Using My Phone

"Mom, May I use your cell phone?" Tabby asked me, responding to my, "Why?" with a laborious explanation regarding Hazel and the hens.  They'd gone out there to gather eggs.

I'm so loving Google Latitude.  My 30 year old son, Sergi, is on it now and the reality of the immense 1315 miles between us is a little too stark.  "Don't remind me," he texted last night, "It makes me really miss you."

But hey, at one point he was living in Japan for three years while in the Navy, this is so much better now.

He can stalk me to the soccer field or to Kroger, to church or to Publix, since I have so many possibilities, right?

99 times out of 100, he can stalk me to the backside of my property, as that's where I prefer to be, in the gardens working.

"Why is Sarah's dad stalking you?" CW asked when he'd checked my phone.  I have kinda nosey teens.

"He's not stalking," I explained, "That's y'all's interpretation of Google Latitude.  Remember he's Ray and Hazel's granddaddy."

That silenced my van as they thought it through.  Wheels, cogs and gears visibly turning in their minds. "But he's not Mexican," Tabby pointed out, which makes little sense to me.

But the soccer field was surely the place to be last night as Allen's team won 3-0, after a fairly dismal season so far.  We stayed late to watch two other U19 teams battle it out into sudden death overtime plus a shoot-out.  The U19 league has slightly less rules, toss on a jersey and play apparently, as CW charged across the field, complaining later how out of shape he'd become.

Sabrina limped in after work also whining about the effort, "My feet hurt," prompting me to point out that this is how I feel most of the time, working my butt off 24-7, while they merely play with their cell phones.  By ten each night I'm kinda whooped.

I ate 4 mangoes and 4 bananas yesterday, knocking out my eat local challenge certainly, but sometimes I go with what my body seems to be craving, sometimes that longing takes me to Krispy Kreme, but usually it's something exceedingly healthy.

I'd put them in the blender with rice milk and a huge dose of protein powder, happily guzzling it and immediately making another huge glassful.  A couple of belches and i was good to go.

Scotty's turning 14 today.  A mom on the soccer field last night remarking, "That's a lotta teenagers living with you," as they clumped around me.  I'd added another to the mix, picking Juan up in order to improve Allen's team's odds.  Juan's parents aren't here, his uncle non-cooperative, so I went and got him to the fields, my family cheering him on.

Maybe so, maybe it is a bunch of teenagers, but they're a really great bunch.  They're eating copious amounts of food, but I'm fine with that.  They're funny and entertaining, demanding and wearing me out, but overall it's such a happy bunch now that we're safe, now that the emotional explosions are so few as to be almost eliminated, no rages, no busted windows, or anyone kicking holes in the Sheetrock - I can't begin to explain how wonderful this sense of being normal now is for us all.

This many teenagers?  Piece of cake.  Even severely oppositional ones are so much easier than any level of violence.  ODD, Oppositional Defiant Disorder, is just annoying, very much so, but not dangerous.