Spring Break

This week was spring break for the boys. We spent the week in Florida with my parents. They rented a very nice condo on the beach. Unfortunately, the boys and I had to travel late at night and early in the morning to get reasonable air fares. We had planned for better weather, but we had the Florida equivalent of a Chicago lake breeze. The temperatures were actually cooler on the beach than at home in Skokie. There was still plenty of sun, however, so we all ended up with sunburns. That was definitely not planned.

Today is Tim's birthday. He would have been 43. The boys and I chose not to formally mark the day, but Tim was definitely on our minds. Tim was not a big beach fan. He didn't care for the feel of sand between his toes and usually wore tennis shoes when we'd go for walks on the beach. However, there were two things he always liked to do when we would go visit my parents. Tim loved to fly kites, particularly two-line steerable kites. I had packed a few kites. Since we did have such a strong breeze, the kids and I took turns flying Tim's favorite kite. Then we put up a single line kite with a lot of line laundry. Line laundry is what you call things like wind socks and spinners that you attach to the kite line with clips. The kite carries them up into the sky. We put up two wind socks, two small spinners and a giant circular spinner. They attracted a lot of attention, which is the whole idea, of course.

The other thing Tim enjoyed doing at the beach was building elaborate sand castles. I always found this a little hard to reconcile with his dislike of sand, but accepted it as one of those quirks that made Tim who he was. I have many pictures of Tim with sand castles built over the course of our marriage. So of course the boys and I built a sand castle. We went out just before high tide and built our castle right at the high tide mark. I don't ever remember doing this with Tim before, but it turned out to be a lot of fun. We all enjoyed watching the tide gradually undermine and wash away our castle. It was a lot better than abandoning our sculpture and hoping that no one would crush it. I even found it more satisfying than the Godzilla imitation that the boys were planning.

Wandering Through Evanston

This morning I had coffee in Evanston with a friend who lost his father as a teenager. He very generously shared his memories of his father's illness and death with me. Sometimes it is very helpful to trade stories with others that have experienced the loss of a loved one. I ending up spending the rest of the morning and all afternoon in Evanston. I went to the bank to deposit a check, something I needed to do. But instead of going straight home to start packing as planned, I decided to go to Lulu's for dim sum and then to The Italian Coffee Shop for gelato. I hadn't planned on doing more shoe shopping, but the shoe store was between the coffee shop and my car. I'm glad I went into the store because I finally found a pair of sandals for our trip to Florida next week.

Dinner Dysfunction

This morning I had to finish up the laundry. As a reward for my good behavior, I spent some time writing. I keep daily notes in a hand written journal and turn them into blog entries later. I spent longer working on the blog than I had planned and ended up eating a very late lunch. I had hoped that the boys and I would eat dinner together, but of course it didn't work out that way, again. In fact, not only did we not eat together, we each ate at a separate time. Theo came home late from school and didn't get snack, so he was ready to eat early. Brendan did get an afternoon snack but was ready to eat at the usual time. Since I'd had a late lunch, I wasn't ready for dinner until late. It just hasn't been my week for effective meal planning.

Making Plans

Today I couldn't put it off any longer. I finally had to go grocery shopping and do some laundry. To make the laundry go down easier, I watched a movie on the DVR while I folded the clean clothes. I had hoped to spend the afternoon reading a book. Instead, I spent it on the phone with my mother and brother. We're trying to rent a house in Wisconsin this summer. It's very difficult to find a house and location to suit five adults with very different ideas of leisure, not to mention the accompanying teenager, middle schooler, preschooler and toddler.

Food Fight

Today I had planned to go grocery shopping. Somehow I ended up shopping for shoes instead, which was a lot more fun. No groceries meant a change of plans for dinner. Since I had to take Theo into Evanston for a confirmation class requirement, we got takeout for dinner. The boys and I couldn't agree on a restaurant, so I gave them money for Uber Burger and I went next door to Mt. Everest. This made everybody happy except Brendan. He didn't enjoy getting dragged all over town when he had a lot of homework to do.

A Night at the Opera

This morning I had to pay my bills. I hadn't planned on spending all morning on the task, but I recently moved all my finances to Quicken and I'm still learning how to use the program. That meant I didn't get to planning my menus for the week as I had hoped. Instead, I had to stop and get ready for my big night out. A good friend took me out for a night on the town. This night actually started at 4:30 in the afternoon and lasted until midnight and included dinner and a ticket to the opera. The boys were in bed and the house was still standing when I got home, so they obviously survived being left to their own devices for that long.

A Morning of Mourning

There was no Sunday School this morning, so I left the boys at home and went to church alone. I don't know if it was the music for the day or the fact that it's been just over nine months since Tim died or that it's his birthday in ten days, but I cried all through mass. Sheil (our church) was an integral part of our relationship from the very beginning. Going to Sheil and singing in the choir has been a source of immense comfort to me both throughout Tim's illness and after his death. As much as I draw strength from the Sheil community, it can also be very painful to be in a place that holds so many memories of Tim. It's not just my memories, either. A friend once told me that she liked to watch Tim when I sang, because his love showed so clearly on his face. I often think of that story when I am standing up front with the choir. It makes me very sad to know that Tim is no longer sitting in the pews with the boys, listening to me and smiling.

So after doing something I wanted to do (go to church) and something I hadn't planned to do (cry a lot), I went home and did something I had to do - laundry. I had planned on serving leftovers, but, surprise, surprise, my dining companions rejected that choice, so we settled for frozen taquitos.