Break!

We had a pleasant weekend in the desert, the first of the kind I’d been dreaming of since I bought the place, in which we just had to pack some clothes and a cooler and head out - rather than having to bring half the house every time. We didn’t do much - met with a new contractor to see about a porch and a staircase, ate a lot of expensive restaurant food, and were generally foggy and dehydrated. 

The new contractor that I found in a local group was a funny guy - Ken doll handsome and with adhd characteristics; talked our ears off for two hours while I kept trying to loop him back to taking actual measurements and talking about materials. He had a good idea for the staircase - right now we’re still using a ladder to climb up to the top floor. His idea was to have stairs going sideways along the back wall which is way better than just building a sturdier ladder. The H didn’t like him, but seems ok with continuing - we should get a bid shortly. As always I don’t know what to think of this guy, but I do know we don’t really have a choice and it would be nice to get these final projects finished even though I technically can’t afford it. Also as always he pointed out all the things the previous contractors did wrong. They love doing that. Sigh. 

One good discovery is that the insulation is doing a bang up job - even with the temps dropping to the low 40s at night, we never needed the heater. The upstairs stayed toasty from the all day radiant heat from the sun, and good bedding meant we were never cold. I know it can get a bit colder out there - it was high 60s during the day and 40s at night and I know it can be 50s in the day and 30s at night, but at least most of the time it won’t get that cold, and we probably only have three more winter visits at most before the glorious spring comes again. 

It’s Monday of the first week off school and I’m a bit panicked about everything that has to happen this week - mainly the grant paperwork - but I keep telling myself it’ll all get done. I have to do two podcast interviews and edit those and tee them up for release while I’m gone; wrap all the presents (when kids go to bed); make candy; prepare for our trip (laundry, packing, use up food, etc); get my hair done; find something for us to do all day on Thursday while the cleaning lady is here and it’s raining all day; get groceries; go to the bank to deposit cash from our last band gig; make breakfast, lunch and dinner each day and clean up after; and, of course, grant paperwork. Why am I blogging right now instead of starting? Procrastination - but I’m going to blame it on the fact that the H is monopolizing the bathroom so I can’t get up and start my day. That’s my story and I’m sticking to it. 

Final week of school

Two more days of school and then I (we) get to sleep in for three weeks (mostly). I’m inordinately excited about this. I know Bobby, my fellow night owl, feels the same.

We’re lagging on Christmas presents this year. Bobby has made an expansive list, which is very helpful, but Theo has no idea what he wants, and we have no idea, either. We did trade their untouched Nintendo switch for a second used VR headset, but we need to supplement with other small things and we’re at a loss. Bobby asked for sunglasses and a drink cooler and I figured both boys could use those things so I ordered them for both, and I also got some books and impulse bought a Lego chess set. But time is running out - we leave for Florida a week from Sunday so our Christmas will have to be Saturday, and all of these things have to be bought, shipped, and wrapped. I also haven’t even begun the candy making I normally do at this time - mostly because there’s no rush, I don’t need to give any out until next week, and next week is pretty empty while this week is pretty full. It’ll all fall into place I’m sure, but right now it’s still up in the air.

This week I’m just allowing myself to enjoy my last moments of solitude before the three week onslaught of family time, which for much of it involves cooking breakfast, lunch and dinner for at least three people every day, which I despise doing. My whole life becomes food prep and kitchen cleaning and it sucks up pretty much all of my time. Not to mention having to monitor kids actually changing their underwear and brushing their teeth and the constant, pulsating guilt of knowing the kids are on screens too much and I really should be arranging fun and enriching activities for us but I just don’t have it in me to be fun coordinator anymore after twelve years of parenting. Don’t get me wrong - I’m actually looking forward to the school break. But I am experiencing a certain amount of existential dread regarding what I’m actually going to do with these kids all day every day.

I had a big nothing of a corporate gig last night that paid ridiculously well, then tonight is the real marathon in that we have to drive to San Diego and back. I probably won’t be home before 3 AM, which is scary. I promised myself last time we did this gig that we should stay at a hotel rather than try to drive home - but here we are. The H will take the kids to school in the morning. And I’ll probably need all day to recover. The good news is, it’s (almost) the last of the gauntlet of Christmas gigs (one more easy and fun one next Friday). 

Looming ever above my head is my grant review which I have not tackled other than reaching out to my accountant for help. He wrote up a chart of accounts for me - that’s one thing done - but someone else in his office has to do a year’s worth of bank reconciliation, and I haven’t heard from that person. I also have a ton of work to do myself, but I’ve been forcing myself to wait until next week so I don’t rush it and can take the time to focus. I’m so terrified of this whole process - I know they’re going to demand some money back, but how much is the question, and when, and will this ruin my life or not. It’s so scary I just have to put it out of my mind every time I think about it. There’s no way out but through, so next week I just have to be a big brave girl and sit down and tackle it piece by piece until it’s done. I desperately want to get this handled before I leave, but the accounting stuff unfortunately I don’t have a lot of control over.

Period showed up three weeks late all nonchalant like the brunch guest as the check arrives, with a Starbucks in one hand and phone in the other, not understanding why everyone’s annoyed. I wouldn’t mind if it was consistently late - fewer periods is of course better - but I’ve entered the age of inconsistency; for all I know I’ll get another one in two weeks, then another a month after that, and another six weeks after that. Sigh. 

Decorated

We did the Christmas decorating this weekend, and I don’t know if it’s age finally catching up with both of us, post-two time covid infection exhaustion or menopause for me, but it knocked both of us out and I hate to admit it but I didn’t enjoy it at all. I just wanted to be done, but between the tree buying and decorating, light hanging and living room decorating, it pretty much took the entire day, and halfway through I was officially done. I did, however, enjoy that the kids seemed to get a kick out of looking at our old familiar ornaments and hanging them, and that was delightful. I do have some Christmas-loving kids, and I’m here for it. The H badly injured his knee putting lights on the house and has been stressed out and limping around all week, worrying about work and not letting it heal. 

I had an odd weekend of emotional upsets that I’m still not recovered from. Sunday I had a very stressful gig in which we played for a fellow dancer’s memorial service, and there were several people there that I can’t stand who normally I can avoid, but, you know, funerals, where everyone comes out whether you want to see them or not. I just hid backstage when I wasn’t singing, so I couldn’t socialize or really be present, and I felt guilty about that, but I also knew the people I didn’t want to deal with would 100% approach me if I made myself available (one finally just barged backstage “to say hello”). So it was basically four hours of torture. Then - and this sounds petty, but hear me out - the goth festival I’ve been waiting to hear an announcement for suddenly put up next year’s lineup, and…apparently it’s now a lame 80s Top 40 festival, because that’s where the money is. I was, and am, absolutely gutted. I feel like I was enjoying a seance in a cemetery and then some cheerleaders showed up. I posted my dismay on the festival’s group (I wasn’t alone in this), got relentlessly attacked and laughed at until I had to block some guy and leave, and then spent the rest of the night trying to calm the adrenaline surging through my body. Once again, the jocks and cheerleaders ruin everything. 

I also am starting to feel like, as much as I’m enjoying the work and feel like I’m doing something important, doing this podcast is kind of fucking with my mental health. It’s digging up a lot of ugly memories and making me feel like a broken person, which I’m not. I think I’m going to just do a couple more interviews this month - one today, one in a couple of weeks - and give myself a break for the holidays. I need to get some distance from it. Then regroup in January and start up again until I’ve made my way through all the people that wanted to talk to me, which could only be a few more at this point. But since I can schedule episodes for whenever, I definitely have enough to fill up December. Then I may find I’m done with the whole project. We’ll see. 

My period is now nearly three weeks late. I’ve been through this before during this year, but I don’t think I’ve ever gone quite this long. I feel the same sense of uncertainty that I had as a young girl, waiting for it to appear - when will I get it? What if I never get it? What if it stains my clothes and everyone laughs at me (I saw Carrie too many times)? Now I have similar but opppsite questions - when will I get it? What if I never get it again? What if it stains my clothes and everyone laughs at me? I always secretly hope my period will just stop appearing and I won’t have any other symptoms - a friend had this experience - but considering how much my mother suffered and how my sister dealt with hot flashes for years, this scenario is fairly unlikely. So for now I just play the waiting game. My prediction is I will get it sometime in the next couple of weeks, and I’ll continue to have irregular periods for a few more months or a year still. We shall see. Other than rapidly gaining weight and a fair amount of bloating and cramping, I feel fine. Exhausted all the time, but fine. Welcome to life in your 50s. 

Back in the Groove

Two more weeks until winter break! I feel like the time is dragging and flying all at once. We were too exhausted to decorate for Christmas last weekend as I’d planned, so we agreed to wait until tomorrow. It does not feel Christmas-y yet because of this. 

The kids’ new school does not do any kind of holiday program, which is bizarre. I’m so used to kids practicing Christmas carols and having to get together white shirts and red sweaters and things. I have to admit I’m kind of bummed. The only thing I can guess is after covid shutdowns the teachers rebelled and said they’re not doing it anymore. I can’t blame them. I’m sure coordinating all that is a huge pain in the ass. 

Since I *think* the H has finally grasped the concept of not buying the kids mountains of toys they’ll never use, I think we’re on board to have a small Christmas list this year. He wisely traded the kids’ unused Switch for a second used VR, since that’s pretty much the only thing they use now and not fighting over the one we have would be great. I think we’ll just get a few small things and then that’s it. I think this is a good plan. I impulse bought a Lego chess set which I’m kind of regretting now. 

My life has become completely consumed by my podcast work, and I’m not mad at it, except that it’s made me largely forget about any event organizing I should be doing (hiring teachers and musicians, updating the website, advertising - every week these things are in my calendar and every week I push them forward to the next week), and I’ve also pretty much stopped exercising entirely, and it shows. I made a promise to myself to get back to walking at least three times a week starting Monday. The weather is cool, I can always go after picking up kids from school, I have no excuse. BUT I just feel like I’m in this flurry of activity to get as much content going as possible; I’ve announced the podcast’s existence in the two relevant FB groups, so now the pressure is on to consistently produce shows. And I think I can continue to do this through December. However…last night I went back through the threads in which people had expressed interest in being on the show, and realized I’m through about half of them. There is, in fact, a finite number of people who would want to do this; it’s a tiny religion, most people who left don’t feel a need to talk about it because they didn’t have a bad experience, many people aren’t interested in being on podcasts, and those who are just may not be able to find the time. So I have a lot of factors against me. I knew most likely this podcast could only be a “limited series” of twenty or so episodes, but I kind of hoped I could continue for a bit longer. If I run out of people to talk to I can certainly re-edit the current long episodes into more digestible “highlight” versions of a half hour or less; that’ll keep me busy. And I’d still like to explore putting shorts on TikTok in an attempt to get more visibility (my listeners/viewership is still very low). But as of right now, recording, editing, and uploading these long videos takes entire days of my time, often 8-10 hours, which is a lot, and causes me to neglect other things. Still, I think it’s important enough that I feel compelled to push forward. 

Our band didn’t get hired for Knott’s this year, but we still have four other gigs in the next two weeks, most of which involve long, late night drives (Santa Barbara, San Diego, Irvine). We are on for Germany in February which means I’m going to miss Bobby’s send off to Catalina for his 6th grade trip, which sucks. But I think 2024 is the return of international travel for us, and I’m thrilled.

The big move

This week we made the big move to the cabin (just stuff, not ourselves, of course). It was a moment I’ve been dreaming of since I first put in an offer on the property in March of 2021. There were many times I thought we’d never get here, between getting ripped off by the first contractor to not being able to find another one for months or years. But this week I was finally able to get a U-Haul and move all the crap I’d been collecting out of the attic, plus unused furniture from the shed, and fill in the gaps at ikea (mattresses, bedding). It was a delicate balance of timing everything just right - picking up the U-Haul, getting movers to help get stuff down our stairs, picking up items at ikea (picking out the bedding took hours and was so ridiculously complicated I thought we were all going to lose our minds), then the H took the U-Haul to Orange County to pick up some water tanks a client had gifted him, while I drove the kids FOUR miserable hours in holiday traffic out to our place. When the H arrived he accidentally backed the U-Haul into soft sand and got stuck, which prompted a crazed attempt at digging/trenching out in the middle of the night and well into the next day, only to give up and hire a tow which cost $350. Then we had a four hour round trip to drop the U-Haul (ah, remote places). Then we had several pieces of furniture to build in two days before it was time to leave. To say it was exhausting was an understatement. I feel like I’ve never been so physically drained in my entire life. Thankfully the H thrives on hard physical labor - and I often thought how I never in a million years would have attempted this as a single woman. I would do other things in the desert - camp, or stay at airbnbs - but not try to have our own place. It’s just too hard. 

The drag was the boys had nothing to do the whole time. They could only be enlisted to help a certain amount; there’s a point at which they get bored or make the task take longer than it should. So even though we brought bags of board games, other than one game of monopoly, they refused to play any of them, instead begging to play on my phone (something I’ve never allowed - until now), tearing the place apart using the new beds as trampolines, throwing stuffed animals at each other, or whining about how bored they are. That part was a misery for me. Since the H was mostly engaged in building things by himself, I was mostly bored along with the kids or cleaning while dealing with the sensory overload of kids whining or screaming and throwing things and making loud explosive noises, all in 200 square feet. 

Why did the kids not play outside or wander and explore, you ask? Because it’s “boring”. I’ve realized kids today, since they have the option of video games somewhere in their life, will never be satisfied with just wandering and exploring like we were, because we had no choice. And I’m sure we did a fair amount of whining, too. I hate that so far nearly all of our trips have been a huge drag for the kids - we’ve always been working on projects out there, mostly ones the kids can’t help with, so they associate the cabin with being bored and being away from their video games. I hate that video games have ruined kids this way, but I suppose TV did the same in the 50s; I imagine parents raised in the 20s and 30s had the same complaint about their baby boomer children - why can’t they just entertain themselves by playing kick the can or whittling a stick like we did? Because there’s something far more interesting out there, and if you withhold it you make your kids out of step with all their peers, and time marches on whether you want it to or not. And so it goes. 

So we had an exhausting, while productive, week, which we all agreed was a success despite the difficulties. Then we had the special Thanksgiving treat I had planned that I was so proud of - dinner at the top of the Palm Springs aerial tramway - the H had wanted to take that tram for ages, and I thought this combo of the tram plus dinner would be magical. Omg did it suck. First, as we were driving to it as the sun was setting, the H bitched endlessly about how pointless it was going to be to ride up in the dark, to the point where I was on the verge of snapping at him - but it turned out he was right; it was pretty pointless to ride up in the dark, after an extremely long wait sitting on the floor in a cramped waiting room. Then we waited on line for what felt like hours in a cramped cafeteria to get our food, then had a horrible panicked fight for tables since there was only seating for about 10% of the people. It was a nightmare. And not surprisingly the food was mediocre at best. Then another loooong wait for the tram back - waaay too much standing for me, I haven’t even recovered from that music festival last weekend - and a blurry drive home after which we all collapsed into our beds. At least we had a good laugh over how awful it was; better in concept. At one point Bobby asked why we can’t have just “normal” Thanksgivings - I told him because what he considers “normal Thanksgiving” involves all the women working their asses off while the men sit around and enjoy themselves, and I’m not doing that anymore. The truth, of course, is a lot more complicated - the fact is I actually enjoy hosting meals for people (as long as someone else does the meat part) and the complicated game of planning and timing all the dishes just right, but sadly I can’t stand the H’s sister and if I host I’d have to invite her, and I just don’t ever want to have to do that again. So, that’s why the years of traveling Thanksgivings. Last year I tried to do a big meal for Christmas, and honestly, that sucked too - nothing I made was really any good, and I can’t stand that heavy American food anyway. But I have to admit, as far as Thanksgivings go, this was by far the worst - productive and important, but a complete bust as far as the actual holiday. Still, at least we had a good laugh about how bad it was. We manage to maintain our sense of humor in these situations. 

Here’s some shots of our place with the furniture in it - our crap is still all over the place so it looks crowded and messy, but eventually we’ll have curtains and things on the walls and it’ll look nice (I hope).

Last weekend in an unfurnished cabin

Last weekend was the last time we spent in an unfurnished cabin - at last, the moment I’ve waited for for 2 1/2 years, moving furniture into the cabin, is upon us. Next Monday we pick up the U-Haul, meet some movers at our house, move a few items from our shed, head to ikea to pick up a bed and a couch and mattresses and bedding, head to Lake Forest where a friend of the H has donated us a couple of water tanks, and then finally drive out to the cabin. We’ll spend the next three days assembling things and returning the U-Haul, get Thanksgiving dinner at a restaurant at the top of the gondolas in Palm Springs, head home, and then I have a gig Friday night and we’ll do Christmas lights and tree shopping over the weekend and then that’s that. We’ll have a real little home out there, ready to host us whenever we want. 

We used the little propane heater last weekend at night when it dropped below 50°, and I have to say the difference of having insulation now is palpable; even on the lowest setting it heated the whole upstairs in minutes and we had to open all the windows. I don’t think staying warm out there in winter is going to be an issue. 

The move is going to be difficult and tiring and I’m definitely dreading it. A lot has to happen in a short amount of time, and there are a lot of unknowns - extracting the furniture from the back of the shed is going to be tough, especially taking apart a large Hoosier which I’m not sure will be possible; the items we want to get at ikea are low in stock and I don’t really know what to do if they sell out before we get there (they can only hold them 24 hours apparently); I don’t know how big these tanks are and they’re way out of our way; and I don’t know how frustrating it’s going to be to try to assemble multiple complicated pieces of furniture with two kids whining about how bored they are the whole time. I’m worried the H and I are going to snap at each other like we did on our anniversary. I just don’t want this to be a bad experience - this should be a happy time, after all. I’ve wanted this moment for so long and we’ve been through so much to get here. But boy is it going to be tiring. I just hope it goes smoothly. And also that projected massive winter storms don’t flood the place and ruin everything. We still don’t have a working shower or semblance of a sink - I’ve been doing sponge baths in a basin with water heated on our little propane cooker, and washing dishes squatting on the floor in a bigger basin. Getting these things in place will make it a lot more comfortable for us, and me, and make it more appealing to invite people. I’m hoping to do some friend visits in the winter when I know I’ll have a lot of free weekends. 

On last weekend’s visit, we did a quick jaunt into Joshua Tree National Park. The boys sure do love rock scrambling. I have a book of JTNP hikes, and I’m excited to branch out a little and do some more difficult stuff there, more off the beaten path. I’ve asked for a compass for Christmas. 

This week is a week of half days due to parent-teacher conferences; I’m picking up the boys at about 12:45 each day. I’ve never dealt with this before since every previous year they were in after school care until normal times. I had Theo’s conference yesterday - as usual, good reports. He’s a good kid, gets along well with others, does well in math. His writing and reading isn’t his strong point - the teacher noticed he really doesn’t like to read, and says he hopes he can kick start a love of reading next semester when they tackle some Percy Jackson books. I hope so, too. Bobby used to be an avid reader but is less of one now - I mean really, books are no competition for the internet. I hardly know any adults - certainly any male adults - that actually like to read or do it regularly. Is there a future for reading fiction written on paper? Sometimes I wonder.

We’ve decided to take Bobby to the Darker Waves concert on Saturday - it’s going to be challenging. A long day at the beach in crowds, and now it appears it’s going to be raining. We’re taking a chance in bringing him - he might hate it and be miserable - but I had a spare ticket and thought this would be a good stretch for him; if nothing else, someday he’ll be able to tell people when he was 11 his parents took him to see Devo and The Psychedelic Furs and OMD and New Order; not many people his age will have had that experience. Theo, who couldn’t care less, will stay home with the babysitter and get the VR all to himself. Win/win?

My podcast is up!

This week has been a whirlwind of activity as my long-thought about podcast finally “launched”. I say launched in quotes because probably only me, my sister, and a couple of close friends have actually listened to it. But STILL.

My podcast is called Leaving Christian Science, and I’m filming them on zoom and then posting to YouTube and then audio versions to Spotify and Apple Podcasts. The YouTube link is here: https://youtube.com/@LeavingChristianSciencePodcast?si=wfugkalCGIDWdDvR

and IG handle is @leavingcspod

Now that I’ve gotten that out of the way, here’s how it’s been for me: it’s been a steep learning curve, that I’m still climbing, and that was very intimidating at first. I had to find an editing program (thankfully there’s always a basic one on computers now, and I have years of editing experience from making my event DVDs, so the actual process of editing was a snap), find a voice recording program, find royalty-free music (after multiple requests, my bandleader never followed through, so I gave up. I’m really happy with what I found, though), navigate starting a YouTube channel and Spotify and Apple podcast accounts, start an IG account (by far the most intimidating to me, and still is). It’s been a lot, but I believe in the work enough that I just made myself push through. I now have two episodes published and a few short clip videos, which I had a blast putting together. I’ll definitely do more of these, since I realize a ninety minute podcast isn’t everyone’s cup of tea and they’d rather just have the highlights. 

So what is it, exactly, and what do I want from it? I mean naturally I’d like it if I had a decent community of listeners and was able to help people - ex-CS or not - I don’t want it to just sit there ignored. But I don’t expect to make money on it nor make it into a “hit” - I really just want it to be a resource for people. I personally enjoy long form conversational podcasts - I listen to one by ex-Scientologist Jon Atack every week in which he just has conversations with smart friends, and I always learn something new. I haven’t posted it in the ex-CS Facebook group yet - I want to make sure I have enough content so people don’t click on it and then forget about it because there’s not enough there to hold people’s interest. So I figure I’ll wait until I have one more podcast up and then put it more out there. 

The funny thing has been working this kind of project around family life, especially when family life involves other people using up the wifi bandwidth and making lots of noise, both things that are terrible for two hour zoom recordings. For my second interview, I set myself up in the attic and told the boys to stay off the VR (much to their despair). I’m going to have to interview people when they’re available, and it’s rarely going to be in that tiny window between the H leaving for work (11 AM) and me having to pick up the boys from school (now 2 PM). So the attic, originally intended as a playspace, may soon be my podcasting studio.

I feel good and revitalized and slightly frantic. We’re leaving for the desert today and I’m a little miffed I can’t spend my day contacting potential interviewees or working on more clips or developing the IG page that literally nobody looks at. But I feel inspired, which is a great feeling. I once heard a quote that “you’re not depressed, you’re just uninspired”, and for me often this is the case. Unless you’re doing something that inspires you, sometimes it can mimic depression, that blah feeling of just not being interested in anything. 

One super cool thing that happened was, when I set up the IG page, I figured I would start by following my favorite cult podcasts. Out of nowhere, my favorite anti-cult activist, Janja Lalich, started following me (I hadn’t followed her so she must have just seen me float by). I had to message her to say thanks for the follow, and she said you’re welcome, and then I told her I was watching her in the Twin Flames documentary and that I enjoy her work, and she said thanks. Omg! Janja Lalich and I had a conversation! Ahhhhh! 

So I’ve got my work cut out for me - the next couple of weeks will be difficult with the boys home by 1 each day due to parent-teacher conferences, and the week after being Thanksgiving break. I hope I can get two interviews in this week so I can at least have *some* content available to publish while I can’t create anymore. The holidays in general will be challenging time-wise, as I imagine a lot of people won’t be available for interviews, either. So the pace may slow down for a few weeks. But in the meantime, I’ve created this thing, and it’s out there, and I'm very proud of it.

Hallowe’en

It was a fully inflatable Halloween as both boys chose blow up costumes - Theo as a space rocket kid and Bobby as a gorilla. Clearly, I went as a chicken (non-inflatable).

Neither inflatable costume popped or slowly deflated like Theo’s dinosaur one last year, but Bobby, at least, decided he didn’t want an inflatable costume next year. He couldn’t see all night and moving around was difficult. I always imagined we’d be the kind of family to make our own clever costumes every year, but that’s yet another thing I’ve let go. For some reason Halloween always sneaks up on me, plus the fact that the kids actively don’t WANT clever homemade costumes. If they ever came to me with an idea and wanted me to implement it for them, I’d be all in. But they just aren’t those kinds of kids. I told Bobby yesterday how when I was (about) his age I went as a “bag lady”. Yes, that was the 80s, in which it was socially acceptable to wear a costume depicting homelessness for humor. I told him one of the most common kids’ costumes when I was a kid was to dress up as a “hobo”. My how times have changed.

I’m glad the kids are still invested in Halloween - for me, the fun ended around 11 or 12. But as I’ve said many times, I feel like kids these days are less in a hurry to grow up. Also, many child-like things - playing games, dressing up, having stuffies and toys - are no longer solely for small children. There were plenty of teenagers out last night, and not just to cause havoc like when I was young. They may have been high AF, but at least they were dressed up and having a good time. 

Today I dismantle the Halloween decorations, put away the costumes, make a promise to myself that for the first time ever I won’t spend the entire month of November slowly pilfering the boys’ candy, and settle in to the new month. I finally got flights to FL for Christmas by the hybrid method - flying there on Jet Blue and flying back on Alaska. It was the only way to not be stuck with a 6 AM flight returning. That’s a huge load off my mind. All of the holidays are now accounted for. Phew. 

Tributes

This weekend we went back to our wedding and camping space to pay tribute to the man who bought the land some 40 years ago and set it up as a place for lost souls to wander and live and find themselves. He died earlier this year - we only met him once, briefly, the weekend before the wedding. When we explained who we were and said we were getting married there the next weekend, he said, “don’t do it!” Ha ha. Anyway, I got notified on FB that they were doing a celebration of life this last Saturday, so we went. 

It was about what I expected - a rag-tag band of random people, some hippies, some raver types, some older conservative folks that must have been family, and people hard to figure out like us. There were only a couple of other kids there. But we listened to the tributes and wandered around the space and shared some food. We would have stayed longer but it was wicked cold - intense, biting winds blowing, and even the scarves and gloves and winter coats weren’t enough. I didn’t know the man beyond that one meeting, but I found myself getting quite emotional more than once. Maybe it was that church-like feeling of people coming together to celebrate something; maybe it was the beautiful full moon rising over the hill that took my breath away, maybe it was the sound of the wind skidding over the boulders. I don’t know - but that place is really special. How many places exist like that in the world - beautiful places just set up by some guy, not connected to any business or government agency? I’m not sure what’ll happen to it now that he’s gone, and it didn’t feel polite to ask, but I’m hoping since it’s a 501c3 and set up for paid campsites and things like that that it’ll continue as before. That’s one non-profit I would get involved in, if they were ever looking for people to help.

Friday I helped out at the boys’ Harvest Festival, and it was just as nuts as I’d anticipated - I just got thrown into the fire making sno cones for long lines of people with little or no guidance. For an hour I ground ice, packed serving cones, refilled syrup bottles, and took orders when that person wandered off. A couple of the moms chatted with me when we could - I could tell they were craving connection, too - but the work was so fast paced and relentless that there wasn’t much room for socializing. Picture The Bear - sno cone edition.

The boys had fun in their costumes and running around with their friends, but it’s weird to think this is Bobby’s first and last experience at this school. Maybe I’m projecting my own weirdness on to him but I feel like he’s not really committed to this place, either, knowing it’s just a way station. Of course, it’s hard to tell with an eleven-year-old boy. If I were to ask him about this I’m sure he’d just shrug. We always tell him he can come to us with anything and talk to us about anything - but I also know that he won’t, and perhaps, shouldn’t. I would have been mortified to talk to my mother about any of the things swirling around for me at that age; of course, my mother wasn’t very approachable for a variety of reasons, but honestly I probably think I am but actually am not, just as she probably thought she was but actually wasn’t. I also think kids, especially at that age, probably want to figure things out for themselves and have some privacy and separation from their mothers. I respect that. 

Much talk about junior high school selection, and I think some of the other parents are finding out the hard way that, if you chose to keep your kid in elementary school for 6th grade, the chances of being admitted to any of the top schools for 7th are pretty much nil. I don’t know why they didn’t know this - I certainly did - but I’m seeing it slowly dawn on some of them. It’s also validating to hear that other parents are concerned about long commutes in rush hour traffic. Quality of life is important, and three to four hours of driving back and forth a day just isn’t worth it in my book. All of this to say, I’m feeling more confident in my choice to just choose the local jr/sr high (Plan A). We don’t find out until March if he actually made it in or not, but even if he didn’t make it in to the actual gifted program, I think I’d still get a permit for the regular school. 

Tomorrow is Halloween which means the end of the first part of the holiday trifecta. This is actually the simplest one, tbh. Thanksgiving involves the big move of furniture out to the cabin, which will be very complicated and expensive. I did manage to get us tickets to Thanksgiving dinner up at the top of the mountain in Palm Springs - the H is always wanting us to ride the gondolas up there, so hopefully this will be a welcome surprise. Then Christmas has been a bit fraught and I’m stressed out that I still don’t have travel plans locked down - we’re supposed to go to Florida, but tickets are sky high, so my sister and I are vigilantly watching prices. Hopefully we can lock something down soon. 

Pumpkin patchin’

I had worried that the kids were getting too old for the annual pumpkin patch visit, but we went yesterday with the donor siblings as has become our tradition, and had a thoroughly great time. 

It started a bit messy as Bobby woke up with a fever and was lethargic and didn’t want to eat anything, and the H also said he felt achy and foggy-brained. Tested for covid - negative. Also one of the moms couldn’t make it due to work, so it was just two moms and three kids, which, unsurprisingly, was a lot more manageable. It’s odd to occasionally have a peek at what life would have been with only one child and no husband. Very, very different, as it turns out. 

I kept Bobby home from school today as a precaution. It was also the first day of my three-day stint volunteering for the safety valet drop off; apparently at this school every classroom asks every parent to volunteer at least three days. I was (and am) happy to help out (anything but being booster club treasurer - lol), but of course as an introvert it was a little excruciating. It was typical of my school volunteering experiences: I show up far too early and am the only one there for a good 15 minutes; because I’m the only adult, people start asking questions and beginning the responsibilities even though I have no idea what’s going on and I just have to jump in and act like I know what I’m doing; nobody really explains anything so I just go with it, then in a rush it’s all over. At least having used the safety valet every day myself, I already knew the concept of waving the cars down to the end of the line, opening the doors, saying good morning, etc. The family dynamics were interesting. The parents who don’t look at me or say anything to me are the ones with kids who don’t look at me or say anything to me; the ones who are friendly and personable and make eye contact have kids who do the same. One particularly delightful little boy who gave me a huge smile and “good morning!” had a mother who also was very friendly. Funny how that works. 

Two more days of volunteering, and for sure we’re leaving later after today. Then on Friday I’m working Theo’s class’s snow cone booth at the harvest festival for an hour; over the weekend we’re headed to the desert to have a cabin visit and attend the memorial of the man who ran the location where we got married, which should involve some pot luck items on my part; on Halloween we’ve been invited to a party which also involves pot luck items on my part. So there’s a lot of non-work related labor coming up soon. I bought the most ridiculous chicken costume I could find for Halloween - I find it’s just better when I’m wearing something silly. With the kids older and less maintenance on Halloween I feel like I have more freedom to participate. 

Activities

I took the kids to see The Muppets Take Manhattan at our new neighborhood revival house on Sunday. The night before we went to a puppet show. I’m glad the kids are still into things like this; Bobby, especially, absolutely loves puppets. I’m curious if he’s going to grow into a hardened, jaded middle schooler who thinks everything is uncool. Or have the generations changed and kids aren’t in such a rush to grow up anymore…? This is the question that plagues me, and only time will tell. I would *think* that Bobby is enough of an iconoclast that he won’t be subject to peer pressure; Theo, I’m not so sure. I personally was not subject to peer pressure and always did what I wanted. We shall see.

Bobby’s armpits have started smelling - I looked at him and said, “are things starting to happen?” and he said yes, that plus some other stuff. I’m going to get him some deodorant today. I gave him a quick lesson on how to most effectively use it (because no one ever explains anything to kids). He still seems like a little boy to me, but that’s probably just my mom lens and the fact that I see him all day so I don’t see him actively growing. I’m trying to push him intellectually - I had him watch Religulous with me and explained how this movie was so instrumental to me when I was struggling with belief in god; I’m trying to talk him into seeing my favorite 60s Japanese art/horror movie, Onibaba, at the revival theater next week, but I don’t think he’ll go only because he doesn’t like horror. 

It occurred to me that in just over two years he’ll be the age I was when I stopped living with my mother and moved in with my sister at fourteen. I thought I was so mature and grown up, like all fourteen-year-olds do. I think when I finally see my fourteen year old child and realize just how young he actually is, I’ll be really horrified that my mother thought it was a good idea for me to essentially be on my own at that age. She got a lot of criticism about it and was always very defensive about it, and as the dutiful daughter I defended her, too. It was fine, I said. Nothing bad happened, I said. And nothing did, not really, but it definitely shaped me in such a way that probably didn’t help me later in life - being hyper vigilant, isolating, being afraid to ask for help, etc etc. Well. The good thing is my sons will have an in-house mother through their teen years whether they want one or not, ha ha! 

Gauntlet survived

I have survived the gauntlet of weekend travel gigs - Chicago two weekends ago, and Eureka (northern CA) this weekend. To celebrate I went to the doctor early this morning and had my boobs smashed, blood drawn, and an X ray on my very painful big toe that’s made it increasingly difficult to walk for several months, to the point where I’m pretty incapacitated. Why have I not dealt with this before? Tune in to my new podcast to find out, coming next month.

This weekend was a jazz festival - a very rare occurrence for us as we normally play dances (my preferred method) - one which we actually blew a chance to play some years ago. This was before my bandleader got help for his adhd and he never answered any calls or emails from the organizer; a groveling apology later and we were hired for this year. There were many positive things about it - some friends came, so it was fun spending time with them; the mostly elderly audience was very receptive; I enjoyed time walking around the quaint little Victorian town by myself and shopping when I was stranded with no car. But. I can honestly say the whole experience kind of bummed me out, and not for the reasons you’d think. Mostly, it was being in this charming little town that has clearly been completely wiped out by meth and opioids - the meth zombies were literally everywhere, and there was a constant feeling of menace everywhere we went - it was actually pretty shocking. I mean, the desert is like this, too, but for some reason that feels different to me; when I think about the desert areas we go to, I think about interesting people moving out there to do interesting things. I suppose people do that in this town, too…I don’t know. Maybe it was the combination of PNW rain and fog plus meth that had me just feeling gross. It was like living in the movie River’s Edge. I couldn’t wait to get back to cloyingly sunny happy Los Angeles, I gotta be honest. Anyway, most likely we’ll be invited back, so I guess I’d better get over it. 

There’s a whole circuit of these small town jazz festivals that most of these guys (and they are all pretty much white guys, let’s be honest) go to. Technically we should be in that loop, but for me, I have zero interest. I spent some time last night ineffectively explaining this to the H. I don’t know how to explain how not fun these situations are for me. There’s a lot of sitting around and waiting, followed by frantic setting up and breaking down and terrible sound because there’s no time for sound checks. And I’m not a “real” musician like these other folks - the concept of jamming out doesn’t really apply to me, as the girl singer, and one who has zero interest in inserting herself into other people’s spaces (and it is a completely white male space, which, as much as these guys are all neurodivergent nerdy types and therefore mostly lacking in bro-y toxic masculinity, I still don’t feel comfortable there). So I find it mostly isolating and boring. At least at a dance event I know everyone, can maybe dance a little, or make small talk with like-minded people. I don’t know. It all just makes me want to run away and watch Korean dating shows on my phone. 

The boys seemed to have survived their weekend of farting and burping and making messes with dad in control; I won’t be leaving them again for some time. It’s a relief, because these trips make it hard to focus on anything at home. The boys have their own doctor appointments next week (after Theo’s urgent care trip for the flu last year, we’re getting flu shots this time, dammit), and I need to start a few house cleaning projects (it’s time for a kid clothing cull and game closet cull). Fall is here and I’m digging it. Especially SoCal fall which means it still occasionally dips into the 90s. I’m here for it. 

Fake summer

E-choices - the LAUSD system of applying for magnet and other programs - opened on Monday, and I applied for Theo to get into the gifted magnet at his current school. I think it’s *fairly* unlikely he’ll be admitted next year; unless his brother’s sibling points (3) push him over the edge. But I think he stands a good chance of making it for 6th grade when kids abdicate for middle schools. So there’s hope there yet. I’m bummed he’ll never get Bobby’s 5th grade teacher - the cool person with the Mohawk and the PhD; she’s teaching the highly gifted magnet for 5th. But if he’d stayed at his old school she wouldn’t have been an option, either, since she moved to this school. 

For Bobby, I delayed a couple of days…I still had it in my head that I wanted to tour other schools first (I have until mid-November to submit an application), but after looking at the available options, I have to say, they’re just logistically impossible - too far away and too impossible to manage with two kids. Also if I then wanted to try to move him back here for high school, according to the tour I took last year, there are very few spots for ninth grade. So your best bet is to start here for 7th, which was my idea in the first place. So I took a deep breath and applied for just the one local school with the gifted program. This is the one both boys could be in all the way until they graduate. There’s no guarantees Bobby will even be admitted - if he’s not, I’ll have to make some decisions - and we won’t know until March. But with his many points for being in the magnet system as of this year, he stands a really good shot. So that’s done and done.

I’m currently in between traveling gigs - last weekend was Chicago, this weekend is northern CA. I’ve had to learn a lot of new songs, which I positively loathe doing, but we do need to mix it up now and again, so I know it’s necessary. Once I’m back from this weekend I feel like I can really lean in to the holiday trifecta heading my way; I’ve decorated for Halloween but don’t really feel it yet. One reason is the current unseasonable high temperatures. But I also feel like I need to focus on this travel and learning new songs and everything else can wait.

Motivation has been a real issue with me lately, and I’m a little worried. I know I’m not depressed - far from it - so it’s not that; but I’m having a really hard time doing more than the bare minimum in life. I just feel like I want to take naps all the time and just relax and be comfortable and not do anything. I’ve never in my life been this sedentary - I rarely go on walks anymore, and up until fairly recently would go nearly every day. There are so many cleaning and organizing projects I should be doing, but getting started is nearly impossible. Part of it is being overwhelmed by the sheer weight of four people’s crap - it’s a lot to manage, as household manager. I’m staying pretty on top of business stuff - I’ve got a planned overhaul of my website, I’m working on hiring for next year, even this week started uploading our earliest videos to YouTube which is a huge and time consuming process. But everything else - meh. I can’t remember the last time I was motivated to try a new recipe or start an exercise routine. I just can’t do it. Is it post-event and post-covid fatigue, still? Is it menopause and my age in general? Is it normal? Should I be kinder to myself and just say fuck it, kids are fed and happy and get dropped off/picked up on time, house is clean, bills are paid, who cares about the rest? What, exactly, do I think I should be doing at this age that I’m not? I don’t know, but I feel like a lazy slob. At the same time, being lazy just feels so goddamn good. I don’t know if this is an actual problem or if I’m making it a problem. 

Reclaiming

We finally got back out to the desert this weekend after a long hiatus. It had been nearly four months since we spent the night out there, and it showed. The place needed a great deal of rearranging and sorting - we had packed up and put nearly everything in the container to make way for the contractors, and the place itself was full of sawhorses and wood and sawdust. They had also left several large garbage bags full of detritus, and siding all around in the sand which had to be painstakingly walked over to the container, piece by piece. The H was not thrilled with the condition they left the place in - they clearly didn’t care by the end - they also took much of our 5 gallon jugs of water away for some reason. I was annoyed, too, but considering what we went through to get this place finally in order after two and a half years, I take it in stride.

Upon entering the place, we discovered the spiders had claimed it as their own - and two scorpions had taken up residence in the “kitchen” corner. I’d never seen scorpions out there before and I have to admit it freaked me out a bit. I kept having flashbacks to my mother describing her daily habit of shaking the scorpions out of her shoes when she lived in huts in Mexico in the 60s. So I was on edge that first night until it became clear that the bugs were aware of our presence and stayed away the rest of our visit. Still, the H insisted on bagging everything up and spraying poison as we left - not something I would have bothered with, but probably not a bad idea. 

It was uncomfortably hot and dry - much hotter than original predictions - so I tried to lay low in the shade and not move much; I managed to get the kids involved in endless games of Uno, and we did have one lovely night in hammocks under the stars (always the highlight of being there). The H busied himself with projects in the hot sun with no water and was surprised when he felt hit by a truck later. If we were on Naked and Afraid I would be the one that would succeed by conserving my energy and slowly starving; he would be the one that would crash and burn after blowing too many calories with tons of activity. Sometimes it’s about the strategy.

We won’t be seeing heat like this again for a long time; our next visit isn’t for a month, but I hope to spend much of November out there, maybe even another friends-only visit, depending. I don’t feel comfortable firing up the shoddily installed wood burning stove, but I think with the new insulation that our little propane heater should do the trick (with the C02 monitor and a window cracked, of course). I look forward to winter days when long hikes in Amboy or Joshua Tree National Park will be feasible again.

For now, the boys are back at school and I head to Chicago on Friday for a singing gig that involves learning eight new songs; I think we’re being housed in a hostel-type environment where there will be multiple people in a room together which I’m very much not looking forward to. The weekend after we’re at a jazz festival in northern CA where we get our own hotel rooms, and there’s a lot less for me to do and friends in attendance, so I’m excited about that one. Our band travel is, very slowly, returning.

After some false starts, I have a gut-wrenching logo for my podcast drawn for free by someone I did a favor for; I’m not sure when my bandleader will have time to record a little music for me, but I think I can at least start doing interviews soon, maybe once these back-to-back trips are behind me. I’m still nervous about the technical side - making it sound good, promoting it properly, etc etc, but I’m going to give myself the grace that I’m not a professional podcaster and I have to start somewhere. I think the content alone sells it - for anyone curious about my rapidly diminishing obscure little former sect, this will be the one place you’ll get to hear about it from the people who lived it, interviewed by someone who also lived it. I think it could be a helpful resource regardless of how slick it is or isn’t.

Recovering and becoming

Covid negative, woot! Despite the inconvenience of having to curb all social interaction for a couple of weeks, this go-round was shockingly mild and not life affecting for the most part. Am I still terrified I’ll get out for a hike and drop dead of a post-covid heart attack? Yes. Who knows what internal damage this virus has done to me. Welp, whatever it is, it’s me and pretty much everyone else on the planet. 

Weather appears to be cooperating, so we should be set for a cabin visit this weekend, which thrills me to no end. I’ve missed it terribly and am looking forward to having the cabin and the surrounding area back in our lives on a consistent basis. In other news, because my newly-cleared brain has to plan something, I’m plotting a spring break rv trip for next March, hitting some spots still on my list. My notes from our summer trip taught me two things - campervans are not practical unless you don’t plan on ever using the bathroom or shower, and these owner-rental sites, despite having worked out the first time, are not worth using anymore. All you get is misinformation, broken equipment and lack of guidance. I think originally the big rv rental places were more expensive, but this is no longer the case. I looked at one out of curiosity and found we could get a nice new clean rv for less than half what I’ve been paying for these broken down old wrecks that are always delivered with full waste tanks and broken gauges…eff that. I’m going to guess that two things are happening - camping dropping off post-covid has caused the big companies to slash rates, while just like Airbnb, the owner-rental sites have gone up and up and now comprise endless extra fees that make you end up paying more than double the nightly rate you thought you were paying. Since it’ll be March we’ll need a warm, wind proof place to sleep, so regular camping is out. I want to take the week and hit Red Rock Canyon state park (officially the last desert park in CA we haven’t visited), followed by the Trona Pinnacles, then rounding out at the Kelso dunes which we’ve driven by but never stopped at. I doubt the Kelso dunes can compare to the Ibex dunes, but we shall see. As usual, the H is on board. So, hooray for plans (and cheap ones at that).

I did a thing on Saturday that I have been debating for literally 35 years. I got a tattoo. After declaring to the H some months ago that “I guess I’m just not a tattoo person - if I were, I would have gotten one by now,” it dawned on me that the reason I haven’t gotten one is because I just couldn’t figure out what I wanted, nor push past the discomfort of finding an artist, making an appointment, talking to new people, etc etc. But this summer I had a consult with a very talented female artist I know through swing dancing, and this Saturday we spent the entire day fleshing out the design together and then spent three hours on the actual tattoo while I watched the entire 12th season of The Real World. Did it hurt? Yes, but pretty much exactly as I expected - mostly just an annoying scraping feeling with moments of lip-biting pain that passed quickly. Let’s just say I was able to endure three hours of it, and I probably have average pain tolerance. My plan was to have something old school - Sailor Jerry style - and that incorporates elements of my hidden heritage (Brazil) and one of my favorite phrases that sums up my approach to life; A Luta Continua (Portuguese for “the struggle continues” or “the fight continues”). This is a phrase said by Brazilians in response to “how’s it going?” It’s so true, isn’t it? 

Right now the tattoo is covered in plastic with a repulsive bubble of trapped ink and blood swooshing around…it’s giving me massive anxiety that it’s going to pop and ruin my clothes/the car/the bed etc, but the artist assured me this is normal and to leave it until Friday when the healing should be complete enough to remove the plastic. Here is what it looked like right after application:

I love it and wish I hadn’t waited so long, but I guess things happen when they happen. I don’t intend to get many in my life - I’d still like to get a NY street sign at some point - but I think that’ll be about it for me. I guess I have to start investing in some muscle tees and thinking about toning up these arms, huh?

Now what?

As always in those fading days of summer post-event, I’m flailing a bit as I’m not used to having this much free time. It’s weird only getting a couple of emails a day. So, mostly I’ve been on auto pilot getting the kids to and from school, making dinners, supervising showers and laundry and homework. This week they started their afterschool clubs - a thin and expensive replacement for the free afterschool program which of course they didn’t get admitted to. On Mondays they both have chess club, and Tuesdays Bobby has parkour while Theo has dungeons & dragons club. This buys me an extra hour, hour and a half pickup on those days. It’s not much, but I’ll take it - and thankfully, despite their protestations (and by “their” I mean Bobby’s), they’ve enjoyed the clubs. I’ll be honest, though - the early pickups have proven to be not a big deal. The only time it’s a problem is when I can’t be here - like on traveling gigs, which are still few compared to the Before Times - otherwise leaving in the middle of the day to pick up kids hasn’t been as disruptive as I thought. 

Still recovering from covid - I feel totally fine, but as of yesterday was still testing faintly positive. I’ll test again tomorrow before I attempt to go to back to school night on Thursday. I hope I clear it this week. I could really use some friend get togethers. With the H working late every single night and all weekend, it’s been a bit lonely around here. I’m filling the void with Japanese and Korean dating shows which are wholesome and delightful.

I’m already on the plan to put together next year’s event, negotiating with teachers and thinking about bands. Every year is like a jigsaw puzzle. Tomorrow is my tax consult, which will greatly determine my future. If I can’t put next year’s ticket sales into next year (and I’m going to guess I can’t), taxes could really wipe me out this year. I could owe $40,000 more than the $25,000 I’ve already paid. Ouch. Well, at least this will be the only year I’ll really eat it. We’ll see if he has any strategies for me going forward. 

In the meantime I’m starting the ball rolling on my podcast - I’ve reached out to the person that offered me a free logo design, and am getting recommendations for audio equipment and platforms. Then I just need my bandleader to record a little guitar piece for me, and I can set up my first interview. It may take a while to get rolling but hopefully this can be my fall project and I can get into a groove with it soon. 

If the weather cooperates, we could have our first desert cabin visit in almost four months weekend after next. I am dying to get out there. Last time we had a real visit was our anniversary weekend when it was still not finished, and we had to clear the place out at the end and put everything in the shipping container. So this time there will be a lot of cleaning and re-setting up of the whole place. I’m proposing we go out Saturday morning so we don’t have to set everything up in the dark, and stay through Monday when the kids have school off. Then I want to do the big furniture trip over Thanksgiving, since that’s going to be a lot of work and involve a U-Haul, moving of furniture from our shed, and a lengthy trip to ikea. It’s taken two and a half years, but we’re finally ready to “move in”. I can’t wait.

Post-event wrap up

I survived the event, for the 25th time. Despite my fears, everyone made it *to* the event, even the tabulator who had danced with covid positive people at an event the weekend before; even the sound engineer who’s town was being battered by a hurricane the day before his flight. So we all made it to the event, and the event went, and it was great. Lots of good feelings and tears of joy and meaningful moments.

However, I, and everyone I know, got covid at the event. Last year we must have just gotten lucky; this year was the superspreader I feared in 2023. I can barely go on Facebook this week because it’s nothing but pictures of positive tests, which I take as a personal rebuke (and is sometimes, though not always, meant as such). It’s been a huge bummer and an unpleasant end - especially being sick myself, although this time it’s barely registering as a mild cold - but as I keep reminding myself, this is our life now. I used to routinely come out of this and every other event much sicker than this - a reality people forget - and it looks like Labor Day will always involve a spike in cases, since it has every year. Between kids returning to school and people returning from vacations, Labor Day will always be a covid hot spot. Another reason to consider moving dates, if possible. 

The H and kids so far don’t have it - although Bobby started coughing today - and I’m hoping I’ll clear it sometime next week. I’m worried about this lingering cough with two traveling singing gigs in two weeks, but at least I don’t have to worry about getting covid before or during those trips, now. I may even be good through the winter and can delay getting the next booster shot until before next year’s event, which might allay some of my fears next summer. We’ll see. But welcome to event planning with covid.

Other than that, I sincerely wish the event were less crowded with stuff - it was a steamroller that ran me ragged, especially on the final night. But I don’t know how to fix that. Our tribute to Jean was absolutely perfect, and that was everything I had hoped. My voice held up. I was able to guide our blind participant through her contest, and that was a pleasure and a very special moment. I opened for next year’s ticket sales, and that was a hit - we sold about 260 tickets as of last night. So I will definitely continue that tradition - although, sadly, it may screw me in taxes this year. I have a consult with my tax guy next week to figure that out. 

How do I feel about the future? Optimistic. I was looking at my list of austerity cuts during the weekend and realized they all suck and I don’t want to do them. I think I need to be brave and hopeful and push harder, not fall into that trap of retracting the event because less people are coming, only to have even less people come because the event is less appealing. I think we’re operating on all new metrics right now - that the 25th anniversary wasn’t really a draw and that issues like the various strikes and no room at the hotel and covid were way more of a deterrent (and really, we went into the event with maybe only 100, 150 people less than 2019, so not bad). So I feel good about next year. 

Fear and loathing

I sort of put the fear of covid on the back burner for a while because I figured “if I catch it now, it’ll be ideal because I’ll be recovered in time and will go into the event with kick ass immunity”. Well, I didn’t catch it, and now is the worst possible time to get it - just in time to start getting sick right before the event so that I can’t even go. This realization has sent me into a full-blown panic. I can’t get sick. I can’t.

And yet, anecdotally, it seems like everyone around me is catching it right now. I’ve had about six friends and their kids get it in the last week, plus our neighbors, and an event running this weekend in Minneapolis apparently was down a front desk person and several musicians. There’s a massive spike happening, once again, right on top of our event, and there’s nothing I can do about it.

Of course this weekend was full of covid-tastic events - massive Metallica concert Friday night (the H and I had masks glued to our faces), a packed nightclub gig for me last night (had mask glued to my face except when I was singing), two indoor mall birthday parties for the kids yesterday, and now my final Knott’s gig tonight (at least it’s outdoors). I cannot get sick this week. I cannot. But the kids will be in school, and the H works with people all day with no mask. I can’t control my environment, and that’s horrifying right now.

I did have the thought, as I was freaking out about it, that the idea of staying home and directing the whole event from my phone actually sounds kind of awesome. I mean, everyone knows what they’re doing - as long as all the stuff gets there on Friday, other than singing, is my physical presence really that necessary, in a pinch? Well, let’s hope we don’t have to find out.

This is the first time I’ve had to deal with this - last year I had immunity so had no fear, and of course the two years before were canceled. Right now we’re all well, so I’m just going to keep that thought. Every morning we wake up with no symptoms through Friday will be a blessing. Just five more days, that’s all we need. Five days of waking up symptom-free. 

This of course doesn’t help when it comes to all the other non-replaceable people who won’t be taking this week before as cautiously - the teachers, the musicians, the sound guys, the judges, the volunteer staff, the camera guys, the DJs, etc etc. The list goes on and on. There’s no way none of those people will contract it in the next few days, and there’s no way to have a backup plan for every single person. It’s just an impossible situation to be in. 

Everyone I’ve talked to said they don’t care if they get it during the event, they just want to make it to the event. I’ve only had one person cancel due to catching it, and one due to fear of catching it. I’m sure these numbers will start increasing next week. But hey, at least I won’t have to deal with last year’s last minute freak out which was realizing pretty much no one had gotten the required booster. I don’t ever want to go through that again.

Right now attendance is at a respectable number - below my hopes and below 2019 still, but only by a couple hundred people. Not sure at this moment how the money will shake out. I know it won’t be great and I also won’t be destitute, so there’s that. I do worry for next year when it’s not an anniversary year, but I get the feeling not many people really care about that - right now it’s more “can I afford this this year”, and for a lot of people that answer is no. We’ll see how that changes for better or worse next year.

Today the boys are at Knott’s on my final free passes while I go sing later. Yesterday was a mad dash to two birthday parties very far apart - I literally spent the entire day driving hundreds of miles to drop them off and pick them up; plus walking four miles in circles in a giant mall looking for a Dave and Busters; I loathe those giant malls with the heat of 10,000 suns. It sucked I couldn’t stay at any of the parties to chat with parents - we all have so many questions about junior high schools and magnet points and who’s going where; now’s when I need to talk to other parents the most, and yet I had to run out each time, with apologies. Sigh. At least the parents remembered to include our kids even though they’re at a different school now. Apparently school tours are already filling up - as much as I still want the kids to go to the local jr/sr high, I know I need to look at other options as well, especially with Bobby now being labeled as highly gifted, which opens more doors. So that’ll be a priority after next weekend. 

My hurricane

So, many of you may be aware that California (and Mexico, and other Pacific Coast areas) were subject to my namesake hurricane over the weekend. Despite lots of worry on my part for our desert place (the fear of it getting flooded after finally being completed was very real), it did just fine. I kept a hawk eye on the washes along the back via our security cameras, and although they were fast and full for a few hours during the day, they never filled up again, which was puzzling. I think the desert areas to our west - Palm Springs, Cathedral City, etc, took the brunt of it. Honestly, we’ve seen and even experienced first hand far gnarlier storms out there. It was definitely a wake up call that we have to build some kind of berm along the west and north sides of our place - that’s where all the water pools. 

It’s been a surreal few days for a few reasons - one, Theo came home from school with a fever and a covid test on Thursday; tested negative, but was still feverish and not eating so I kept him home Friday and shuttled Bobby back and forth to school alone. Then Saturday he was recovered so they both went to their dental appointments, then we all went to see Raising Arizona at the new local art house theater (Bobby liked it, Theo was bored), then we hunkered down for the storm in the strangely humid and heavy weather. My penultimate Knott’s gig was canceled Sunday morning and I spent yesterday keeping an eye on the cabin and watching movies; then word came that school would be closed today. Even though the storm was over overnight, they couldn’t guarantee the safety of the school buildings at such short notice, so for the fourth day in a row I’m home with kids. At about 9 last night our power went out; by this morning it hadn’t been restored, and I scrambled to figure out how to keep kids entertained and fed all day with no internet or tv and not wanting to open the fridge. I was busily re-structuring my day when at about 11 the power came back, despite having spent over an hour on hold with the power department just to be told they had no updates. 

While I’m extremely grateful that our place(s) suffered no damage and our power is on and we’re all safe, I’m so rattled by a weekend of worry and two school days of having kids home when I didn’t expect to that I’m having a hard time focusing or being effective; I feel like my brain is short circuiting. Like…this wasn’t in the plans. Thankfully I’ve gotten a great deal of the most fidgety projects done in advance so there’s not a ton to do this week other than customer service, but there’s still lots of loose ends hanging, and I only have this week and four days next week and then we’re on. As always I’m convinced I’ve made tons of mistakes and have forgotten urgently needed things. In fact I keep finding mistakes, which doesn’t give me confidence. But hey, at least I’m finding them in time to correct them, right?

I’m very much looking forward to getting back to school routines, which reminds me of how unmoored I always feel without school as a grounding mechanism. It really is true that school is our co-parent. Even with shorter days and having to pick kids up so early, it’s still comforting to get up with somewhere to go and the understanding that I’ll have the house to myself for at least a few hours. Today I put the kids on wait lists for afterschool clubs that, if they’re admitted, will garner another hour before pickup one or two days a week. I don’t expect them to be admitted, however. They need to go together otherwise it’s pointless, and there just aren’t enough spots for everyone. I’m not going to hold my breath on that or the afterschool coming through for us. I’ve pretty much resigned myself to early pickups every day. It’s fine. 

Getting in the groove

It’s been four days at the new school and we’re getting in the groove. I figured out the proper route to be in line for the “safety valet” drop off each day (I never realized how important this is until I needed it) which makes drop offs a breeze. Pick ups are a bit different - I saw a whole thread on FB yesterday about how chaotic pick up time is at all schools - but since I have the luxury of going early, and having both kids with watches where we can communicate, I’ve been using both of those tools. If I get there 1/2 hour early there’s usually parking, and I can tell them where I am. It’s a complicated jigsaw puzzle compared to how things were at the old school, but I’m just working with it because I have no choice. 

I have been getting my ass out for walks each day, and even though it’s a little uncomfortably hot even at 8-9AM, I’ve been managing. I figure now, right before my event, I need the physical/mental help that even moderate exercise gives more than ever. I plan to reclaim my body once the event is over - look into yoga again, keep up with the walking, keep up with the dieting. I’ve failed miserably to lose weight before my event - the combo of visiting family/my birthday/our trip made it just impossible, as I’d feared - and I’m going into this event the heaviest I’ve ever been at the event, 5 lbs heavier than last year. I’ve had to alter my costumes or buy new ones. It sucks. But I’m determined to keep on top of my health while also forgiving myself for the times I can’t. It’s an ongoing process. La lucha continua.

I’ve decided definitively to sell tickets at the event - and was reminded why I don’t do this, ha ha. I realized that during the event, I have to make everything live, which in this case means putting a link on my website, activating all the tickets and making that live, and posting all over social media. While I’m at my event. No one else can do this for me. And we have to announce it and put QR codes everywhere, but we can’t do any of this until Sunday night so people don’t accidentally buy next year’s pass for this weekend (next year’s will be cheaper to start). It’s complicated but I can’t think of a better way; the idea is to grab people while they’re there and excited, not when they get home and are exhausted and feeling broke. Anyway, it’s an experiment - I don’t imagine lots of people will go for it - but again I can’t think of any reason not to sell them now, and it might just help break up that big push in February. Worth a shot.

For now we have a somewhat mellow weekend going - we’re going to see Raising Arizona at a new local movie theater, I’ve got my penultimate Knott’s gig, and other than that I plan to just chill and hopefully not do a lot of customer service. 

We’ve been in the pool each day after school which makes me feel a lot richer than I actually am at the moment. 

First day of 4th and 6th grade

After a weekend of moderate anxiety over what would happen today, at last today came and went, and, as hoped, everything worked out. 

Being me, I barely slept, and got the kids to school so early that we were in fact able to park and walk in. The poster with rosters still had Theo in his other class, but I called the office (I rang the doorbell but no one answered) and they confirmed he had been moved. Phew! 

I also was early picking them up and was able to grab a spot and sit anxiously listening to cult podcasts until the bell rang. The experience of standing in a crowd of parents waiting for school to end is something I’ve pretty much never done, but it’s my life now. 

So, how was school? The kids just kind of shrugged and said it was fine. Ha. I was able to get out of them that Theo’s class has 27 kids, several from their summer camp, he had chicken nuggets for lunch, and when asked to come up with a word to describe how he was feeling, said “unimpressed”. I was mildly mortified by this until he said other kids said “traumatized” and “bored” so I guess his wasn’t so bad after all. Bobby said his class had twelve kids, he liked his teacher, and he ran but had a cramp and had to stop. Neither have homework tonight, and Theo’s heavy backpack full of supplies wasn’t addressed so he just brought it home. Huh. Mostly they just cared about post-first day ice cream, which we got.

It’ll be a while before I really figure out the drop off / pick up routine. I’m not going to expect to be able to park and walk each day. Hopefully soon I can just swing by in my pyjamas and scoop them up. Tomorrow I might heat up the pool and have swimming after school, since it’s going to be hot AF and they’ll be home by 2. Why not?

For me, work has consisted of the usual messes that happen in the last weeks of registration - people needing to fix mistakes, people trying to get discounts, people trying to unload passes they can’t use. I let myself not do a ton of things today since I was so anxious and just needed to focus on that and then kick ass the rest of the week. I’m glad I’m in a position where I can make room for those feelings and not have to squelch them to perform at a job. 

I’m considering selling tickets year round. I realize this is the exact opposite of what I was trying to do before - reduce my actual work time to just a few months - but I think that’s a bit of a pipe dream, as people still bug me with their issues whether I’m selling tickets or not. Since it’s so easy to set up next year’s registration on this new system (I did it already), and there will always be a few people who just want to grab their pass a year in advance, I figure, it can’t hurt. It will also spread out the sales so I won’t have one giant chunk of money coming in in a 24 hour period, which hopefully will make me less of a red flag for the credit card processing company. People like to buy people passes for Christmas and birthdays, I could use the extra cash to sock away, and overall I just can’t think of a reason to not do it (there may be tax implications, but I seriously doubt I’d make enough sales at the end of the year to affect much). So that’s a new thing I’m pretty close to pulling the trigger on. 

For now I’m going to try to get into a rhythm with this new school thing, get used to getting up early, and hopefully get out and hike now that I’m up at this new ungodly hour. 

Disorientation

We had the kids’ new school orientation today. In brief, it was a bit of a hot mess. I wore my best “responsible mom who would never swear in front of her kids” outfit, got us all up early to drive to the school…only to find that Theo had been moved out of the classroom we had been promised, the only one with a gifted cluster. What did I say about Theo falling through the cracks?

Thankfully I happened to bump into the teacher he was meant to have purely by accident, who said that yes, if Theo has the gifted designation that he should be in the class and to go to the office (which was the next step). Not surprisingly the office was pure chaos, with attendants running around wild eyed and kids sullenly standing around in corners while their parents pleaded whatever case they had - the person in front of us was a middle school kid who left their baseball glove behind last year and is there any way to track it down? - and our situation was no easier to sort out. Everyone was just confused and said they’d have to verify his gifted status (didn’t we already do all this?) and might get back to me today and might not. As it’s now after five, I’m going to say *not*. So, exactly, wtf are we supposed to do on Monday morning when Theo has to walk into school by himself (no parents allowed) and not know which classroom he’s supposed to be in…? I talked with some other parents and they said just have him go to the one with the gifted cluster - if nothing else he can tell the teacher he’s supposed to be there (thankfully he’s met us now) and maybe he can sort it out. But boy isn’t that an anxiety producing beginning of the school year! Jesus Christ. Like I wasn’t nervous enough, now I have to send my nine year old in there alone on Monday to deal with this mess. 

After this we sat through long, boring presentations that were mostly just a pitch to get us to join the pta, and then when it got to afterschool I could sense the less-informed parents low key panic as they realized that no, most likely your kid will not get into any program, and any other options don’t start for over a month and are also no guarantee of getting in. Good times. At least I was emotionally prepared for this. Many were not.

The gifted magnet presentation was last, and it didn’t tell me much, either - except when we were walking around looking at classrooms, the magnet coordinator randomly asked Theo who’s class he was in, and when we told her, she said, “you’re not supposed to be on this tour”. Great way to make Theo feel even more welcome! Jeez. I jumped in to explain we were here with our older boy and that’s why we stayed for this part, and I could tell she was flustered and said, “I don’t know why I said that.” Everyone was a stressed mess, and I get it. Working in education just seriously suck right now. I honestly don’t know how anyone does it. 

So, it was a very sucky introduction to this school, but honestly, I’m so used to things being stressful and shitty (just yesterday I got in a huge fight with one of our vintage clothing vendors and had to fire them - they were awful) that I figure this is just part of everything being sucky and shitty. It’s going to be a fucking brutal week with school starting on a messy note and all the complicated work I have to do with my event just over two weeks out, and now having to pick the kids up at 2:30 and 1:30 each day. Right now with the event it’s just one crisis after another, because that’s how it always is right now. 

No matter what, we will get settled in this school - it sounds to me like gifted kids are actually not supposed to be not at least in a cluster - we’ll get used to the newness and the routines and everything will get sorted out. And my event will come and go as it has 24 times before. I have lots of plans to cut costs and ease my load for next year, which gives me hope. And I made a “poverty retirement plan” based on my social security and possible income from renting this house if we move out to the desert, and hey, it’s doable. So. Despite everything being nuts at the moment, I’m taking it in stride. Sometimes things are just like that. 

Last week of summer (sorta)

I’m already in mourning that it’s the last week of summer (break), which is odd, because the kids should be mourning it while I should be celebrating (cue the old commercial with the parent joyfully tossing school supplies in a shopping cart while children sullenly drag their feet behind to the tune of “It’s the Most Wonderful Time of the Year”). It’s mostly because we’re facing down a new school, and I’m scared. Also I discovered via my friend who’s kid already goes there that afterschool care is not easy to get - that although she filled out a request form last year like I did for this year, her kid just never got a spot. At our old school there were always rumblings about not having spots, but somehow they always squeezed everyone in, so I’m finding this a little shocking. Mostly, it’s not an emergency, just an annoyance - as well noted, I have the extreme privilege of being home all day so picking them up any time is not a problem. But, for these first weeks while I’m preparing for my event it is indeed a problem having kids at home as early as 1:30 on Tuesdays and noon on any of the stupid “minimum days” that pop up randomly, and there are other days where this just isn’t practical - I’ve actually got two traveling gigs with the band in September and October, and the H having to pretty much barely go to work for a day or two is far from ideal. And I think it’s important for the kids to have free outdoor playtime with other kids for an hour or two after school. I know there will be a solution to this - maybe they will get spots, or my friend and I will work out some kind of buddy system (she’s already said she can pick them up the day after CH when getting home from the airport by 1:30 will be totally impossible), or we’ll set up some schedule by which the kids can go places in the area for a little bit just to give me more breathing room (the library across the street, for example). But still - what a pain in the ass. I’m missing the old school, and their freedom to walk home, already. However, my friend informed me that our wonderful principal is leaving the old school, so I’m feeling less bad about leaving. With all the best teachers exiting and now the principal, it makes me wonder what the school will really be like going forward, and makes me glad we’re trying something new. And again, our days were numbered there anyway. Sooner or later we would have faced the dilemma of having kids picked up on time every day. Might as well be now.

I’m feeling very overwhelmed and dysregulated (my new favorite word) lately, and I think perimenopause is at least partially to blame. I feel very weepy and emotional, while also being pretty much exhausted all of the time and with a hair trigger temper. I know that there’s only one answer to this - exercise and clean eating - but both of those things feel totally impossible at the moment. After the event, sure, but right now I just don’t have the bandwidth to try to start a new exercise routine with all the planning/research/equipment/commitment that takes. And I can’t walk because it’s too hot (although I am committed to walking every day after dropping kids at school starting Monday, when it’ll be early and cool enough and there’s nothing else I can really get done at 8 AM anyway). Last night I got into it with the H because he got a condescending, shaming tone with me that I found really offensive - and while I’m glad I called him out on it and he of course apologized, it was still messy and I’m still unraveling my feelings about the whole incident and had horrible nightmares all night about being in a small boat in an ink black sea with waves and waves threatening to topple me. That’s where I’m at, mentally. Maybe I should just listen to the most recent Radiohead album I just downloaded and really exorcise whatever demon I’m wrestling with.

In other news, I posted in my ex-religion FB group about my potential podcast and there was some interest there, so I figure I have at least 10 people I can interview, with hopefully more when/if I actually start producing something that people can vet for themselves. I have a source for free intro music and possibly a free logo designer, and have fleshed out a list of questions and an intro. Now I just have to make decisions about the technical part - how to record, where to post, etc etc. This has been one bright spot for me, having this new project to look forward to. 

Post trip wrap up

I’m back in work mode, which these days means pretty much working all the time, but with lots of breaks so I don’t burn out. Again I try to balance computer things, physical things, checking ahead and scheduling things, and house and kid things to keep my brain fresh and operating properly. It makes for a much better work day, I find.

I got an email from Bobby’s magnet with a class supplies list and an orientation notice (on the day the kids will be at Disneyland on the last day of camp, so I guess it’s just me going), but absolutely nothing for Theo. I had to go to the school website to find out about his orientation, fill out a form to show interest in their afterschool programs (no guarantee either kid will have any afterschool care at this point), and find an outdated class supplies list. I’m starting to wonder if he’s even registered or has been forgotten about. If I don’t hear anything by Friday I’ll call just to double check. But I get the feeling this is going to be our lives for at least the next two years - Bobby will get all the advantages and attention, whereas Theo, thrown into the general school population, will be forgotten, and I’ll have to work extra hard to make sure a) he doesn’t know this and b) I advocate for him. Sigh. 

The kids also need shoes and clothes in addition to probably over $100 in school supplies. It’s going to be an expensive month.

Prices for my event went up Monday night, and that actually went well - I now have just over 1000 people in attendance. Considering I had about 1400 in 2019 and this is my biggest anniversary year, this sucks, but again, I’m trying to change my perspective. We’re rebuilding. It’s going to take a while. With all the challenges with everything being so expensive, the hotel being full, and everything else, having 1000 people is a remarkable achievement. Will I get 1100 in a month? Maybe, maybe not. I expect a slow month going forward. But my goal had been to try to hit 1000 and I’ve done that with still a month to go, so for now I’m content. 

It’s starting to feel like end of summer, with all the melancholy that brings. As much as I want school to return to give us some structure, I’m also dreading it - I am not looking forward to getting up an hour, hour and a half earlier, rushing around, being stressed, the longer drive to and from the new school, not to mention the learning curve for me with a new school and not knowing how it will actually be for the kids, especially Theo. What if it doesn’t work out? Then there’s the relentless nagging about homework, the supplies I have to get and forms I have to fill out, all of the hyper vigilance required in those early weeks of school that fall right when my event is happening. Ugh, just thinking about it makes me exhausted. 

In other news, I have an idea for my post-event life that I think I could do with a minimum of effort and expense, which is to have a podcast about my former religion. I figured I would approach people (or just post) in my FB groups on the topic to see if anyone would be interested in telling their stories, and take it from there. I listen to so many ex-religion podcasts, but there isn’t one for mine. I don’t expect it to be a hit or to be anything really, except an enjoyable hobby of sorts. I love to interview people and am quite knowledgeable on this topic, having lived it, so if I can just get the nuts and bolts together (headphones, microphones, editing software), I figure, if people are willing to participate, it could be a fun and fulfilling project for me going forward.