Mami Drama

So I got to live out a fantasy a week ago, and my gratitude to my mother, sister, and various friends-and-relations knows no bounds. (An aside, thank-you notes are in the offing from both Shay and me.)

I wanted to throw a graduation party like those I remember. You know, family, friends, punch and mints and finger sandwiches. Boring as hell if you’re a kid, I suppose, and next time I will probably ask for input. But this time I got to use my china and my punchbowl, and I made delicious punch and disgusting mints and my mommy made sandwiches and I had a ball!

We were blessed to have half my folks and my sister & brother-in-law, Papa & 2 of his sisters and their hubbys, and many friends. We missed the people who couldn’t be here, but I think we had a good time, anyway. I think there was a total of around 40 people. Not a lot of leftovers, not very much mess, not very much stress. It was awesome!  My mom & sister kept control of the chaos, as usual, and made it so much easier on me.

It was a fantasy because I’m not very good at entertaining. I am all about ideas and making stuff look pretty, but I suck at execution. & I REALLY suck at mingling. I have the attention span of a gnat. I wanted to relive my childhood, and for a few hours, I really did. I felt what it might have been like if I’d not left the Midwest, and for me that meant everything. My homesickness comes in waves of nostalgia and I am finally figuring out ways of staving off the worst of it by bringing elements into my life that remind me of the best of it.

Thank god for my mother. I appreciate my sister and our friends, but my mom understood what I wanted even if she doesn’t get why I needed it. I had sweet-tart punch and sour cream mints and ham salad & egg salad sandwiches and bars and salads and pretty things on my table. I had a punch bowl and a coffee urn filled and hostess plates & cups and pink china. I had people sitting in my living room and eating and playing outside, all to celebrate my oldest baby graduating. It was one of the coolest days I’ve had in a long time. Cuz, you know, it’s all about me:)

I haz one:) On the 21st of May, 2009, I became the not-old-enough parent of a high school graduate. Ok, I am technically old enough, but since I feel like I age at a rate slower than most around me, my oldest kid should be around 13.

But she’s not. She’s a fresh adult with goals and aspirations and, as of ten days ago, a golden ticket to Grown-Up Land. She doesn’t agree, of course…she says that while she’s an adult, she refuses to be a grown-up. Like that’s a dirty word. Ahh, I remember those days LOL.

Come September, (actually late August but I like September better) Shay will join the ranks of collegians  at the University of Alaska-Fairbanks, provided we are able to jump through the remaining hoops for financial aid. She will be several thousand miles away in a fairly remote area we have only dreamt about, probably alone and having the time of her young life.

She wants to study animal behaviour. Sometimes she wants to teach, or be in theater, or do art. She is better equipped for some of these than others, but from experience I know that what she finds out about herself in the coming years will determine her path irrespective of what she’s come across so far. I know that whatever she decides she will not easily lose her spontinaity and effervescence.  And what she finds, she will love.

She is much like her father, I am realizing.  She charms with her smiles as she heads off to play, and I am hoping this means she also has his ability to roll with the punches and his aptitude for excelling at the next thing once boredom hits. Because she has such varied interests she won’t long be satisfied with one carreer. I know she will be a force for good let loose on the world. Positive change, people.

For clarification, I’ve been writing the kids’ names as their first letter to protect privacy. I will no longer be doing that, as it confuses my family (and me!) so they’re just gonna have to deal with their names being in the ether. Es becomes Shay, Kay-Kara, Jay-Jake, & Emmy-Molly. Thank you and good-night.