I have failed as a mother

Someday I will probably look back on this day and laugh. Right now I am just shaking my head and wondering what in the world? How have I failed them so completely??

This is my kids’ first summer at home alone. At least the older two. Silas is still at daycare. It is only day 2 and them negotiating the world is just frightening.

Thursday is housecleaner day. I don’t really want my two underfoot while they try to clean the house, so I suggested that they take some money (that I gave them) and walk down to Yokes and get some breakfast - a couple donuts and something to drink.

Skadi texted me and asked if they could please ride their bikes. I caved and reminded them to wear helmets. Then I didn’t hear anything else. I went into work, spent the majority of the morning locked in a video teleconference. But when I got out AB started telling me a story. And all day, little things have embellished the story here and there.

So the kids rode their bikes down to Yokes. They went in and decided on which donuts they wanted. But no one came to serve them! Apparently, it isn’t like the Spudnut shop where they get you the donuts. They waited for about 30 minutes before finding someone to ask for help with the donuts and whoever they found told them that you help yourself.

My oldest, being the frugal child that he is (ha), noted that you could buy ONE DOZEN donuts for less than they could buy four donuts. So they got the box out and each carefully selected 6 donuts. The donuts were so big that they needed a second box. So two donut boxes full, they got their drinks and headed to their bikes.

Yeah problem. How are they supposed to ride their bikes back, uphill, and carry all those donuts?

At this point Leif calls AB and asks him to come and pick them up and take them and the donuts home. AB and I both work about 15 miles from home - by highways. Hans tells them to go pound sand. Nicely. As in, “Leif go in and get some bags, hook them on your handlebars and ride home. Figure it out for yourself.”

Apparently at this time some unknown person comes up, knows the kids’ names, tells them she works with me (brown hair, with a young blonde daughter) and asks if they need help. She yelled in the phone “hey Hans!” (I still have no idea who this person was.) She tagged another woman that apparently we know and asked her, “hey can you run them home?” This unknown person says she is going the opposite way.

To be honest, this whole exchange kind of freaks me out. Skadi admitted that it made her very nervous that some woman she didn’t know was going to put them in her car and drive them home. I am glad it made her nervous.

Ok, so this couple of people I supposedly know (yes, I live in a small town) leaves and the kids are still standing there with the statement from their dad to “figure it out”.

At this point my recommendation would have been to, sit on one of the picnic tables, eat your donuts, throw the rest away, ride home. Lesson learned.

Nope.

Figure it out to my oldest meant to call his best friend’s mom and tell her they needed help. SIGH. Of course she leaves and heads out with her minivan and shows up at the grocery store for the kids. Plops their box of smushed up donuts into the car, loads up their bikes and hauls them home.

So after hearing this, I am mortified. I immediately messaged her with apologies galore and she reassured me that she was just glad that the kids knew to contact her when they needed something. We listed off the life lessons (you can’t buy in bulk if you have no means to carry or store the bulk items), and we have moved on.

Leif’s version of all this is that it is Skadi’s fault because she decided they should ride bikes.

Skadi’s version of all this has her arguing against every point of failure, “we don’t need 12 donuts”, “we can’t call your friend’s mom, that’s rude”.

I will never really know. I kind of want to forget it all right now! But I am guessing like so many stories out there, I will never hear the end of this one!!

Wanderlust, or something else

I have had various versions of this post rolling around on paper, in my journal, and in my head. None of them seem just right. And I have moaned about it previously here. And if I checked, I would probably realize that those moanings are getting closer and closer in time, becoming more frequent.

This place. I like very little about this place. I have come far enough down this thought process that we know that it is the physical location and amenities associated with this place. It is separate from all that we do love about our lives. We love our friends here, we love our family so very much. I (for the most part) love the schools - ok, maybe one of them I am really fed up with now and very much looking forward to summer break and strong hopes that they figure their shit out for next year when I have two kids there. I love my job and the flexibility it offers. I really like where I am, what I am doing, and I have a great group of people I am working with now and lots of opportunities available to me. I have even had a few recent opportunities to leave for 2 year appointments with other organizations.

Those are hard because AB also needs a job. And it is hard to embed oneself in a job that would be short term. We have talked more seriously about Vienna - that maybe we would go as a one job family. But the logistics start becoming heavy - dogs, kids, and the logistics of switching my work focus for that role. But it is tempting.

I have friends recently who are moving and I am finding myself a wee bit jealous. A woman I have only just started to know at work has announced she and her family are moving to Seattle for her husband’s new position - and that started me dreaming.

The other day AB mentioned that he is just about done with this area. Yeah. I get it.

I keep telling myself that if I was able to renovate the house to create my personal paradise whereby I would not be coming home everyday and feeling the weight of my dissatisfaction with our residence that maybe our issues would be solved. Maybe if I didn’t worry daily about what new things the neighbors are going to complain about? Maybe if I didn’t find this neighborhood and my house so stifling, it would be ok? I need to uninstall Zillow...

My list of places I would leave here to move permanently is quite small. You couldn’t pay me to go back to Colorado. Large cities make me claustrophobic. Traffic makes me nuts. I need beauty. I need the outdoors. I loved Reno, but the job situation there would be abysmal. I crave Alaska and so does my Alaska Boy. But that isn’t as simple either. We have never ever lived near family and only moderately tolerate having our family (that we love very much) visit us. How would we really do living in the same city as family?

For now, here we are. And we are committing to ourselves (in the absence of any extenuating circumstances, or fantastic opportunities) that we are here until Skadi graduates. At that point all bets are off. We are lucky in that our kids don’t seem to have a particular attachment here and if we mention moving they ask excitedly, when and where? I don’t have any notions of having this house for my kids to return to - and am more of the opinion that if I could rid myself of this place right now I probably would... but it requires too much work that needs to be put in - and I have zero time right now.

Ok, so I have put this post here. It is rambley and not terribly well organized. But out there.

My kids were born here, all delivered by a fabulous doctor, all attended a wonderful daycare (in the larger scheme), are working their way through teachers that, by in large, we adore and have enriched our kids’ lives. We have friends we can rely on and call on. We have food. We can travel nearly anywhere we may want to. I get my kids on the bus and can be home at the end of the day (most days) to watch them get off. AB has Friday’s off. Life is good. Just why can’t this place be the community we would love to love?