Suburban Rhapsody

This is the last week of school for my boys. The weather has been phenomenal. Homework hasn’t come home in a week and reading logs have been abandoned. I’ve reached the I-Don’t-Give-Two-Shits-What-Goes-In-Your-Lunchbox stage of the school year and our afternoons are filled with playing outside with friends and taking dips in the pool. The sprinklers have been dusted off and the rosé is flowing like water. We all have a little pep in our step and the excitement is palpable.

I got this feeling inside my bones. It goes electric, wavey when I turn it on. 

I start off every summer with the same level of enthusiasm that I have the morning of a snow day. Every time a snow day gets called, I have visions of snowman building, cookie baking, fort-making, hot chocolate drinking nirvana. The reality is that everyone is bored by 9:00am and we all hate each other by lunch. Most of the time we end up drinking beers with the neighbors while our children complain about being cold and end up inside the house after a whopping eleven minutes of snow play. Nonetheless, I naively believe that this snow day will end in seventh heaven.

I got that sunshine in my pocket, got that good soul in my feet. 

So, here I am at the cusp of summer. This will be the summer that we actually complete a summer reading log. That will be a cinch since my upcoming second grader has decided to read ALL the Harry Potter books. Sure. Ok. This will be the summer that we take some time everyday to work in that activity book so that my kids don’t forget how to count or what a rectangle is. This will be the summer that we spend all our time outside and I give them that 1970’s summer I keep reading about on Facebook. Maybe I’ll even buy some Tab to make it truly authentic. Then me and the kids can watch the Golden Girls marathon and I’ll try to delicately explain some of the Blanche Devereaux jokes. I think they’ll really enjoy that. This might be the summer that I finally implement all that crap I pinned on Pinterest three years ago.

So just imagine, just imagine, just imagine

Our weekends won’t be crammed with practices and games. Plenty of time to create a rock collection and study bugs under that unused microscope from Christmas. No more after school activities. So now they can finally work on that “nature’s fort” in the backyard. And when they’re done with that, they can take their Harry Potter books in there to read in quiet bliss. Now that the boys can swim on their own and my daughter has that game-changing floatie that doesn’t require an adult in the pool, they can finally entertain themselves at the pool while I sit back and work on my tan. Nobody will fight because they’ll be happily splashing about and having swim races that will all end without tears and drama. Mainly because my kids are all good sports and can manage their emotions appropriately.

This summer my children will learn that it is okay to be bored. I hope that they get so bored that they play with each other. That’s why we had three of them, after all. Play with each other, dammit! And once they do that, they’ll be so happy they’ll probably forget that iPads and video games exist.

This summer they will each have a sketch book so that they can journal and draw all the wonderful things they will see and experience. We’re going to tap into the left sides of their brains and expose their creative genius. Easy peasy.

This summer I won’t yell. I won’t have to! They’ll be so engulfed in their sketching, forts, and books that my need to yell will be nonexistent. That will afford me the opportunity to happily bake them some organic snacks and spend more time perusing farmers markets for their fresh, locally grown fruits and vegetables. Because this will be the summer that the boys really take to eating veggies. I can just feel it. I will be the mom I planned on being during my first pregnancy and the years of therapy that my children currently need will dwindle away.

Ooh, it’s something magical. It’s in the air, it’s in my blood, it’s rushing on. I don’t need no reason, don’t need control. I fly so high, no ceiling, when I’m in my zone. 

This will be the summer that I hit my motherhood stride. I won’t have to read anymore parenting books. I’ll be able to write them by the time fall arrives. My kids are going to go back to school in September better, smarter, kinder, more empathetic and creative human beings. They will be the well-rounded Renaissance children that I always dreamed I could raise. I just have a feeling. And I can’t stop it.

P.S. I’ll circle back with you in a week or two. Let ya know how things are progressing.