Going, going…

I don’t know how far into this parenting thing I have to be before I remember that you cannot have unplanned days with kids. What typically happens around here - Bobby stares at his iPad all day; Theo tears the entire house apart and pronounces he’s bored every three and a half minutes. It’s…not fun. Thankfully my seemingly endless stint at entertaining children without summer camp ends tomorrow, and the week at the end of the month that I have with them I’ll make sure is full of beach days, hikes and pool. I’ll have the energy for that, then. Assuming all goes to plan, we’ll have spent ten days away and then the boys will have spent seven days at sleep away camp, so I’ll be up for the task of leaning into parenthood. Right now I’ve got too many distractions to be up for it.

As of now, it *seems* like none of us has covid and we’ll be able to successfully make it to Fiji tomorrow night. Of course there’s still: none of us waking up tomorrow feeling sick; my sister and brother-in-law’s flight from Florida not being canceled (they’re on the airline with the most cancellations - ugh); our flight not being canceled or having any other issues just getting there. Then we have to pass the covid test at the resort on Sunday. I’m not sure what happens if we have covid in Fiji - do we get locked in the hotel room for ten days? What if we don’t make it back in time? Can my sister & brother-in-law take the kids to sleepaway camp? Will they have to miss sleepaway camp? Also, they get tested on the way into camp. What if they pop up positive and can’t go? Do we get a refund? Ugh! I fucking hate covid!! It’s seriously sucking the joy out of everything and none of us have even caught it yet!

Odds are it will all work out. But with everything that could go wrong…it’s a lot of anxiety. I’ll feel much better when (if) we’re on that plane. Just making it to that point will be a huge accomplishment. 

It’s crazy to think that if all these things come to pass, by the time the kids get back from camp it’ll only be three more weeks until school. The summer is flying by already.

I can’t say I’m not enjoying it on many levels, though. I’m enjoying the warmer weather and the less structured days (despite my opening paragraph). There’s something nice about not having to be too strict about bed times (mine included), not having to be responsible to anyone (school), and the feeling of holidays and freedom and fun everywhere. I love summer. 

I do miss the cabin and the desert, though. Temps out there are about 108° all week, and if it’s anything like last year, it’ll be that and higher for the next two months. I doubt we’ll make it out there before end of September when I’ve bought us tickets to a “night sky festival” being held by a local observatory. I’m itching for our neighbor to return and be able to do more work for us…but that’s not going to be for a long time, possibly into next year. There’s also the problem of my possibly not having any money to pay him. I imagine I’m in for at least another $10,000-$20,000 on that place just to make it somewhat livable and able to have furniture in it. Every once in a while I watch it on the security cameras. So far despite being notified nearly every day that someone is detected, we’ve only had two incidents of people actually out there - one during the wedding that looked like just hikers walking by, and a far more sinister one of a pickup truck arriving at 2 AM one night and then pulling away very quickly. Is this the person that stole our stove coming back for more, only to see we’ve secured the place? Someone who was lost? Or a new crook? Either way whatever we did out there seems to have scared them off, so that’s something I guess. I’m just glad it’s not an endless parade of thieves. I honestly thought it’d be worse. 

We all went to see Kraftwerk as a family last night. I’m pleased to say both kids handled it well and didn’t get too antsy. Bobby of course saw them years ago with us, but this was Theo’s first. We kept our masks glued on our faces.