'm just glad she's not in school. She is also quite large - in a healthy but unusual way.

On the way over the hill and back I listened to NPR shows about parents with seriously messed up children, and then another piece on adult children dealing with parents with Alzheimer and stuff. As depressing as that sounds, it helped me realize how important every single day is. And how much I love my Mom and my family. I cried a few times in the car.

Picked up Richard from fencing, where his coach told me how pleased he is with Richard, and how he almost beat the best (16 year old) guy on the team today. Nice. Back home I tried out my cool new bike trainer. Joe made me wear a helmet. Boy did I feel like a dork. Until I wobbled once and my bike came off the trainer. Then I realized that he was (urg!) probably right. I hate that! I look totally dweeby wearing a helmet on a trainer.

A nice shower and then a relaxed dinner making time with a glass of wine. Tacos were enjoyed by all. And a little ice cream after! Mmmmmm....

Here's where I'm not such a great mom. I love watching movies. And I probably let my kids watch movies that I shouldn't. When Richard was 5 or 6 he was so sheltered and sensitive he couldn't watch The Lion King. But over the years standards have relaxed and now my 7 year old Rose watches Lord of the Rings movies. And worse...tonight we watched part of Braveheart.

Remember that movie with Mel Gibson about the Scottish guy fighting the English. Well, I remembered to skip the sex scene, but I forgot about the:
1. hanging dead bodies
2. graphic slitting of throats
3. sexual content (English lords practicing Prima Noctis - ugh)
4. general bloody fighting

So, I'm like, "Close your eyes!" and "OK, he's going to kill her now". Rose keeps asking "Why are they doing that?" and "What is he doing?" so I have to keep a running commentary going the whole time.

It's a great movie. One of my favorites. But I think I let my enthusiasm affect my mothering judgement. I'm scared to see what I'll let my baby Marie watch. Already she walks around saying things like, "My baby is dead. She got killed by a soldier." I think she got it from Andrew's LOTR computer game. I don't know. I am a bad mom.

Joe is at a birthday party for a friend. His parting words were, "I won't be gone long". Yeah right! He loves parties. He'll be there for many hours, which is fine with me because at least he'll have been there long enough for any effects of whatever he drinks to wear off.

So all in all, it was a pretty nice day.

Good night blog.