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[ CONTESTANT #1 ] DON'T IT MAKE YOUR BROWN EYES BLUE?
It's October. The sumac in our yard has turned orange in spots and that lovely green vine growing over the screen on the porch window is turning a very deep red. A certain amount of melancholy makes itself known with that first spot of orange and it sometimes grows as the colors change. I love fall. I love the smells and the colors and the temperature. But it's as though I can hear a violin playing in the background; one little melancholy voice in the back of my head. School is in full swing and life is just not as settled as it once was. Besides making certain everyone is fed and clothed and at least partially clean on a daily basis, I've been Room Mom, organizing "treats" for special occasions, chaperoning field trips, printing brochures for the PTA and completely ignoring the cure for something that's growing in the lower right hand drawer of the refrigerator. The Ex-Fiancé has had the keel repaired on his boat so he's been racing and hugging (the boat, not the wife) more of late. The Cave Dweller (age 11) and the Philosopher (age 9) and I have been doing the homework thing and the eating thing and the cooking thing and the bathing thing and the tucking-in thing and the laundry thing and the-getting-up-in-the-morning-to-start-all-over-again thing. The Philosopher (King of Worrydom) frets terribly about his inability to complete "time tests" in math in under five minutes. His description is as follows (take a deep breath): "Mom the teacher passes out the papers and says GO and I look at my paper and I hear all the pencils writing and writing and writing and all the papers rustling and then I hear pencils being put down and then I hear footsteps walking up to the desk and then I hear the teacher say 'Good job' and I'm only on the first problem!" All of this is said in one breath and the pitch gets higher and higher until his voice is so far into the upper octaves that it registers only with the dog. Last weekend he was so mired down in this that he actually developed a facial tic! When I asked him why he kept making faces, he said, "I just need to stretch my face." So, he walked around grimacing every 30 seconds or so. (He also worries about whether our insurance policies are up to date and if the doors are locked.) I keep telling him that he is way too young to have such concerns, that it's not his job to worry about things. He just says, "Mom, I can't help it. This is the way I came in the package." The Cave Dweller is just happy as a clam spending much of her day being allowed to read and getting credit for it. She has also discovered the science of dominant and recessive genes and has spent the last two evenings making up all sorts of charts to figure out the possible combinations of traits for gerbils with brown eyes and soft fur or blue eyes and rough fur and variations thereof. While she was discussing this "neat gene business" with her father (that would be the previously mentioned Ex-Fiancé) I overheard him say to her, "And isn't it interesting that you have brown eyes, even though your father and your mother have blue eyes?" Lest you think too highly of him for carrying on this educational discussion with his eldest, please note that her mother (that would be me -- wife of the Ex-Fiancé) does not have blue eyes. She has never had blue eyes ... but she does feel a tic coming on ...
Maybe I'll go stretch my face for a while.
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