Summertime, summertime, sum… sum… summertime

Praise the lord for warm, summery weather.  I know by August, in my un-air conditioned abode, I’ll be whining again but for now, bring it on.  Summertime means leisurely cups of sweet tea or lemonade,  barbecuing with friends and family, and lingering evenings spent outside after dinner, watching the N-Man fight the dense jungle vines in search of mighty beasts and buoyantly bonce about with big bursting bubbles.  Who can possibly get enough of that?  Especially when such fun and frolic leads to a simplified, rapidly comatose bed time?

Remember me?

I’m that mom with the boy and the horse who decided to start a blog about six months ago and then recently, just as I was developing a good following,  disappeared with no warning or explanation.  Um, yeah. OOPS. Sorry about that.  But really, I’ve just had zero blog worthy thoughts lately.  Life is just cruising along:  work stuff you don’t want me to whine about, the N-Man doing his thing, the hoofed coming along swimmingly, actually a little social life I’m not willing to dissect, in literary caricature fashion,  just for the sake of something to write about, and a lot of exhaustion from juggling the first four.   Nothing news worthy at all.

Really the only profound thing that has happened was at a recent trip to the zoo.  The N-Man and I were oohing and ahing over the Bengal tiger, pacing anxiously, up close and personal in his indoor cage, waiting for his  outdoor run to be cleaned.  All of a sudden the huge, magnificent beast stopped and squatted to do his business  and,  in full potty training mindset,  I loudly squealed with delight, in exact  and quite admittedly bizzare unison, with the mom of another toddler, standing next to us,  “Look! The tiger is pooping!!”   Wow!  This is my world?  Openly and proudly discussing feces in public with strangers? At least it’s not just me and, instead, appears to be just an unavoidable phase characteristic of this stage of parenting.  Dear lord, I sure hope someday, someday SOON, I’m no longer excited by a big steaming pile of yuck.

So what can I say?   Aside from  the proper disposal of bodily functions, my biggest conundrum right now is figuring out what to cut out of my backyard landscaping  plans in order to stay within my budget.  YAWN! But you know, that’s a good thing.  After the roller coaster ride of the past several years, I frankly relish being able to look around and realize that  life just is and be content with that.   No drama to define my existence.  Just me.  Just fine with just me.  Frankly, that is  a huge accomplishment.

So hi!  I’m here, just being, and as soon as anything exciting happens, I promise, y’all will be the first ones to know! In the mean time, I just love this pic that Camera Guy took of the N-Man and me  on our zoo trip.  So sorry it’s not of tiger poop.

HAPPY MOTHER’S DAY!

Need I really say anything else?   It’s the  hardest job in the world but I wouldn’t trade it for anything.

Happy Mother’s Day to all the moms out there, single or otherwise!!

Smiling in my sleep

I’m wiped out from a long, perfect day in the glorious, Colorado, spring sunshine.  The kind of exhausted that leaves you aching and incapable of even traversing the staircase, despite the promise of a warm, soft bed.  But, through the haze, I can’t stop smiling, beaming , more like it.  It finally happened.  The hoofed one and I came together and busted it out.  I won’t dazzle you with technicalities.  What matters is he did everything he was supposed to do, with me on his back, for the first time since we met.  And the end result was clinching our first Reserve Championship as a team.  My dear friend -  since  all regular players need a catchy, annonymous title we’ll call him Camera Guy –  nothing less than a genius  behind the lens, was there to capture it all. 

On my mind

1.  I’m frustrated because I haven’t had time to write.  Actually it’s not really the not writing that bugs me so much as, since I decided to do this, I feel obligated to check in now and then.  My issue really.  The lack of time thing though, that is 100% under my skin in a big way.  I have waisted an inordinate amount of time, again, just sitting and sitting and sitting at the courthouse this week and waiting and waiting and waiting.   I’m over it.  I can’t do my job if I spend 75% of my work weeks trapped, unable to do anything but breathe in breathe out and hold in screams. Come on private practice.  Come together so I can put the ball and chain behind me.

2.  X.  Sigh  I dropped the N-Man off at his house this morning at almost 10 am and he was still in bed asleep.  Didn’t see him the whole half hour I was there either, despite the N-Man running up and down the hall screaming.  But in his mind, that’s ok because his mom is there to do the parenting for him. Why should he?   This  happens  probably 90% of the time I drop off his son on a morning when X doesn’t have school.  School he can get up for.  It’s very important that he continue to delude himself that he will be the next Martin Scorsese and spend money on a degree that he won’t be able to do anything with, but getting up to spend time with his child, eh, that’s not such a big deal if there’s someone to pass the buck to.   I’m over fighting with him about it.  I can’t make him be the dad the N-Man deserves, so it is what it is.  But it still bugs the crap out of me and hurts me for the litte guy. 

3.  Yesterday when I picked the N-Man up from school the teachers yelled Happy Mother’s Dayto me as I was walking him out the door.  It made me cry.   It still strikes me as odd to think that I am somebody’s mother.  When did that happen?    Then last night, the N-Man spontaneously walked up to me, sat down in my lap and started singing Happy Mother’s Day to you…   He sang the whole song.  More bawling.  I have found that since that beautiful little creature came into my life, it really doesn’t take much to make me boil over with happy, appreciative, tears of joy.    Yes, I’m crazy!

4.  WE’RE GOING TO DISNEYWORLD!  I officially decided yesterday.  My brother in Florida assures me that Orlando in July will be a disgusting, swampy, humid, steam pot but I don’t care.  I’m in the throes of some serious burn out and need a vacation.  I had already set aside a week for going to an out of town horse show with the N-Man, but frankly, that won’t be very relaxing.  Besides plane tickets to Florida, plus hotels, plus three or four days of Mickey Mouse will actually be cheaper than horse show & trainer expenses and the cost of a condo in Estes Park  at the height of tourist season. I can go to a different horse show.  Right now I need deserve a silly, mindless week of fun like this!

Anatomy 101

It finally happened.  I secured the upstairs gate, closed all the doors, made sure the N-Man was engrossed in his books and then jumped in the shower  for my morning ritual, sprint bathing.  As usually happens, about five minutes in, my head and face covered with shampoo, I heard a faint pitter patter through the sound of water rushing over my ears and suddenly, the curtain flung open. And then… Mommy has a penis!  OK,  I admit it.  I rubbed the soap & water out of my eyes and looked down to check.  Nope.  Not one there.   I turned at looked at the N-Man who was now hanging onto the edge of the tub, ignoring the splashing spray, and beaming with an ear to ear, chicklet grin.  He pointed again and yelled, PENIS!

Now I am one of those parents who believes there is  value of just teaching children the correct words up front, in lieu of dancing around with terms like willy or po-po.  I was able to bring myself to teach him the proper term the day he discovered his own bits and pieces and stretched them for all he was worth.  May as well bite the bullet and do it again. No, baby.  Mommy doesn’t have a penis.  Mommy is a girl.   He looked at me, perplexed.  Oh no!  Where mommy’s penis? Matter of factly, I told him.  N-Man is a boy.  Boys have a penis.  Mommy is a girl.  Girls have a vagina. (For the record, I hate that word, but it is what it is.)  Va-gi-na, he parroted.   Yes baby, that’s right.  Vagina.  The chicklet smile appeared again as he turned on his heal, and exited the bathroom  at full speed, joyously shrieking, Mommy has a vagina! Mommy has a vagina!

Fantastic.  Can’t wait until he tells the guy at Home Depot about his latest discovery.

But on a more serious note,  I wonder, as the solo parent of a boy,  at what point should I start locking the bathroom door and exercising a little modesty when I’m showering or getting dressed?

Mother Nature in menopause

It’s the only logical explanation people.  One day we’re having a 80 degree hot flash with sunshine, happy, chirping birds, and gently blowing breezes.  The next it’s a  frigid low 40’s with pouring rain and/or blowing snow and the kind of winter humidity that seeps into your bones and rattles you from the inside out.   What else could possibly be causing such violent mood swings?   I know that here in Colorado we are known to tell outsiders that if they don’t like our weather to wait five minutes.  But I don’t feel like waiting.  All I know is that it has been cold and rainy or snowy for five weekends in a row now and I need my weekend outside time.  I’m over it!

Can some one please hook Momma N up with some hormone replacement therapy so we can get on with the business of spring and summer?

All about me

Excuse me while I indulge in me.  I figure you won’t mind.  After all, you’re here on my blog, reading about me and my life.   So either you want to know all about me, or you are so amused and/or disgusted by my over inflated ego and sense of self that you just can’t bring yourself to look away from the train wreck.   And if the later is the case, I can make some great recommendations for people to talk to and steer you back to a more satisfied and fulfilled life of your own.

Anyway, I digress. Back to me.  There’s nothing I love more than looking at pictures of the hoofed one and me.  Not in the, Wow, I’m so great I just can’t stop staring, sense.  But in a, let’s see where things are at and how far we’ve come, learning kind of manner.  I’m a very visual person and gain a lot from seeing still photos and watching video replay.  So I was thrilled to come home today and find pictures from last weekend’s horse show waiting in my mailbox.  Props where they are due first, since I’m about to post a scanned  proof  of a picture that, yes, I will be actually buying.  Thank you, as always,  Bryan Ryder of Horse & Ryder Photography!! 

And with no further ado, here were are!

Far and away the best picture we’ve had taken of us, thus far, since finding each other.  And on to my critique a la George Morris.  My back is flat and relaxed.  My eyes are up and focused ahead.  My hands/release are pressing into just the right part of his neck.  And I am thrilled to see that I am no longer standing on my toes and pressing off to climb up his neck.  I’m actually jumping with him, instead of ahead of him.  He looks relaxed.  His ears are up, looking for the next fence or turn, and he has a pleasant expression on his face.

 The ugly.  First of all, we aren’t doing the A rated horse shows this year so he isn’t braided, which is not a big deal, but it makes me crazy, aesthetically speaking, that his mane is flying every which way in this picture.   Photoshop please! He’s a little drapey with the lower part of his legs.  His knees are up and square and even, but he really should be tucking and popping them a bit tighter.  I suspect, as the fences get bigger, it will happen.  He is just a five year old after all.  And me… UGH!  Those pesky toes.  At least they are no longer sticking straight out at a 90 degree angle but I really need to work on keeping them pointing forward.    And my lower leg has slipped back a tad too.

But it’s a far cry from last season.  We’ve come a long way, Baby!  And only better things ahead.  So have at it, you arm chair Grand Prix riders.  It’s your turn.  I’m tough.  I can take it.  What do you think?