I’ve been playing this game with myself called, “What would I be doing in the Alternate Universe?” Today in the Alternate Universe, I am ordering cute new maternity clothes online to wear to work. Before I got pregnant, I envisioned my future bump snug in the floral print maternity sundresses that I didn’t get to wear last time.  In Reality, I’m wearing old sweatpants and my husband’s t-shirt, which is completely unflattering and depressing, but I have nowhere to go.

In the Alternate Universe, my baby shower was a few days ago.  My friends and family got together in my house to have a tea party, planned by my mom, to celebrate the babies on their way. I got to wear a dress that made me feel pretty instead of just huge. The nursery is painted and decorated, ready to hold baby items from the shower, and awaiting its mini inhabitants.

In Reality, nobody came over this weekend. Floral paper plates sit in a box on the floor of the guest room. The nursery is not painted because my dad is isolated in his own house, and never got to come here to paint it. In fact, I haven’t set the nursery up at all, just folded some old baby laundry here and there. I keep saying, “We should pick a day to paint.” But now there’s no hurry– June is still two months away.

In the Alternate Universe, we are packing to leave for our spring break trip. I will get to spend the weekend with one of my best friends and her family on our way to the beach. I have a red maternity bathing suit that my husband bought me that says “Baby Watch.” The beach is our happy place. We’ve been planning this trip since last April.

In Reality, our trip is canceled because most of the country is “staying at home.” I had a Zoom coffee date with my friend, which was wonderful, but also sharpened the disappointment of not seeing her, probably for at least another year now. The bathing suit sits in a drawer and will never be used. 

In Reality, I’ve been holding these virtual coffee dates with several of my friends to replace seeing them. One morning last week I had two dates in a row. I spent hours on the phone. My son watched TV all morning so I could chat, and I felt guilty about both his screen-time and the work I was procrastinating, but it was worth it just to laugh in the same time (but different space) as my friends.. 

In Reality, I spend about 12 hours a day with my son. In a row. In the Alternate Universe, I only spend a few hours a day with him, and those hours are shared with activities like Cooking Dinner and Folding Laundry and Bedtime Routine. But lately, because life is slow, I can absorb him. He loves to laugh and has a great sense of humor. Like me, he’s overly sensitive and leaves cups of water all around the house. Like Patrick, he’s detail-oriented and stubbornly independent. He talks about his babies all the time, and worries about his mommy, and wants to watch dada “bix” things around the house. 

In the Alternate Universe, Patrick and I have separate activities, our own friends, and lots to do. We also don’t have a regular babysitter. Full conversations rarely happen all at once. In Reality, we have been in this house together now for a month without any activities.  There was a 20-minute stretch after he switched our sides of the bathroom entirely (drawers, medicine cabinets, EVERYTHING) that I wondered if we were going to make it. But actually, I don’t think I’ve ever loved him more. Considering the circumstances, it’s been really nice to just spend time with him, without the rush of our normal lives, without all the extra people. I remember during my honeymoon thinking that this was the most in love I would ever be, but I was wrong. Love is wearing a face mask to go out during a pandemic to buy your pregnant wife a new iron supplement because Amazon now takes a week to deliver. It’s watching The Sopranos again together during naptime. I keep thinking about how lucky I am to be stuck in the house with him.

It mostly hurts to think about the Alternate Universe and everything I am missing out on, especially my friends and family, and what should be a really exciting time to share with them. There are those who have been affected more directly by this pandemic, who are on the front lines or actually sick. But I think the rest of us still need to mourn our “old” lives, our people and our hobbies. Humans are social creatures and we are seeing how physically painful it is to isolate ourselves. 

On the other hand, I think for many of us there has been a silver lining to our lives being on pause. I appreciate my old life in ways that I never knew I had to appreciate it. The little things like running to Target just to browse, and not wiping off all of my groceries with a Clorox wipe. I keep asking my husband, “How will this change us?” I hope that when this is finally over that our appreciation will linger, that we won’t quickly forget this reality that we are living. That we’ll continue to have regular Zoom coffee dates and happy hours with our friends who are far away. That we remember the little ways we tried to make holidays and birthdays special without any of the normal fuss. We got this chance to reset and simplify our lives, and for that I can be grateful. 

My classroom is an extension of my heart. Everything I have put into it: the furniture, the background music, the posters on the wall, my too-loud voice at the start of a new unit. It’s the purest reflection of me.

This classroom feels both full and empty at the same time. The bells are all ringing at the wrong times, there’s not enough seats for everyone, and you all are speaking monotone. I can’t find the words to say all the things I think you need to hear. I get choked up every time I wave goodbye in a video.

In my latest remote learning dream, you are crowded around devices in my guest bedroom. We are discussing Gatsby. You ask me questions that I cannot answer. It’s burrito day for lunch– downstairs, in my kitchen. I know it’s your favorite.

But in real life, all I have are the words I write to you, the sub-par awkward videos that you watch, and the sentences of your journals to keep me going.

“The news scares me, ” you wrote one day.

“Most people are happy but I really like school,” you wrote another.

“I can’t believe this is how my senior year is going to end.” You fill the page with the worries of what you’ve already missed and what you might miss in the future.

Your make up work comes in at 5 am on a Saturday. “I hope you weren’t up all night,” I write.

You write back, “I kinda was.”

Without your voice and your smile and my stupid jokes, what is a classroom? Without the voice I make for Lennie’s character, or the Backstreet Boys song I play too loud?

And if my classroom is my heart, what is my heart, without you?

I’ve spent nearly four weeks trying to figure that out. I can write plans that keep you busy, questions that make you think, assign reading that is ambitious.

But you know what I can’t do?

I can’t tap on your desk and say, “Hey, are you okay?” I can’t congratulate you on your last lacrosse win with a high five. I can’t stand at the door and call down the hallway before the bell, “You’re not going to make it! Hustle up!” I can’t make the same bad joke over and over again until I finally get you to smile at me out of pity.

You see, this weird detached version of my heart placed in modules, poorly cut videos, and calendar assignments: This is not me. This is not how I wanted to show you literature and poetry, teach you scansion and fun Shakespearean insults.

This classroom is devoid of all the reasons I teach. Your eyes lighting up when we read poetry, your eloquent personal narrative read aloud in front of the class, your attempts at getting me off topic talking about Oscar-time films.

But right now, this is all we have. And if I can invite you inside my digital heart (Come in, there’s plenty of room!), I would love to hear all about how much this is wearing on you, what new project you decided to start, and what your dog or cat has been doing while you write journals in your bedroom. Because all of that, that’s just as important-actually more important-than Fitzgerald or Shakespeare.

The world has changed our classroom for an uncertain amount of time– and I want to make sure you see me, arms flailing, standing by the classroom door, saying, “I hope you are doing okay.”

A group of my college friends have arranged regular Zoom meetings. It’s helping us see ourselves through a mix of situations. Maternity leave, a sick parent, business owner woes, homeschooling, work/home balance, and also the recent news for one of us: No school for the remainder of the school year. Eek.

Some of us feel the flashback of being home with a new baby. You are expected not to really go anywhere and one day blends in to another. A shower feels like an achievement. A walk feels like the ultimate liberation.

But with none of the new baby oxytocin coming in, this lands a little different. This has the feel of a college Saturday (everyone is in their jammies watching TV for too long and no one in showering until they have to be seen in public), the brink of some weather-related disaster (you are constantly checking in on family and friends to see how they are affected), and a rainy summer vacation ruined-ALL AT THE SAME TIME.

But tonight I passed up the Zoom and asked if we could postpone it (Everyone’s calendar free? Yeah? Oh good.). I am usually the social director, the planner, the organizer. But I was in a wretched mood and just wanted to sit on the couch and read my book. Again.

Marriage, parenting, friendship, sibling-hood, caregiving. All of it seems like it’s under this huge microscope right now. We Zoom, we FaceTime, we talk, text, post, and like each other’s hopes thoughts, and dreams—digitally.

FOMO is no longer a thing because, you know, we are all doing nothing. But even doing nothing has a hierarchy. Some people make beautiful rainbow sculptures and hang them outside their homes, some are now gourmet cooks, some are working out incessantly, some have become Tik Tok aficionados (guilty) or expert home renovators (not guilty). But, don’t get it twisted: No one is good at this. Not a single one of us.

But while we might not be good at it, the joke is on us at the same time. Because, little by little, layer by layer, it’s making us better and giving us time we didn’t even know we’ve been searching for. All the things we knew we needed but never thought we could have: time to relax and be silly, have better communication (because well, we are around each other all dang day, we should probably talk). Time to slow down. We can finally stop saying, “This week is going to be so busy,” over and over and over again.

Relationships feel simple all of a sudden. Support each other, check on each other, send each other funny Tiger King memes and good online deals to spread the wealth. Tell funny stories. Drop thoughtful items on each other’s doorsteps or pull into the driveway for a sidewalk-to-car-door-chat.

Communication doesn’t get rushed or messed up or forgotten (“I thought I told you my appointment was today and I couldn’t get the kids?”) We have nothing but food, work, house chores, schoolwork, Netflix, and Zoom appointments.

But, simple doesn’t mean easy. We are used to a rhythm that’s no longer there. But, I don’t know about you- this new rhythm can be nice. I’m more relaxed most days, clear(ish) headed, and nothing is rushed. It makes me think of something someone said right before I had Parker, my first. “Your only job when that baby comes is just to sit at home and love that baby.” It was so bizarre to me to reduce what I thought was going to be the most profound change in my life to “just” sitting home and loving another person. But now those words seem wise.

It was Mother Theresa who said it best, “If you want to change the world, go home and love your family.” And love the mess, the chaos, the too many board games, the I-can’t-plan-another-frigging-meal, and know that there is no award for best pandemic pantry or most artful rainbow bedazzle. There’s only page of your family’s history where you can say, “We slowed down, we loved each other, we had fun, and we made it through.”

At the start of the madness, I texted two teacher-mom-writer friends and asked if they would be willing to write about this experience together in my blogspace. Julie, one of my dearest teacher-mom friends, took me up on my offer today. Enjoy her eloquence and ability to capture what I know we are all going through in our little house-pods all over the country.

 

All of my tabs are open.  Every. Single. One.

The tab that tells me how to talk to my kids, how to keep them calm when the world as they know it – as we all know it – crumbles around them. “Go out for a bike ride,” we say.  But instead of warning about speeding cars or vicious dogs, we warn of 6 feet and cross to the other side and, “No, you can’t play with your best friends today.” Or tomorrow.

The tab that opens to order all the things, because stores are the new haunted houses now.  There is no longer a “just to pick a few things up,” no longer a casual browse for something new-healthy-beautiful-interesting-splurgeworthy.  I order a myriad things – necessities and things-to-keep-busy and seeds to plant in the Spring.

The tab that asks when Spring starts.  A week ago?  Really?  We must have missed it while the world imploded.  I hope it didn’t take our locked front door and “Just leave it on the porch!” sign personally.  I hope it comes back.

The tab, the darkest one, that descends into the worst case scenario. The long-terms and the missed opportunities and the ventilators and the people the same age as my parents and NO…x out of that one.

The tab that tries to maintain safety and consistency and some form of academia for my students.  My students for whom I know my colleagues and I are…were their only sense of security and normalcy.  Read this book and journal your feelings and see how nice I made my video background so you could enjoy our sessions? I am trying to be there for them without being there, trying to make it clear how desperately I miss them and their lame homework excuses and the exploded pens on their desks.

The tab that is fueled by wanderlust and wants to travel to all these places that are closed up and broken, but will someday open wide again. The flights are so cheap, the beaches and museums and restaurants seem so empty, so ready.  But to hit the purchase button would be to tempt fate, so I will not.  Not yet. Fate has been tempted enough these days.

The tab that lists the symptoms.  I am 86% sure at least 13 times a day that I have it.  A slight sniffle or clearing of the throat – once innocent harbingers of the allergy season to come – now carry a foreboding sense of this is it.  I know, I think, that right now it has been kept at bay.  However, there is the constant, crushing fear that it has somehow stormed our gates and penetrated the Lysol force field I lovingly spray into existence three times a day.

The tab that generates lists and charts and schedules because order seems to quell the storms inside me.  There are complementary colors, trendy fonts, and orderly time frames with specific blocks carved out for “creativity.” But sometimes the implementation of order makes things feel even more chaotic, and I suppose I will need to make a list to combat that paradox as well.

The tab that reveals my family, some across town and some thousands of miles away.  We virtually clink our wine glasses, pretending to be OK with the cancelled upcoming vacation, the pirate show and Easter brunch that were never meant to be.  We laugh as the baby shovels food in with his chubby little hands, and we all have the same, staggering thought: He has no idea what’s going on.  Wouldn’t that be nice?

Slowly, slowy, I x out of my tabs as the day draws to a close.  One by one they disappear.  Some, I linger on. Some, I eagerly send away. I know they’ll all be back tomorrow to taunt and comfort and terrify.  But I hold out hope that one day, maybe soon, these tabs will finally, mercifully, be closed for good and I will finally, mercifully, be able to breathe once again.

It comes in waves. Big, aggressive, dangerous waves. Waves that go in and out with tide. Sometimes 10, 11, 12 times a day.

Now, I’m not talking about the virus at all. Or the news coverage of it. I’m talking about that feeling. The feeling that the light at the end of the tunnel has some kind of shade pulled over it and you can’t figure out how to get it up. The feeling where your child asks you why you are shaking your head and you are not really sure why, you just have that weird panel of dread on your chest again. 

But you ride that wave out. Dinner comes. You arrange a quaratine beer delivery for a friend’s 40th birthday. You go for a two hour walk and come back rejuvenated and ask your BFF to send you the great pork recipe she told you about. The wave crests, the wave falls, the wave lifts us up again.

I am purposely writing this on the crest of the current wave. The wave of– Are my children doing what they are supposed to- Are my students all understanding my directions, what are we having for lunch and dinner?- What am I going to do for exercise today? Why am I not sleeping better? Et cetera. Et cetera. Et cetera.

It comes like a whoosh. And it brings out all the versions of you that you don’t like. The negative. The defeated. The mentally and emotionally exhausted. It feels like quicksand for a moment or two. Okay maybe 30 minutes or more. Until you push through. Push up. Get up on your board to ride.

Then there are all the things that you think you should/would/could be doing in the downtime that you are not riding a wave. Some of those things are getting done, the small things maybe, but the rest hang over your head like dark clouds. Things on your ever so optimisitc Corona to-do list that you may never have the mental or physical energy to do.

Unless you pick one of them up on the wave of feeling good. On the day when you nail homeschool and remote school and have your home/office/school in tip top shape. The dishes are done, the dryer is going and you are like, “Hmmm, should I touch up the paint in the kitchen?” (This hasn’t happened but it will someday, right?)

The waves will come. They will be short and disappear quickly. They will be long and give you a headache. They will be full of joy and laughter as you sit around a lunch table for too long. But the waves are just that. Waves. They have a rhythm, a motion that has a beginning, a middle, an end. You determine how to ride the wave without getting pulled into the undertow. You pick yourself up, straighten out your board, and get ready to ride again.

That’s what this is. Over and over again. Don’t kid yourself that all of it is worse for you or that all of it is so much better for someone else. It’s waves for everyone. And we are all just trying to hold on, wave after wave, and get through the day. And maybe, just maybe, have a normal-ish night of sleep for the first time in weeks.

So a week ago, I thought, “Wow! Think of how much I could WRITE about this! Think of all the things we will have a chance to do! We can do more home projects, decompress, not worry about rushing here and rushing there! I will read so many books!”

Oh, honey. Bridgette from 7 days ago,  you were so, so, so naive.

I have been a teacher for almost 20 years. I have had to think on my feet in many situations. None of them involve remote teaching. None of them involve relaying all of your plans, thoughts, ideas, expectations, and lessons for students— through a device. And, in those years, I have happily stayed in the lane of English Language Arts for high school students. Aged 14-18. I have never thought myself cut out for elementary. I’ve always said, “Teaching someone to read has to be one of the most important jobs a teacher can do. That’s a lot of pressure.”

I have been a mother for 10 years. I have spent exactly 8 summers off with two kids running here, there, and everywhere. I have never in all that time spent 30 days going absolutely no where. I have always been able to tempt them with an outing or an ice cream run. A playground or a park. I’ve always had some little “maybe if you are good today we can go…” in my back pocket. We have always embraced the busy. This blog was kind of founded on that principle.

So take all of the above comments, put them in a blender, blend for 45 minutes, then walk over to the sink, and pour all of it down the drain.

That’s what all of that experience and wisdom gets you when you are remote teaching and homeschooling at the same time, every day.

All of my skills felt useless. All of my tricks were gone. It was just us. All day. Together. My husband (also a teacher, but in homeschool life I refer to him as Mr. Gallagher-your-fun-substitute) took care of the groceries, the TP (we have respectable, non-hoarding amount), the Amazon orders (a bidet), and the big picture thinking (“For God’s sake, Bridgette cancel Great Wolf Lodge, we are not going.”) And I, I took care of the schedule.

Yeah, I’m one of those. I wrote it out in big black magic marker. Got each kid their own labeled bin for their work, made a little charging station for all the devices (why are there so many devices?). I had it figured out by Sunday night. We were going to do this. Our homeschool was going to be the coolest of all the homeschools.

But Monday came. The “This could be fun!” day. “Well, that wasn’t so bad, was it?” (We were fools).

Then Tuesday. What’s that whole thing about the wheels falling off the bus? Does the bus even go to Homeschool? Cause that bus had no freaking wheels on Tuesday.

Wednesday it was sunny. That made it nicer. I went for a walk and felt like a human. Mr. Gallagher subbed for me that day and made sure they ate a lot of broccoli. At some point I went to the store and bought pints of Ben and Jerry’s– one for each kid and one for the substitute teacher. They picked their flavor from the pictures I sent from the grocery store.

Thursday was yesterday and maybe the longest day. Like a big yawn into saying,  Have we been doing this for a week already? 

And then today. I wanted the freedom to give a half day because I wanted to be the fun homeschool teacher (much like Mr. Gallagher), but then I realized that it was almost lunchtime and I was using my calculator to help Celia determine whether 42 could be divided evenly by 8. (The answer, in case you are wondering is: NO. I should not be allowed to help with math).

But I had a thought today. It was this.

We get used to the default. If the default is busy and barely two ships passing in the night, then that is how you live. That is what you do. If the default is this- unlimited time together with no big break from it in the near future, you adjust to that, too. Sometimes not in the most graceful ways. But you adjust. You change. The house feels small and loud. The kitchen table is a co-working station and a classroom. A lunch spot and a teacher-video recording space. Everything is everything all of a sudden.

And then another thought, This will change us. 

Today, I allowed an afternoon movie during a rainstorm. I finished up emails and communication with students, kids watched the new Jumanji movie. Then the glow of an after-rain sun came through the window.

“You guys want to go for a walk?”

We walked to a farm nearby and ran around their open field. A field trip. (Get it?) It’s a place where we have watched the sunset as a family in the past, a great spot for playing tag. Which is what they did.

It was brief. It was sweet. It was absolutely nothing I would have ever suggested we do on any other Friday when I was jockeying between dishes, laundry, and talking out the weekend schedule with my husband.

But it was amazing. Because, as we were there, the skies opened up and a fierce rain came down on us. Parker and Celia squealed with a happiness that made my heart tingle. We ran on the sidewalk back. Rain soaked everything.

They peeled off socks and shoes and jackets on the front porch. I sent one up to a hot shower and started making dinner.

Parker cuddled under a blanket on the couch. “Rain never felt that good, Mom. That was awesome.”

Tears stung my eyes and I wrote down his words in my Corona journal immediately. The absolute purity of the unexpected moment, the joy in the run back to our house from the field– it filled us up. With all the uncertainty, the worry, the moments of being completely overwhelmed, we were able to get caught in the rain. A week ago, I would have taken advantage of that moment. I would have missed it.

Bridgette today is wiser than Bridgette a week ago (and possibly a bit better at 3rd grade Math). And, I am, we are– all of us–forever changed.

Author’s Note: Anonymous Summer Children wrote this post in the spirit of the other posts I have written over the years.

We have dirty feet, questionably greasy hair, marshmallow in the corners of our mouths, and possibly too many potato chips in our bellies.

We are the summer children.

When we aren’t asking for a bike ride or an ice cream trip, or *another* round of mini golf, we are debating, questioning, and arguing in the back seat of some van or SUV and you are probably turning up your podcast not to hear it, again.

But we are so sweet. We still crawl into bed with you in the morning and laugh at (some of) your jokes. We ask if you know where all of our stuff is- even before we look for it. That’s just the what summer children do.

We sleep until we want to get up and stay up later than you ever used to allow. Our boundaries have stretched so far, sometimes even we feel guilty. How much ice cream are you going to let us eat?

We play with all of your friends’ kids and like the lack of supervision that comes with huge parties and gangs of pre-tweens running through a backyard. Your friends have pools, trampolines, lots of snacks, and streaming TV we don’t have, so we like that, too.

You signed us up for camps so you could get some peace and quiet. We didn’t mind. We made friends and only missed you a little bit most days. You wrote us a letter for each day of our sleepaway. We know you missed us even in your peace and quiet. We liked that, too.

You packed so many bags and did so much laundry, and applied so much sunscreen, we know you must be tired of that. But summer laundry has nothing on winter laundry, or that’s what you said once anyway.

We like to cuddle on rainy days as long as no one is around and we tolerate the chores you give us. Sometimes we have to do extra chores because of our behavior and we get that, too. Especially when the completion of said chores means-ice cream?

We are happy we get so much more time with you in July and August. We don’t always say it but we know that the daily fun you have prescribed for us is something we will always remember and try to create for our own kids.

Summer children are loud, sometimes naughty, and often are sent outside. But they also collect rocks, make very specific plans for lemonade stands, and catch fireflies.

But we also know you don’t want us to transition out of summer mode too quickly.

School year children have regular bedtimes, more predictable moods, cleaner feet, and perhaps more balanced meals (not as much ice cream). But they don’t have the sparkle, the carefree nature, the zest for adventure quite like the summer child.

We know you know this.

So, we promise not to transition a minute too early. We promise to let you keep making us s’mores, keep nagging us to shower, and keep folding load after load of laundry.

Because we see the corners of your eyes fill up in beautiful moments. Summer parents are total saps.

Your summer children know you love the summer as much as they do.

And we know you’ll be sorry to see us go.

There was a part of parenthood, the early part, if I remember correctly,  that felt a bit lonely. These little people I made didn’t have a very vivid vocabulary yet or superb conversational skills. They ate things while strapped into a chair. They got dressed when I carried them into their room and dressed them. They went to the car when I carried them to the car and strapped them in. They needed me endlessly. Until they didn’t.

This part of parenthood, the part I find myself in now with a 7 and 8 year old, is definitely not as lonely. In fact, some days it seems like I have zero chance of ever being alone again. I treasure the hours between 8 pm and 10 pm (when I am currently writing this), because these are the hours when I remember my own thoughts, watch my own TV, eat my own unhealthy snacks.

I am nostalgic for the days of sippy cups and morning feedings. I miss the blissful quiet of a well-earned afternoon nap after an exhausting pumpkin patch visit. I watch videos of them as babbling toddlers on the verge of tears. Where did that little voice go? What happened to that little face? It’s almost like I dreamt it.

They are big personalities now. They fight, have specific opinions about EVERYthing and vocalize their experience with the world play by play. There’s zero quiet time, very few morning cuddles, and bedtime stories are read less and less by me.

But there are still Barbies in the bathtub.

When I stand in bathroom, simultaneously drying my hair and scrubbing the toilet (don’t judge) and I see my husband dump 8-10 naked Barbies on the floor before he takes a shower, I remember.

This is a phase, too. 

There will not always be Barbies in our bathtub. There won’t always be little Lego heads stuck in the vacuum. There won’t always be slime staining the bedroom carpet AGAIN.

Today, I sat in my house alone trying to read a book. Being alone in my house, while luxurious, feels wrong. The mess that is our house is an expression of the life inside it. The french toast casserole left on the paper plate tells the story of the picky boy who doesn’t like “things with eggs in it.” The decks of cards spread under the coffee table tells the story of the little girl who makes up her own card tricks.

And the Barbies in the bathtub mean she still plays in the bath. I still wash her hair. And she still lets me.

This phase feels different. Like the calm before a storm that I never want to come. The luxury of my children, and their stuff, spread far and wide so there is no mistaking their presence.

Their shoes will get bigger. Their showers will get longer. The time out spot will shift from in front of the front door to behind the door of their bedroom.

The snacks will disappear more quickly, the conversations will be shorter and reveal less. The grocery bill will increase. My inbox won’t be filled with Sign up Genius PTA spam.

They will text me with requests from upstairs. I will knock on their door and offer snacks.

And there won’t be a Barbie in sight.

I’m having trouble appreciating this phase of the parenting hamster wheel. It feels more ominous, it tricks me in its exhausting chaos. It makes me think I want it to end.

But between the hours of 8 pm and 10 pm, I am praying to God it slows down. Because I am missing it before it is even gone. I am mourning it before it has a chance to disappear. I am feeling like this part of parenting is falling through my fingers.

Nine years ago, I held a baby in my belly and had so many thoughts of how I would be a good parent to the little person inside me. I didn’t know that the more I parented, the more I would want to parent. And not meaning more children, but more chances to parent the same children. Wishing for the time travel of hearing your baby make new baby sounds, or listening to them laugh their baby laugh, or the way they would say “try again” when they wanted to see something repeated.

So, for my parents of children aged 7-11, look for the signs in your own home. Remind yourself that though so many parts of the baby and the toddler might be amiss, there’s little signs that the souls that you live with are not yet tweenagers.

And, for a while, I promise I will not organize all the abandoned items of playtime into their prescribed Tupperware bins. I will not yell down the stairs about the doll clothes that are spread all over the hallway. I will not line up the books perfectly on the shelf for the umpteenth time.

For a while, I will think: this is a mess I should try to love. Because in the naked Barbies left stranded in the bathtub, there is evidence that they still have more growing to do.

I read this post recently and was very moved by it. When you are in the middle of parenting, it seems like it’s a never ending challenge of refereeing arguments and trying to set screen time limits that you know won’t mess them up. You worry about reading levels and temper tantrums and bullies on the bus, and you don’t think that there will be eventually an end to all that parenting.

My sister is about to send her two adult daughters across the country to live in California. When I talk to her, I feel an overwhelming sense of sadness as I know she is bidding farewell to a part of her parenting life. I feel cozy in the idea that I am not there yet, my farewell is still far off. I mean, my kids are only eight and six, I have many more years, right?

That’s what I keep telling myself, anyway.

When Parker was six months old, we moved out of our house for an entire summer and spend it on an Adirondack lake. The summers that followed were spent on the same lake while people rented our house in our little tourist town. In 2015, we bought our RV and summer took a new shape. The inaugural trip was what caused me to start this blog. Every summer thereafter has taken a different traveling path. Some are long trips, some small trips, sometimes we stay with family, friends, or Mike’s teaching assignments take him away from us and I pack the van up for weekend rentals with my two well-trained vagabonds. And we go.

Because we are teachers, we get to have this life. Since I stopped working when we had kids in the summer, I have been able to devote time to them in time to preparing our house for whatever guests we may host. Sometime in February, we start talking about “what we are going to do this summer” and I start to get giddy with the possible plans that will come and the new places we will explore.

When I tell people that we rent our house for weekends all summer long, I am often asked the question, “Well, where will you go?” I love that question, because somewhere in it is the idea that in order to make our home available to others, we must leave it. But that’s the easy part. We must go. And go we do.

This summer, we are not going as far as other summers, but the cumulative nights spent away from our own beds will exceed 30 nights. We will be in guest rooms, on air mattresses, and in the comfort of the RV. But, we will be together.

My children have very little attachment to staying in one place. I mean, they’ve never really had a choice in the matter. I am always in awe of their thirst for adventure. The tradition of our vagabond summer has become a way of life that our family expects of summer time. Sometimes it’s stressful, sometimes it’s rather expensive, but it’s always part of us.

I spent every summer of my first 17 years of life in the house I grew up in. I went on camping trips with friends and neighbors, I got to visit my aunt who had a camp on the Susquehanna River, but, comparatively, I saw none of the beautiful chaos of being on the road that my children see each summer.

You see, where we go is not important. Making money on renting our house is not important (okay, it’s nice) but the ability to experience summer as a vagabond family has become a part of the fabric of who we are. It’s something we probably spent more time and money on than we have decorating the inside of our house or picking out perfect landscaping. It’s become a challenge that we rise to summer after summer.

I’m more than halfway through the 18 summers I will spend with both of my children and in looking back, I’m so grateful for everything we’ve been able to show them. But, I don’t think it’s necessarily the number of states or national parks or beaches or lakes or campgrounds that you show a child, it’s more just the idea that in wherever we go, we are there: together.

I never expected this would be the childhood I would show my children. I never set out to be someone who constantly has a bag packed all through July and August. I never thought I would crave the purity of family travel once the warm weather set in.

But because we go, and we have always gone, I know that some day I will be sitting on the phone with my sister talking about how Parker and Celia are set to move away from us. I know I will have that same feeling of loss and happiness that is so conflicting as a parent.

So, I will take the chaos. I will take the mediocre Airbnb reviews. I will take the heat waves that kill my flowers when I am away. I will take the endless cleaning of my house before I leave. I will take the emotional weight of remembering to pack *all of the things* that everyone needs in one little minivan. I will take the travel crabbiness and the car fighting. And I know what I get from all that is probably worth it’s weight in gold.

We will go. They will remember. And I hope they will seek the same vagabond summers themselves someday.

I’m just crossing my fingers it’s in this time zone. 🤞

The story of this trip begins with an air conditioner issue. The first leg of the journey was through the pouring rain with issues with directions and an odd sound coming from under the hood.

It continues with a hot journey from Hagerstown, Maryland to Williamsburg, VA and a funny noise. The story continues with smoke billowing out one morning in North Carolina right before a ferry trip and the loss of power steering.

It goes on, still,  with a repair on an island. Where the mechanic came to us and only charged us $300 before we were up and running again.

Traveling can undoubtedly be stressful. There are many memories I have of tears, tension and the admission that, yes, I didn’t tell you the right place to turn.

But that’s all a part of the story. The good, the bad. The ugly. People said to me two years ago, when we would tell about some of the pitfalls of the trip,  “You didn’t post that story on the blog!” And indeed I didn’t. Some stories are only funny if you tell them in person and some are only really impactful if you know Michael or myself personally.

Stories are a part of my life everywhere I look. They are part of my job,  part of what I try to do in this blog. Stories play a large role in my marriage (often at my expense!) and are what I try carefully to curate as my children grow in the pictures I take, the travel journals I keep, the memory boxes I prepare from our adventures.

I write to tell stories. I travel to have stories to tell.

In reflecting, the story never has the luster of perfection, the shine of nostalgia,  the poignant details which make it funny until long after it’s over. There were times when I cried. There were times when I yelled. There were times when I thought that I should be or feel or act happier about the great opportunity we have each summer. But, for some reason, those things never make it into my stories. Like disappearing ink or a shooting star, the bad stuff fades quickly in order for the good stuff to squeeze up to the foreground. Nostalgia is tricky like that. Makes a blurry picture crisp. Vivid. Flawless.

I also happen to be a terrific sap and have a memory that I like to think is a vault. Each evening of the past three and a half weeks is locked tight. But it’s the good stuff that rises to the top. Only the cream memories remain.

I miss my bed. My friends. My home. But each time we go away, I bring something else back.

What I bring back with me this time is humility. Empathy. The ability to adapt. The person who came back from the 2015 trip was a little high on herself and all her traveling wisdom. The 2017 traveler knows never to count yourself skilled in anything too quickly. New experiences will show you pretty fast that: You’re not quite as prepared and clever as you thought you were.

I also bring back my family. Our stories. Our memories. And all of the ugly warts of our travels. But, with them, we have lots of cream. Lots and lots of cream.