All is Fine

All is fine in our lives.

Christmas was wonderful. It was chaotic...but wonderful. There's this unbearable lightness of being one feels watching children open their stockings.

"He knew! He knew! How did he know?!" exclaimed #3 as he tore through his stocking items. And I concur. Just how did Santa know exactly what little things #3 wanted? He really must have spies.

Routine has set in once again. Life is busy at school. My debate team is hosting a tournament on Thursday, and performance nights for the musical I'm helping direct will be mid-February.

#1 did not make the basketball team at his school, but has stepped up to offer to help the coach as team manager. He's eager to be in the loop, even if he can't make it in the hoop.

#2 will be eleven years old on Wednesday. Time flies so fast once you have kids. Is it the zombieism from lack of sleep or is it that time's effects show so much more on kids? Just why does the very act of giving birth seem to put the entire rest of your life on fast forward?

Main Man is brutally busy at work. He goes back to the office just about every evening after supper to work on his current project. Huge deadline toward the end of the month. Then hopefully he can catch up on his life.

Nothing much more to add. We keep putting one foot in front of the other. It seems to keep us heading in the right direction.

STRESS with a Capital S

Today was report card day. It's a really stressful time for me. Three times a year I get to experience mind-numbing stress and debilitate my family with my vile temper.

I like to think that I would be diligent with my responsibilities in any case, but I teach in an interesting community. It's a suburban community in which most of the population is composed of urban professionals with college educations and expectations of the same for their children. Many of them tend to hold the teacher responsible if any of their little darlings get a mark which doesn't please them. It is very important for me to have documentation up the wazoo in order to justify every mark on every report card.

Next week - Tuesday and Wednesday evenings to be exact - parent-teacher interviews will be held. Those are the height of stress. Christmas can begin in our household and in my heart when those are over with.

The kicker of it all is that last night we received an email from my mother-in-law informing us that my sister-in-law (Main Man's sister) is experiencing a very stressful time. I believe the quote was "STRESS with a capital S". Her stressful time is that she is in the process of preparing to move her family into her dream house (with the financial help of my mother-in-law; it's a long story - for another time, perhaps). She (my sister-in-law), incidentally, is a stay-at-home-mom (something I've dreamed of being all my life but, alas, I don't have the nerve to ask others to pay my bills; if I sound bitter, I am).

My mother-in-law will be staying at our house overnight tonight. If my sister-in-law's STRESS becomes a topic of conversation, I may pull someone's tongue out.

Christmas Mysteries

The Christmas commercials have begun.

I'm excited about Christmas. It's my favourite time of year. I love it for many of the reasons that other people hate it. I love the buzz, the excitement, the gift-buying, the card-writing, the concerts, the parties, the getting together with family and friends, and the heart-bursting happiness of it all.

If this season makes me so happy, why do the commercials have the effect on me that they do? They can make me cry at the drop of a hat.

What's up with that?