Author name: Sandra Tayler

Howard came home yesterday. That was the biggest happy thing.

Then he checked his email and we discovered not one, but two, convention invitations for him.

Then he checked the forums and learned that Schlock Mercenary: Under New Management was reviewed positively in the latest issue of Analog.

It all combined to make us feel giddy/happy for the remainder of the evening. It is such a nice change from the last couple of weeks where we were both so stressed we could hardly see straight. Convention vacations are a good thing. The only thing that would have made it better was if I could have gone with Howard to World Con.

So I’ve continued my reading of journals past. The experience has become less strange because around age 17 I actually started thinking and sounding like the self that I know. That was reassuring because prior to that I chased a new dream every month or two. In six months time I was going to be a debate champ, act in the school play, letter in cross country and track, sing and dance on stage, spend a year as an exchange student, publish a book, be a youth conference speaker, and write letters to every friend I ever made anywhere (I kid not, I had 5 shoe boxes full of letters from other people which I finally got rid of just before leaving for college, and I wrote far more letters than I ever received.) When I reached the journals for age 17 and older, I started being impressed with some of the writing and insights rather than embarrassed at the social gaffes and inexperience.

At one point during my senior year in high school I was given an assignment to create a pictorial representation of myself. It wasn’t meant to be a difficult assignment, but I agonized over it. I didn’t want to limit myself to any single image. Months after the assignment was past due I finally found an image that fit. One of those dandelion puffs with the seeds blowing off into the sky. I really liked what I wrote about why I selected it, so I’m posting it here:

I am like a dandelion blowing in the wind, flying in hundreds of directions, trying to see everything, wanting to travel the world over, but always missing home, flying high and far on ideas and concepts, but accomplishing little. Needing to be needed and wanting to be independent. I’m such a contradictory person, but I’m happy with me. I don’t want to change. I have infinite possibilities, I just hope other people won’t limit me to one thing in their thoughts.

It really fits who I was then. Now I’m a little more settled, but I still have dandelion days when I want to fly free and travel far. I’m going to get a dandelion day this week. On Wednesday my mom promises to manage the kids while I go off and do whatever I want. I intend to pack a bag and go tour Thanksgiving Point Gardens. I’ll sit and write and draw all without interruption. It will be good. I may also go see a movie. It won’t be a day for getting things done. It will be a day for just being me.

Some nights coherent thought flees and all I’m left with are bits and pieces.

Howard’s still at World Con. He’s having a good time. I’m glad. I wish I could be there with him.

We’ve all survived the first week of school. I’m not comfortable with the schedule yet, but I’m beginning to adapt. So far no major mishaps have interfered with the kids settling into school too. I’ve begun developing good working partnerships with each of their teachers.

I’ve been rereading my teenage journals. It is very strange. I’ve changed so much since then that it’s like reading someone else’s life. And yet it was mine. It has definitely given me a greater appreciation for the challenges that are inherent in being a teenager. I would certainly chafe at many of the restrictions I lived under back then. I had to ask permission to make long distance phone calls. And a distance of 30 miles seemed an insurmountable obstacle.

There was much crankiness here at the house this afternoon. None of us have been getting enough sleep. Tomorrow we can all sleep in and hopefully we’ll have a better day. Perhaps tomorrow I won’t have to chase Gleek through a video store because she refuses to relinquish a desired candy. Also perhaps I can return the pokemon dvd box that came with the wrong disk inside it. The kids were all very disapointed.

I’ve been a journal writer for most of my life. My journal keeping was particularly abundant during my teen years. It tapered off a lot when I got married and began having kids. But I’ve kept the journals I wrote in. I figured that some day it would be useful to me to go back and re-read them. I had in mind that re-reading my teenage journals might be a big help when I had teenage children. Kiki isn’t a teenager yet, but last week I dragged out the earliest of my journals to see if any of it was applicable to a crisis that she was suffering. It was.

But then there were all those other journals. I kept reading, and reading, and reading. It has been an odd experience. Some of the things in my journal I had completely forgotten, so it was like reading someone else’s story. Other things I remembered clearly and the journal just pulled me back into the memory. Some things have made me laugh out loud, like a list of goals written when I was twelve. Number 6 on that list was “establish personality” as if I completely failed to have one prior to that goal. I am astonished at how busy I was and how social. My journals are full of people I talked to, dances I attended, activities I was involved in, guys I was interested in, all of it mixed up together into one big social whirl. I guess I was much more extroverted during my teen years.

It is also fascinating to watch myself as I develop an identity. I struggled a lot with the emotional/physical desire to be with someone and the intellectual/spiritual desire to be strong on my own. Most of my friends were struggling with simillar issues which sometimes made us perfect confidants and other times we made each other feel worse. There was a strong drive to be doing something. I really wanted to be needed, valued. The practice in modern society of putting teens in limbo where they aren’t children, but aren’t yet adults creates a whole set of problems. And yet teens really aren’t adults. I look at these journals and I was so short sighted and short memoried. I’d make the same realizations and complaints over and over again.

It is odd what got put in and what got left out. I’d ramble on and on about some things and then drop a brief mention of a familial conflict without giving any context whatsoever. I was definitely not writing for posterity, just to sort my own thoughts. Kind of like this entry I guess.

I’m up to age 17 journals. I’m going to finish reading through them all.

Thanks to everyone who has offered to send postcards to Kiki. If even half of the email respondants send postcards, Kiki will be thrilled.

I’m also getting what I wished for. Next week my Mom is coming into town and she’s giving me a whole day for myself. Now I just have to decide what to do with it.

Kiki’s class is trying to collect postcards from all over the world. Kiki gets points for every postcard she brings in. If any of you who live outside the US would like to help Kiki feel like the coolest kid in her class, please email me (sandratayler at livejournal.com) and I’ll give you an address to which you can send postcards.

School began today. I bustled to get everyone out the door. Kiki and Link were off to school. Howard ran down to The Keep for awhile. Gleek and Patches ran next door to play with friends. I was left in an oasis of silence. I had the whole house to myself for two hours. It was heavenly. I didn’t do anything productive with it today, but I will be using that time wisely in days to come.

This week is an adjustment week. I’m getting all of us used to waking up earlier. We’re all adapting to getting kids out the door in the morning. And Howard is gone to world con. Kindergarten starts next Wednesday, so after that we can truly establish a “normal” for this school year. Already things are feeling much calmer because I’m actually getting some quiet time during the day.

So far so good with school. Both Link and Kiki had fun and are happy to be going back tomorrow. I hope that holds up.

School starts tomorrow. Am I ready? Are the kids ready? Will this be a good year for them? Will it be a good year for me? I’m honestly not sure how to answer any of these questions. As I mentally review the personalities of my kids and thier particular challenge sets I see so many places that things could get bad. I also see so many places where things could go really right.

Today I go to an open house where I get to meet Link’s teacher and Gleek’s teacher. More information is a good thing. Unfortunately that doesn’t happen until after 4 pm. I need to fill the rest of the day with useful things rather than with waiting for the open house to begin.

I’ve been in a holding pattern for much of the last week. There wasn’t much on the schedule except waiting for school to begin. Tomorrow the waiting is over.

Today I took Patches to his first ever Gym class. He was uncertain about going and so I scheduled my time so I could stay and be with him if he needed me. He needed me for the first 5 minutes. Then he needed me briefly near the end when he was sad. Other than that he mostly ignored me in the parents waiting area. I’m glad because it means that next week I can go run a few errands while he has his class.

Sitting in the waiting room was interesting because I got to eavesdrop on the conversations of other moms who were watching thier kids in Patches class. In particular I listened to two women. For both of them the 3 year old was their oldest child. They were both obviously pregnant. One had two kids the other had three. I listened to them discussing behaviors and potty training and I remembered being them. I remember being stress about the things that they were stressing over. I remember being buried under the needs of multiple young children. It seems odd that I’ve moved beyond that. Now in conversations about toddler behavior I get to be the voice-of-experience rather than the frustrated/stressed seeker-of-answers. When did that happen? I also wonder what, of the things I am thoroughly stressed about right now, will seem like no big deal in a few more years.

Gleek also attended her gymnastics class today. She last took a gym class when she was Patches age. I was amazed at the behavioral difference a couple of years can make. She did much better at following instructions and staying with the group. And when it came time to leave I didn’t have to physically grab her and carry her to the car. I think Little Gym is going to be good for all of us.

Tomorrow Kiki and Link have thier classes. The day after that is the first day of school. The summer has finally wound down to a close. Only the weather doesn’t seem to know it. It was over 90 degrees out today. Tomorrow is supposed to be hotter. Tell me again why I should be buying sweaters for back to school clothes?