When I came home from work on this third of a string of three gorgeous blue-sky-sunshine days it was to find my daughter lying on the trampoline in the sunshine with a friend, my son writing diligently on some extremely involved project he’s working on that mostly consists of lists of clans and names and monsters (much reading of the D&D Monster Manual going on right now, even though he’s never actually played a game), my husband outside in the front yard ripping moss from the lawn with a moss ripper, my father-in-law cosily ensconced in the living room watching the French Tennis Open and my mother-in-law halfway down the line of our stunted backyard hedge, WEEDING under it. In the hot sun. On her knees. She’s over 80.
She makes me feel like such a slug, sometimes.
Heh. Honestly, she loves gardening, and since I know she really misses her own garden since moving to an apartment last year, it’s more than okay that she wants to come to our house occasionally and indulge in her favorite hobby, but it makes me feel rather guilty that I don’t immediatley don a straw hat and get out there on my knees beside her. I’m not a gardener. Not at all. She said, when I remarked on how nice the quarter of the very long row of hedge plants that she had weeded looked, that she loves it and loves to see it look nice. I like to see it look nice, too, I laughed, but I sure don’t want to do it myself!
I was supposed to go to a work party tonight, but I blew it off in favor of a dinner with the Wonders which was subsequently cancelled because of the 5 of us, one just had surgery for carpal tunnel, one is on the verge of a nervous stress breakdown, one’s husband is back in the hospital and one of us can’t drive and relies on two of the first three to get her to the dinner. So even though we all really tried and really wanted to make this happen before we all disappear into summer and vacations, it was just not to be. Then I was going to get together with just one of them tonight but we missed the opportunity and things got away from us today and suddenly it was too late and I was already home. Where my kids immedately put on the power beg for sushi for dinner.
It’s far too hard to say no to the politely worded requests barely veiled threatening demands whining pleading cajoling repetitions response for sushi for dinner when I love it as much as my kids do.
Sometimes, the perfect end to a busy week, several sunny summer days and the start of a weekend is to cave in, go get sushi, buy a new DVD (preferably one with Robert Downey Jr in it) and pop some popcorn. In fact, there’s no “sometimes” about it.