Finally Home!

Before I begin just a shout out to the Petura Patrol Pals, Kim, Stacy, Jen, Christina and Hana. You are always welcome on my blog (even though you should probably be taking care of your kids or something)!

Ok, after getting home from the beach you come into the house and because of total exhaustion you drop your cooler, kick off your deck shoes (which are still crunchy inside from sand), drop your bag with the sunbloc, the book you did not read, your sunglasses which somehow have lost one of the lenses and your camera which only has two beach pictures because you did not check the batteries before leaving and your SD card was already filled anyway. Hopefully, those pictures are of the girl with the wedgie and no top. You go up to shower and even the cool water seems like needles hitting your hot pink, soon to be fire engine red, skin. Once showered you feel a little better but your skin is very hot. Slumping onto the sofa you pass out cold and sleep for about 3/4 of an hour only to be wakened by your cell phone. You look but don't answer and realize that the movement to look at the phone is excruciating. Your whole body is stiff as well as hot. There are great streaks on your face from where you laid your head on the arm of the sofa and you realize you look like a racoon because you left your sunglasses on at the beach. Little blisters are forming on you shoulders and the tops of your feet look like raw London broils. Ah summer! Did you ever notice that whenever you have bad sunburn everyone seems to slap you on the back, step on your foot and say stuff like, "Were you out in the sun?" or "Boy, you look like a lobster!" to which I always answer, "No" and "Yeah, you should see my tail"! When you are sunburn aren't all other people idiots? When you are sunburn don't you want to hurt your children when they climb on you? Doesn't getting into the great outdoors really lift your spirits? NOT!!! My problem with Summer is that I hate everything about being outside and everyone else thinks we should always be outside because it is summer. The catch is that since I work in a high school that is when we have off. It seems much smarter to me to have winter off and go to school in the summer. In the winter when weather is bad and it is real cold outside how great would it be to just stay in bed and not go to work? If we had school in the summer we would get off at 2 or 3 PM and still have 5 or 6 hours of sunlight to "enjoy". Well, that's not how it is so I guess I have to live with it. Have a great summer. If you need me I'll be in the living room enjoying the air conditioning and watching Dr. Phil.

Can't Wait For Summer!!

Its that time of the year again. School is almost over for me and then we will begin the lazy, hazy, crazy days of summer. Oh the fun we will have grilling our food out back when it is 97 degrees and 90% humidity. Let's not forget the extra plus that huge bees and hornets will be dive bombing at our head, arms, legs and face while we are enjoying the grilling experience. It also gives me the opportunity to pick up whatever I drop on the grass and patio blocks as quickly as I can so that YOU never know it hit the ground. Of course, I will strategically place it on the platter (whatever it is) so that I know where it is and it will be you who eats that one!

Then there will be the days we go to the shore to "enjoy" the beach on hot days. We will pack wonderful lunches and fill a cooler with cold drinks and head to Cape May or some other acceptable place. If we are really lucky, lots of grandchildren who will be quickly disenchanted with the 2 hour ride will come with us. Then we can "enjoy" spending time with them as they yell in the car, "Are we almost there?" When we finally get to the beach the real fun will begin. We can spend about 20 minutes looking for a parking space close to the beach only to park where we should have in the first place. Then we can carry all the great stuff we brought for 10 minutes as we make our final approach to the sand. Oh yeah, the sand. When we finally get to it it will be incredibly hot and burn our feet as we prepare to have fun and find the perfect spot to drop all our crap on the floor. Finally we arrive! Ok spread out the blanket (which will keep folding from the gale winds which are always at the beach). When we finally get that done the blanket will be sprinkled with sand like measles on a 2 year old. Now we can sit (so that some of that sand will stick to our legs and get into that sadistic mesh thing that put inside mens' bathing suits to make sure we are never comfortable when we wear them). Ok, now the real fun begins. Once seated we get to look around at all the others on the beach. There's the 5'9" man who weighs 225 and is wearing the speedo. He has a tatoo of Jane Fonda on his thigh. There is the 72 year old guy who has obviously hit the tanning booths before the beach season began. Lots of stuff is hanging from his extremities in the form of skin tabs and hair is growing on things that should not have hair (eg top of his ears, elbows etc.). He also has volumes of grey hair on his chest and legs. And then there's the ladies. Many are wearing bikinis or two piece bathing suits and are spending all their time trying to cover themselves. And lets not forget the twentysomethings who lay on their stomach, get a wedgie, unhook their tops and then cop an attitude when you look at them! About 20 minutes have passed and I am thinking about when we are going to leave. I can't mention that though because everyone will yell at me (I know that from previous years when we went there to have fun). Some dope says, "Lets go into the water". We do and that is another serious error. It is freezing. Also there are various forms of algae floating everywhere and unusual, never before seen things are biting our toes. And let's not forget the jelly fish. We had enough and head back to the blanket to dry off. OK, lets eat. We unpack the lunch and drinks and cannot figure out why there is sand all over the soda cans. We never opened the cooler! The first bite of the sandwich makes a crunching sound. Ham and cheese is not supposed to crunch. More sand. How did that happen? I can only eat one sandwich because sand fills me up. I don't know about anyone else but I think I'm getting a little red. Why? I put lots of sunblock on. (That's another story. Slimy, greasy sunblock that never goes away and always makes you feel like you work at Jiffy Lube). I guess I missed the part behind my legs, my ears, the top of my head, my neck and especially my ankles and the top of my feet. After about 2 hours (seems like 10 to me) we get ready to leave. The gear is not as heavy because we have consumed the food but we are all feeling a little skeevy so the journey back to the car is no more fun than the trip to the sand. Finally we get into the car and I blast the air conditioning. This is what summer is all about...air conditioning. Now we can drive home burnt, with chills, itchy from the sand stuck in our butts. We spend about $15 per day to air condition our house and we just went to the hot, humid beach so that we could enjoy a summer day. Yeah, summer's coming. Get ready for the fun.

Can't Get A Break

Even on my birthday I can't catch a break! All I wanted to do was blow out my candles. Four little faces show up and not only blow out the candles but probably deposited a huge amount of kid spit all over the icing! As if that wasn't bad enough, they ate most of the cake too. What they didn't eat they left on the chairs and floor. Aren't kids really cute?

And The Beat Goes On

Thirty-eight years ago right now I was a single man. I knew the night would not bring much sleep and I was right. I just laid awake and had short naps because all I could think about was my wedding tomorrow. We planned for that for over 2 years and suddenly it was our time. Thinking back it seems that those two years were longer than the following 38! Where has the time gone? What an adventure! Who in their right mind has 7 kids? I think the key word there is "right". Neither one of us is really mentally OK. But that old saying has come true for us. You know the one about grandchildren being the reward for putting up with your rotten kids!

We have really been blessed in our marriage. There have been a minimum amount of emergencies in our lives and the lives of our kids. Except for an occasional bunch of stitches, broken bones and a surgery here and there things have pretty tame. For the most part, we all have enjoyed good health (not counting hearts).

I think all young couples getting married have stars in their eyes. That's the way it should be. But 38 years later, in this moment of reflection, the stars still twinkle. I look forward to the next 38 years with my bride (hopefully, 35 of them will be in NC).