Elianna had a meet in Lincoln Park. It doesn’t take long to get there from here. It was occurring to me earlier that she’s kind of had the same issue as my son where more experience running has not necessarily resulted in faster times. My daughter is one of the most disciplined people I know and in season and out of season has been faithful with her running for years. I really don’t study it or anything, but in my head it just seems to make sense that the more you stick with it the better you’d get.

Her friend on the team has had a similar experience. I think of how much change occurs in their bodies over these years from junior high through the end of high school and even beyond. Every year they are essentially running with a different body. Every season, ever race, is a different experience from the one before. But then there are ones who do get faster and you remember when they were younger and have watched them grow and develop in their running as the leading runners in their races.

So I don’t know. This is probably the hardest course of the season. Dad and two of the boys went their way and me and another one of the boys went our way. I said he didn’t have to come with me but he said it was fine. He was interacting with one of the squirrels along the course. We found our way to the hill but only stayed for the first loop. The next time we were higher up past the hill. When the girls went by we went back to the finish line. I used to cheer for all the runners but I had to let that go.

I have been thinking the past few days about marriage, specifically the marriages of my aunt and my in-laws. I’d never pretend to know the ins and outs of a person’s marriage, but just based on the things I did know about each of them, it seems that even though these marriages went almost 50 and 45 years respectively, there were seeming elements of unfinished business. Longings never met, issues that went unresolved. I kept imagining my father-in-law, in his hospice bed, and what I wished he’d done.

How I would’ve given anything in some moment (not anything, but that’s the saying) to see him wake up, take her hand, and say “Thank you for everything.” And later I thought truly how tragic that any marriage would go without saying it, without so many of these important things being expressed: “Thank you. I love you. I’m sorry.” Are we meant to go that whole way and have there still be barriers? Dreams abandoned? Words unfelt or unsaid, or even love unrecognized? Must all of us wait until eternity to love truly?

Dad and the boys were gone today at the gulf outing. It’s an annual fundraiser that people do to for camp. When I heard the boys were going too I held my hand up to my heart and said, “my boys”. I felt a pang of sadness that we wouldn’t be spending the morning or day together doing our school things. They seemed genuinely confused that I would miss them. They were only going to be gone for the day.

But I kept busy. We actually did do some school in the morning before they left, which wasn’t until around 9:45. After that I showered and sent my sister my resume. She was looking for examples as she is wanting to step away from the job she does at their church but doesn’t necessarily have a ton of official experience. She has all kinds of skills including graphic design which she regularly donates to the camp.

Then I went shopping for groceries. It was a big deal because I went ahead and did one of the larger pantry stocking trips. Extra potatoes, apples, seasonings, etc. Squash, beans, even a bag of lentils and another of bean soup. I promise either one can be made to taste good and turned into a meal people like. In addition I picked up window clings for the dining room and ingredients to make a dessert again.

I also picked up a bag of ready-made chocolate cookie dough. Sometime, I thought, I will make these for whoever to have homemade cookies when they get home. I decided to make them for the two bigger kids who had a half-day at school and were home for lunch. It’s hard for me to do things sometimes as I think, “But we’re not all here, what’s the point?” But it still means something to the ones who are there.

They liked the cookies and said it was one of the best lunches they’d had in a long time. One, because it was home, and two, because there were extra snack things, plus the stuff for the sandwich, plus the cookies to top it all off. That is one of the special things about the day you go to the store, there is food in abundance. I put the cold food away but told Josh I would get the rest sometime. The boys finished it later.

I got lost on my way out of school. We were done with class about 8:30. I walked out of the classroom and toward the elevator where I hit the down arrow. A woman wished me a safe trip home and I thanked her and disappeared behind the doors. When I came out of the elevator I walked in a direction until it seemed like nothing I was seeing looked familiar. I thought maybe I’d gone too far down to the basement floor.

So I walked up the stairwell until I came to the next floor. The woman I’d said goodbye to was walking out with a friend of hers who is also in the program. It was obvious I was lost and the door they were walking out was not the usual door that I come in when arriving for class. This looked like a main entryway and door but mine is a door with a skinny hallway. This wasn’t ringing any bells for them and they thought maybe I came in from the back.

But they weren’t going to leave me to figure it out on my own. We ended up walking to the woman’s car and she drove me around until we found mine. It didn’t take long to find it. I had just been excited that I didn’t need Maps anymore for directions. The woman is very beautiful and I almost told her but didn’t. I was very grateful for her help and time. I hope I do not do that again but I find the Brookens layout confusing.

Dad said that Ron said there was leftover orange juice and milk in the camp fridge. Most of the time the food extras are good. Sometimes in the summer they have an abundance of scrambled eggs or several Ziplock bags of egg casserole they send home with us. Especially in the summer when we are eating down there, the eggs do not end up getting eaten and it gets to the point where no one really wants any more eggs.

But orange juice and milk we will definitely take. I was eating supper after getting home from internship when the muffled sound of the boys talking to me with thoughts and ideas turned into us getting into the van to drive down there. My son with the drivers permit drove. I can tell a big difference since he’s started with the driving every day after school. We are always afraid of hitting cats but they so far seem to know to move.

My son parked and the younger boys went into the kitchen. I said to make sure he had it in park so that he didn’t accidently run over anyone when they came back out. He said it already was in park which was good. There was a song he thought I’d like that he wanted to look up and play from my phone. It was Lullaby by Lord Huron, a band we both like. All of my sons have different temperaments, it completely fascinates me.

We drove back. I didn’t get a long enough chance to listen to the song to see if I liked it. I’ve told the boys that the songs by this group are basically all about the same person. One of the writers fell in love with a woman and almost every song he writes now has something to do with her. They thought I read that information in an interview somewhere, but I said no, you just have to listen. They’re all about the same person.

I was eating a peanut butter and jelly sandwich. Dad and Elianna had left around the same time to find her some ice cream. The gas station didn’t have any so they continued on to Country Market. They were taking too long and I thought perhaps there’d been a crash. Dad didn’t answer but they were home not long after. He said, “You weren’t wanting me to get you food were you?” I said, no, you were just taking too long.

I am finally feeling better after several weeks of not. It’s still not great, but it’s better, and I am thankful for those days when the better comes back. The boys and I went down to the beach in the afternoon. None of us were up for swimming but they played baseball in the sand and I sat on the dock and on the beach and attempted some exercises. We ended when one of the boys was accidentally hit in the face with an oar.

When we first started homeschooling, I had extreme thoughts about how we were preparing our kids to live in a war torn country that was different from the one we grew up in. They would need to know two important things in order to survive this or at least cope while enduring it. The two things were 1) how to work, and 1) how to sing. People don’t know how to work anymore. If they could know how to do the humble people work that does not fade, the cleaning toilets, the washing dishes, these kinds of jobs will always exist, and if they’re willing to do them they will always have a job.

The other one was singing. It’s how the slaves survived when they were working in the cotton fields. In their heart is where these songs would live, and they could carry these songs there wherever life would take them. When they were in their concentration camps, or stuck in traffic, or going through a particularly rough time in life, the songs would come back and help get them through. They would be uplifted through voice.

Every so often I’m reminded these days that it is junior high boys who are homeschooling here, and not the younger ones who once were. This morning we started school time with a synchronized floor dance, or at least I tried to start off school that way. I was really just being silly, but I was surprised at how difficult it was to get them to do it, indeed, I could not get them to dance with me.

We sat on the floor and I tried to have them form a circle with our hands touching also. This is something I did with the yoga group this summer during high school week. It wasn’t really yoga. It was movement and stillness to the sound of indie-folk music. It was absolute heaven and I loved every second of it. The group was mostly girls, and at times it hits me too how outnumbered I am at home in terms of girl energy.

One of my boys said such dancing was against his morals and he could not bring himself to do it. I wasn’t interested in forcing him, but I did say, how about just moving one body part to the music? A finger, anything? He could do that. Obviously my priority in homeschooling is not to get my boys to loosen up and become better dancers. For me it’s about environment, togetherness, and nurturing the faith.

And I’m used to it feeling like I’m accomplishing only about 5% of what I actually want to do in the way of prioritizing this. Maybe it’s a little bit higher this time. I think about my older kids and the times that we also had together here. I was so much more exhausted when we were homeschooling all of them though I would never, ever, trade it. It was much more physical in the having to keep them busy and dividing my attention.

A big difference now is no longer feeling the need to entertain. It wasn’t just the little ones who sparked this in me, in fact I would say it was mostly the big ones. I didn’t want them to be bored, one of the great pains and trials of this life. I do not kid. This time the subjects simply speak for themselves without trying to add extras. I feel like I am more understanding of their normal life stages.

“If we live by the Spirit, let us also walk by the Spirit. Let us not become conceited, provoking one another…”
~Galatians 5:25-26~

One of my favorite proverbs when I was little was Proverbs 15:1, “A gentle answer turns away wrath, but a harsh word stirs up anger.” I love the proverbs because they’re so relatable to my life, like someone literally has handed me a guidebook. I see myself in them and see others and also see how I am supposed to be with them and not be. I have neglected the study of God’s words, relying more on worldly advice.

We drive to church in good spirits, the kids in the back of the car minus one. It’s Rally Day for the Sunday School. An announcement is made about trying to get families together for the fall festival again. And then another is made about the survey in the bulletin. Where would you like to serve? Where would you like to be plugged in? I woke up with different things on my mind: how to no longer experience these debilitating setbacks because of this reason. If we could only get this down, but how? I cannot remove myself from this equation. I cannot walk like this alone.

The Galatians verse stands out during church. There’s no need for blame when we’re walking like this, no “if only you wouldn’t or if only you would…”, instead, there’s only “Let us not become conceited, provoking one another”. He takes the fight work out of trying to figure out whose sin comes first, whose fault holds us back, and he shows us where to walk, in step, how to say to one another eye to eye, “let us live…”

Dad went shopping earlier in the week for everyone’s presents. He wanted to get us gifts for his birthday again. I can hardly type it without, it’s not crying, that’s not the word. He asked me if there was anything I wanted. I said some clear nail polish with the French tip white polish to go with it. And maybe a bracelet or something to decorate my arm. I’ve noticed more how women do their nails and wear jewelry like bracelets.

So that’s what he got me. For the younger boys he had them pick out materials for various projects they wanted to work on. Elianna’s running watch had recently quit working so he bought her a new one. Ethan is hoping to get a bike for his birthday, so Dad bought him a thing to lock up a bike on a bike rack. I made him one of his liked desserts and there are certain things that always count, but I didn’t have any gifts.

For supper we met up with his mom. We went to a place called Dublin Pub. All the dirt is leveled out around the house now and recently the landscaping guys planted grass. Earlier in the morning was a meet in Williamsville. Elianna wasn’t feeling great but still ran with the girls. Miles had a game in Kansas that we could watch. He said he was going to try and score my husband a goal for his birthday. He didn’t but they won.

The Concordia team had their Augustana Twilight Invitational again at Yankton Park Trail in Sioux Falls, South Dakota. I’d been planning for months to go, so much did I enjoy the trip to see this meet last year. But I ended up needing to cut out a trip. I completely would’ve gone if I’d had the energy but at the beginning of this week I could tell I still wouldn’t. I am planning on going out for another meet in two weeks, and then another next month. My sisters and I are also planning a trip to New York in October.

I wished I could be there but I’m glad I didn’t go. It was enough for me to be there in spirit even though I’m not sure such said spirit matters much to anyone else. I don’t mean that to sound gloomy it’s just the hard facts that my kids don’t have that same sentimentality when it comes to my memories and wishes and desires to be with them. What feels big to me is often just a small thing for them and vise versa. I wasn’t even going to watch the stream site because it gives me such anxiety to do so.

But I changed my mind and did watch. I can’t help it, it’s like when I know the race is happening that’s just where my head is. He ran nearly two minutes faster than last year’s time at this meet. All the others have moved up as well, so his placing is still give or take the same which is fine. These are the kind of times I was expecting to see last year and I still don’t totally get what the deal was there. He’s still having the breathing issues while running that weren’t there when he was running in the summer.

He went to the doctor and they gave him an inhaler. It’s only been a couple of days so it’s still to be seen as to whether or not it’s going to help. The coach does not seem particularly concerned about it, with his thoughts being that it’s likely either the lingering effects of a past respiratory virus, or a form of exercise-induced asthma. If it is asthma, and the asthma is exercise-induced, then in my head it would make sense that one should take a break from the exercise that is potentially causing the problems.

But it’s not my body. It’s not my running. I probably bugged him about it too much for a couple of days and asked too many questions before I finally hit my “letting go” wall again where I just had to let it go for my own peace and sanity and because there’s actually nothing more I can do. I’m turning into one of those praying women. And obviously I want him to tell me these things so I have to make sure I’m not making that too much of an unpleasant experience. Or something like that, who knows.

The boys and I went swimming before I had to go to class. Dad was somewhere–where was it? I believe he was picking up our son. There are various places he gets picked up from depending on the location of Elianna’s cross country practice. The arrangement now is that when he gets picked up he has to drive home. This is how he’s going to continue getting driving practice and working up to his required amount of hours.

I had these grand plans of starting in September again with a routine but this latest fog and round of sickness has thrown things off. Since the day we drove home from last month’s vacation my steps have been barely crossing over a mile and my productivity at home has been very low. I did take some time to clear the kitchen counter off in the afternoon, also before going to class. Everyone’s things went to the dining room table.

They were sorted into everyone’s normal place settings. From there people were supposed to put things away and when I came home from class I could see that they did. I made a sign to place on the cupboard, above the counter space where I had cleaned. The sign says, “Please do not store things on this counter. Thank you.” I really like it. I went in early to get some IT help. Class was done early so I went home after that.