Camping. At Home

To My Friends and Family Who Love to Camp,

I’m thinking of you.  It’s a beautiful weekend for camping and probably the last one for this year.  It is, after all, officially fall and the last weekend of September. Sob. But the sky is blue and the air is warm with an occasional soft breeze that ruffles the leaves on the trees.  And the feathers on my chickens who are just across the yard from me.  Because I’m camping at home.

I’ve got my camp chair out in the yard, my cup of tea on the ground beside me, and the campfire at my feet.  Every so often I stand up, grab my campfire stirring stick and move the wood around.  When the wood gets low I walk a few feet to our wood pile, pull out a couple of pieces and toss them on the fire.

And when I need to take a potty break I just walk in the house. Which is the best part of my camping experience. Because once it grows dark and cold I’ll just go into my house and sleep in my own cozy  bed.

I think I’m going soft.  Sorry, camping folks.

But know I’m thinking of you.

Sleepless Near Seattle

While watching my grand baby entering the world this past summer I was struck with how difficult being born is.   Which got me to thinking about my father-in-law’s recent passing and how difficult dying is.  Beginnings and endings. There are a lot of similarities. Babies are bald and toothless and chubby and have speech issues.  Old people are often bald and toothless and chubby with speech issues.

I’m not yet bald and toothless but my grand baby and I are both going through a similar stage– the difficulty-sleeping-at-night stage. Grand baby wakes up and wants to be fed and changed.  I wake up and go to the bathroom. Grand baby fusses and cries.  I toss and turn and stare at the ceiling.

Grand baby will soon be sleeping longer.  Maybe I will too.

In the meantime I’m spending a lot of nights sleepless near Seattle thinking about my grand baby and wondering if he’s sleeping.

Grandkids and Dessert

My soon-to-be-a-grandparent-for-the-first-time friend looked at me and said, “People tell me that having a grandchild is amazing and I’m sure it is. But I can’t help wondering if it is as exciting as they say.  Then I see you light up when you talk about your new grandbaby and I know that it is true.”

Having a grand baby is magical.  But what is it that makes it so? Having my babies was magical. But there’s a difference.  And having pondered on this for a day or so I think I am beginning to understand the difference.

Having children is amazing and awesome and inspirational and a whole lot of work with sleepless nights wrapped up with worries and financial issues and potty training and driver’s education.  But grand parenting is more of the amazing and awesome and inspirational, and (usually) less of the sleepless nights and worries.

It’s the difference between a very good meal that you planned and assembled and prepared and is good for you, compared with a dessert made by someone else that has no nutritionally redeeming value but is oh, so good.