Today we got together with Devon’s Godmother and his two Godfathers to celebrate Heart Day. The real day isn’t actually until Wednesday but this morning was an opportune time to get together and laugh and eat Texas sheet cake for breakfast simply because all our hearts are in working order and it seemed like a swell idea to do so. A weekend of Halloween madness and soccer festivities has knocked me on my butt enough to where the act of composing more words is just too damn challenging.

For the past couple of years I have been whining, none too subtly, about the trials and tribulations of being a mother to a boy teenager. It’s mostly been senseless blubbering about his lack of good decision making, how me is making me crazy, etc. Tonight I encountered a new creature all together in my home and I am scared senseless;  the Pre-teen She Child. Holy hell. Not only is she a ruthless animal who enjoys taking down weaker beings, but she is smart and hungry. After she fells me she’ll fry me up and serve me with a side of sweet peppers just because she can. And she won’t share any of it with her siblings. We have six more months until she hits her teen years. Maybe if I keep her well fed and happy we will have relative peace in the house. But I must admit I’m scared.

Tonight Cassidy and I were walking hand in hand through Lowe’s while I searched for some suitable window coverings for my classroom. I hate Lowe’s, it overwhelms the hell out of me and I avoid if at all possible so to have Cass along for conversation was a good thing. She was pattering on about all things ‘tween when I suddenly heard her voice rise an octave, this is always my cue to tune in and be mom-like. “Mom, I’m funny looking.” This was said with a dramatic sigh and dip of her shoulders.

“Well, of course you are, honey. You’re 12 1/2. Your parts are all growing at different rates and you have a mouth full of metal.” I almost immediately realized this was the most wrong of replies when she turned her brown eyes towards me and her above mentioned mouth trembled.

“I’m an ugly duckling, Mom. I’m ugly now and always will be. I’ll never have my swan day.”

Oh dear. Ouch. True enough she is funny looking right now. Girl is 5′4″, 85 pounds. Add a head of thick red hair, freckles, brown eyes and the metal mouth and it’s not an easy package. But the thing is that in about five years Sister is going to be a stunner the likes of which can’t be touched by regular ole humans. She’ll hit about 5′9″, have the sort of physique most of us gals can only dream of, the red hair and freckles will calm down by then. But more importantly Cassidy’s got it going on inside. She is not only smart, she is a smart ass. She can deliver a zinger without even blinking an eye and leave the recipient, often me, reeling on their ass. Cass reads, writes and delivers. She will be a star and a swan all in one breath. And her one day? It will be a lifetime of fabulousness. She doesn’t get that now. Right now she is the lone red fish in a sea of blondes and brunettes. She is lanky and knobby when the others are curvy and soft. I want to tell her it will even out, and I do. She doesn’t believe it right now because these words come from her mom who is old, 39 is ancient to her. But her day will come and when it does I hope she looks back at her awkward days and remembers the path she travled to get there. And so tonight I replied, “Sister Child, this too shall pass. Your duck days will end and your swan reign will begin. You are destined for all things beautiful. I know this much is true.” Of course to this she merely rolled her eyes and heaved another sigh.

About a week ago my Special Man Friend, Doug, came for a visit. This is no small feat considering he lives in the very depths of the Texas desert and to reach my corner of the Rocky Mountains requires some serious determination. Doug came to give me a much needed hug, hang out a bit at The Manor with my mother, give her advice on what sort of river craft will please her and to meet my children. All in all it went well. Okay, no. It was spectacular. The hug was obviously no big whoop. My mom was all giddy to have a fellow over the age of 16 in the house who was willing to help out. The meeting of the children even went quite well. The kids didn’t take one look at my Texan and wail, “Ew, Mom! He’s the wrong height and talks funny. Go out and find a different sort of guy.” Nor did Doug shake his head and drawl, “All y’all are whacked! I can’t take this noise and I’m outta here.” Okay, he rarely drawls, only when confronted with a fellow Texan and they fall into that whole Southern thing where everybody knows everybody’s family tree and where the best BBQ is to be had. When keeping company with regular folk the y’alls are kept quiet and he ends all his gerunds with a full -ing. I like that chameleon like ability of his to pull it out of his pocket when so inclined or keep it tucked away, flexibility in a fellow is a nice attribute.

My mom snapped a few pictures of us before we headed over the Divide to Denver for the weekend. I’m not a big fan of Heather portraits and in recent years have mostly banned them due to the gravitational pull on my body and the unpleasing way it shows up in an image. But what the hell, I adore this guy so much I’ll suffer through my crows feet and be grateful it was windy and cold enough for my down vest to cover up my mid region. What follows is a shameless display of what Loren just labeled “totally over the top, Mom.”  I look at them and wish the Texas desert was not 900 miles away.

Tonight I spent a rare quiet with Loren while he was sitting in his computer chair, an old overstuffed thing left over from the early years of my parents’ marriage that Lo has a strange attachment to, and I was perched on the sagging arm as he clicked through page after page of stuff he had been saving to show me online. I wasn’t really paying too close attention, mostly just nodding my head and enjoying the chance to be close to him in a peaceable moment when all of a sudden he said, “Um, Heather? Are you sniffing me? If you are that’s pretty whacked, you know.”

Crap, he caught me. I had been absent mindedly rubbing his head and smelling his hair. Not in a creepy way, just in a mom way. All moms do this and any of them who who deny it are big, fat liars. Loren obviously expected an answer to my bizarre behavior, so as it was perfectly sensible I replied, “Well, of course I am.”

“Oh. Huh. Why? What do I smell like?”

“Well, you don’t smell like my little boy anymore,” I answered with a sudden fist of grief to my gut.

“What do little boys smell like? And, again? This is a weird ass convo, Mom.”

“Little boys smell like syrup and the morning sun.” And I could remember all the times I smelled his big head when he was small and sweet and innocent. The days before he started tossing around the f-bomb with such ease. Before he started coming home with hickeys on his neck. Before he took to skulking in his room and only coming out for food or money.

“Good thing you still have Devon to sniff all you want. He’s always covered in goo, he must make for some good smells.” Yes, Devon does make for good mom-sniffing. But he’s not Loren, my first born who is now more than a head taller than me and a world away most days. I’ve never been the sort of mom who cried at the first day of Kindergarten, I always figured they were moving on and that was a natural and good thing. But right now Loren seems to be moving away in light speed and it hurts to lose him. He’ll come back someday, I know this. He’ll be more mature, less of testosterone driven animal. And it will be good. But letting him go hurts something fierce and makes me yearn for the days when he snuggled into my lap and held his head still while I smelled the beauty of him.

The warmth of late summer has faded to frosty mornings and the demise of my garden. These were taken a couple of weeks ago when Devon discovered he actually enjoyed the concept of nibbling a few kernels of fresh corn. The deer and rabbits got all the other ears and my cherry tomatoes as well, it was pretty much a daily buffet for them all.

One of my favorite aspects of Devon is his love of The Costume. I use capital letters because since he was about two his attraction to something other than everyday wear has been a devoted one. I first became aware of this in the Halloween aisle of Target, Devon was just a bit over 24 months and when we got to all the sparkly orange and black and he shrieked out the words, “Ghosties, Mai-Mai! Ghosties!” After that day we visited the Halloween section every two or three days until well into November when even the 90% off items were gone. Needless to say, the November turkey theme did not capture his soul the way the wigs, hats and capes of Halloween did. In the three years since then his love of gloves, masks and knee high boots has not waned.

This year the costume catalogs began arriving in late August. By mid-September we had about four or five of them, one for each vehicle and even bathroom reading material. Devon doesn’t quite have his numbers down, but his recall of which costume graces each page is amazing. Phrases such as, “Hey, Mai-Mai, I want the vampire bat costume on the page after the German Beer girl.” Or, “Did you see the glowing alien that comes right after the boy and girl super man page?” Yes, this has been my life for the past five weeks.

Yesterday we happened to be in a Costco about 45 miles away because we had gone to watch Cassidy play in a soccer tournament as a guest player for a team in that area. Of course Devon found the Halloween aisle in about 6.34 seconds flat and then proceeded to evaluate each and every costume in extreme detail. Once he figured out the animals with fat tummies were for wee sized kids, he moved on to the ones with cool accessories like swords and star shaped medals. He was keenly interested in a ninja get up but I nixed that in the name of violence. So instead Dev opted for a magician get up. Yup, the satiny red lined cape, velvet top hat, tux and cumber bun. Oh yes, hire the ice skating coach right now, because this blondie? He is all about the wand and the sparkle.

Some parents might be feeling a bit worried at this point in their child’s life. But me? I already have a 16 year-old who is far too interested in what the girls his age have in their pants. I’ll take my costume loving little fella on any given day. And if he needs something even more over the top before October 31? It’s totally his.

Last fall I signed Devon up for U6 Soccer, it was not successful in terms of athletic development. In fact, he and I were both so lax in our team ethics that he attended only half or so of the practices and not a single mini game. Instead we would often spend those afternoons either in the park or getting an ice cream cone and lounging in the warm fall sunshine. This summer Devon expressed an interest in T-Ball and so, again, I signed him for the lessons. Devon’s T-Ball gusto was such that he had a complete set-up of T, ball and glove at both his father’s and my places. He talked about T-Ball, we watched it on YouTube, it seemed like things were headed in the right direction. Until the day lessons started. Well, actually the second day of practice since on the first day we were lolly gagging in the park and eating ice cream cones. On that second day Devon was pumped up, glove in hand and ready to join the team. Until he saw the organized-ness of it all. First, the concept of just running in one direction after you hit the ball from the T? Not a winner for Dev. Also, the idea that the running occurs only if you hit the ball was not a good one either. Then there was the catching of the ball, the throwing it, again, in a designated direction. It was all a bit much and I think we made it to fewer than half the practices.

This fall I decided to sign Devon up for swimming lessons. The motive behind this was mostly selfish on my part; I could drop him off with his teacher, get 35 minutes of laps in and then get over to watch the last 10 minutes of the lessons. From what I could tell Devon paid attention about 78% of the time. There was plenty of time for pretend to be Spider-Man while waiting his turn to be an assisted motor boat and his teacher was none too demanding in terms of his water achievements. The fact that it gave me some free time to get in a bit of exercise was a pretty good thing as well. Today was Devon’s last day and he received his report card. Now, I know he isn’t top of his class. I got that when I saw him wandering away from his class and mostly giggling when asked to put his face in the water. But really? For what I paid for his lessons I think his teacher could have embroidered just a teensy bit more. But maybe that’s just me.

Would it have been too much for her to check off a few more boxes? How about the simultaneous arm action or feet actions? Something more about recovering from a back float? And really, we know everybody did a great job in the class. Something more original might have made me feel a little better about it all. But my child had fun and, I suppose, that’s what it’s really all about.

I can’t take full responsibility for it, I have a ‘tween child who is smack in the middle of being mauled by the Disney media machine. But, shhhh, I kinda like the new Miley song. Yes, I have reached a new low. But again, I blame it all on the She Child.

watch?v=M11SvDtPBhA

Today I was having a conversation with a lovely woman who I know only slightly. The flow of the chat included the following, “Blah, blah, blah. And, plus, you’re pregnant so you might want to be taking it easy right now. Blah, blah, blah.” I never quite made it to the rest of the blahs-blahs because I couldn’t  get past the sentence where she began, “And, plus, you’re pregnant….”

By the time I recovered, the line of talk had traveled to the point where it seemed less than gracious to say, “Um, can we back up a minute here? Because just so you know? My fallopian tubes? Totally non-functional. When I went in for the surgery I told the doctors not to be shy with the scalpels. I wanted those baby chutes severed, burned AND tied in knots. No, make that double knots. That means no baby baking in my tummy.” So I kept my mouth shut and quietly laid a hand on my gut in some sort of hopes that just by touching it the size of all things me might diminish.

Only once before have I encountered this comment. The previous encounter happened at a wedding where I was wildly drunk and the bride, who had not invited me, asked just how far along I was. Although she was a bitch, she had some right since I was an unsightly nuisance and mussing her perfect day. So I forgive her for it. But this afternoon’s gaffe? Ouch. The thing of it is I have actually lost about 16 pounds in the last four or five months. Sure, another 15 need to go but I don’t think that merits a comment about the signs of a bun cooking in my oven. And also, the business up top? My busty girls? They continue to maintain a formidable presence on my chest. I have gone down a whole bra size, though the cup has unfortunately remained the same double letter digit size. This sort of top region issue leads to problems with finding tops that fit properly. Most shirts drape over my party girls and leave billows of fabric over my belly area, perhaps this excess of fabric lead the woman to assume there must be some sort of fetus brewing in all that cloth. I’ll give her some slack there. And the shirts that do fit are skin tight in the ab region. And really? Nobody on earth really needs to be subjected to that sight. The whole incident made me want to come home and exercise obsessively for several hours and then go on a fast for two weeks. Instead I made a cup of tea and sat down at my computer to lick my wounds and do an online search for better fitting shirts.

About a month ago I found out somebody I once loved had suddenly died. He was young, not yet 40, had a beautiful family and a great life. He was out running and collapsed. A seemingly healthy man dying while exercising. For obvious reasons this sort of thing hits close to home with me since my seemingly fit father died while riding his bicycle about three years ago. There is a website set up by his friends and family that I visit every week or so and read about what a wonderful person he was and how deeply he will be missed. The words are reminiscent of those spoken about my father by many of our friends and family, and like pulling out my eyelashes for the pure pleasure of the hurt I go and read the posts and miss my dad and the boy I loved so long ago.

For all of the sadness surrounding this I have to acknowledge it has made me have a new appreciation of the now. The beauty of simplicity surrounding every day. The present. I find myself really not sweating the little things and instead enjoying some extra time with the kids or reading a book instead of cleaning up the living room. Maybe I’m passing off my laziness on an excuse but I rather like to think of it as an evolution of sorts, an exit from grief and an acceptance of the current love in my life. Not bad, I think.

My birthday was earlier this month, a wonderful day made all the better by  party thrown for me by dear friends. The day after, Cassidy, Devon and I headed over the mountains to lower lands where peaches grow freely. We picked and ate our way through the orchards, at least Cass and I ate while Devon climbed the trees in search of the perfect peach.