Another Great Adventure

A few weeks ago a friend mentioned that her husband had got orders to Guam.  She was a little anxious about the big change--three years in the middle of the Pacific where visiting home isn't really an option due to cost, with two kids and a dog to boot.  As the other spouses and I reassured her, I found that I was actually kind of jealous.

Rick retires next year after twenty-two years of service to the empire.  We're planning our own move, but it's heavier somehow.  8 people, 6 pets, buying a home, transitioning to a new non-military identity and way of life...If we make a mistake, the army isn't going to be there to whisk us away in a couple of years or catch us if everything falls to hell. We'll bear the responsibility and successes and failures on our own.  After two decades of Uncle Sam running our lives, that agency is a little overwhelming.  There won't even be time to adjust--we'll have to hit the ground running, getting kids into extracurriculars and teaching one to drive (two, since the permit age is lower), getting work and reintegrating into a community we haven't been a part of for years.

On the other hand, orders to Guam are an adventure.  A challenging one, certainly.  That kind of isolation is no joke.  The cost of living, typhoons, the pace of life on a relatively small island...there are definitely going to be some major hurdles.  And yet I think about when my kids were younger, how exciting it was to pack up the car and just drive to the next duty station, unsure of what we'd find, and I miss it.  Now there are a thousand different concerns.  Friendships mean more to teens than toddlers.  There's more paperwork.  A ridiculous number of pets to be accounted for.  And lurking behind it all is the little voice saying, "You could just stay where you are, you know."

There are good reasons to stay here.  Rick has a job he could step into without any hassle.  The house is already bought and largely renovated.  The kids have friends.  More importantly, WE have friends.  We know the roads. The cost of living is cheaper even if property taxes are absurd. It makes financial sense to stay.  Despite this, even though we finally have the chance to put down real roots, none of us want to stay here.  It simply doesn't fit.

I've been happy in so many places.  I've been happy here, too, though it took some effort.  Still, it feels like a secondhand shoe--it doesn't hurt, it's roughly the right size, it's a perfectly serviceable shoe, but something about it just isn't right. Sometimes in my more cynical moments, I doubt that there is ever a place that will be "just right." I'm not Goldilocks and there isn't a cottage in sight.  What I do know is that here isn't where our story seems to end.

And so next summer we're going off on a grand adventure of our own.  It feels like the last one, a finality, but in reality it's only another change. I just have to remember all the changes I've already survived.  I got married and had kids and it was so much better than I expected.  Ten moves to wildly different locations.  Sickness.  Grief.  I've been a young mother, a middling mother, and now the mother of adults, and each stage has had its unique trials and joys.  I don't regret any of it.  Whatever comes next will also undoubtedly come with good times that outweigh the bad.

I'd be lying, though, if I said I wasn't intimidated at the sheer amount of chaos ahead.  It's kind of like the climactic scene at the end of the Pirates of the Caribbean trilogy: multiple ships firing at each other as they ride the edge of a swirling vortex of death, it's raining for dramatic effect and everyone's drenched, no one is 100% sure what is actually going on or what anyone else is doing, and for good measure there's a wedding thrown in just to keep things interesting.  It's all you can do to stay on your feet.  That's how 2026 is shaping up.  Orders and out-processing in a behemoth bureaucracy that makes the simplest tasks require three different signatures and a 100 different pieces of paperwork; prepping and selling a house; buying a house 3,000 miles away; getting one kid across the graduation line, another four kept to grade level, and the oldest finishing her junior year of college; bouncing between last-hurrah activities with the girls before we rip them away from their friends again; packing and passports and paperwork so that our circus can legally cross Canada...That's before we even think about the wedding that might be happening somewhere in the middle of it all.

To quote another movie, "I'm too old for this sh*t."

But I remember driving to D.C. in a jankety car and no phone.  That was intimidating too, but we survived.  We survived the first epic southern rainstorm where we couldn't see 10 feet in front of our car, and the first snow that shut down a highway and turned a 10-hour trip into a 20-hour nightmare.  We've made it through car engines melting outside of Dallas and babies starting a domino-chain of vomiting half-way through the midwest.  Heck, we even handled international travel during Covid.  It wasn't fun, but we got some good stories.  In the end that's what we'll remember, and that's what I'm depending on.  We didn't come this far to sink now.

Now I just need to remember that when the winds start howling.

A Lonesome Haunt

 For the first time in 20 years, I'm alone on Halloween.  Rick's on shift, the Bigs have taken the Smalls out trick-or-treating and also took the lead in getting them dressed. The lone spawn left home is holed up in her room doing physics and hating life. The loaded candy bowl is out front with the porch light on.  Mary Shelley's Frankenstein is in the background, Kenneth Branagh chewing the scenery in lace cuffs.  The dishwasher is running and one of the idiot dogs occasionally barks at a ghost but it is otherwise very, very quiet.

It's weird.

Halloween has always been my favorite.  It's a chaotic, irreverent mess of treats and spooky movies with baller soundtracks and indulging in dressing up.  I love throwing together costumes--over the years I've acquired or made enough pieces to make a pretty fantastic dress-up box.  It's come in pretty handy.  For example, this year Aeryn could not choose a costume for love nor money nor threats; then literally about noon today, she decided to be a flapper and made her sister join her in the roaring 20s.  A couple minutes of digging through my magic tubs and a quick swipe of makeup and I had two ladies ready to rouge up their knees and Charleston the night away. 

We've had some great costumes over the years if I do say so myself.  Steampunk Joker and Harley Quinn, Avatar the Last Airbender, the Moon and her Fairies, Superman, Captain Hammer, Firefly, an Old West themed family complete with cow and saloon owner.  More recently the girls have taken more and more control over their costumes, resulting in some pretty impressive results--Captain Amelia from Treasure Planet, Orpheus, Chadifer the College Dude Bro, a Chicken, various witches, and a bombshell version of Rarity (My Little Pony).  There were some missed opportunities, for sure--I will regret not doing Miss Hannigan and her orphans when the girls were still small enough that the costume fit (and they had easily overruled opinions).  Monty Python and the Holy Grail was another missed opportunity.  For some reason, teen girls aren't exactly jumping at the chance to be a "shrubbery" or "Knight who says Ni" (though Claudia was quite delighted at the thought of being the killer bunny).

One of my favorites.

The Toddler we call Jayne

Werewolf at the All Hallow's Eve weekend at the Ren Faire last year.

Drinks at Calamity Jane's Saloon

Cracked Doll

Captain.

Chadifer 

She's of two minds about everything.

I'm actually really proud of this prop. 

This year's Trunk or Treat costume (last week).  Nobody knew who we were.

Fluttershy

Rick and Gregg, back in North Carolina 18 years ago.

Steampunk Joker and Harley.

1 week postpartum butterfly and caterpillar.

ATLA

This was a last-minute costume.  I was two days past my due-date and was not expecting to be trick or treating.  It came together nicely and was rather on-the-nose.

I'm slowing down, though.  To steal a phrase from a much better author, I feel like butter scraped over too much bread; I just haven't had the energy to dive as fully into the holiday this year.  I also realized that the girls are driving it more and more; Aeryn decorated cupcakes with the smalls this year, Echo insisted on decorating the house, and Leah is leading the candy marauding.  I'm not as necessary or involved as I was before.

Echo's treats--pudding-filled chocolates.

I'm not sure how I feel about this change, one more in a great wave of changes.  I take that back.  It actually makes me a little sad.  It's fun to dress up, but it's more fun to help a kid make their vision come to life.  Candy's always nice (especially half-price day-after-Halloween candy), but there's a certain thrill to the post-holiday trading market that springs up in the living room.  Making fudge eyeballs and decorating cookies badly just isn't the same solo.  The magic fades.  Luckily I still have some time with my girls at home; and after that, I'm statistically likely to have at least a couple grandkids; the magic hasn’t dulled yet, and while it will alter it's not likely to fade entirely.

In the meantime, I'll enjoy a couple quiet minutes out of a still chaotic, bustling, beautiful part of life.  I'll sip my drink.  I'll write maudlin nonsense in my blog.  And when those kids come home and the sugar swap meet opens in my living room, you can bet I'll be taking my cut of the candy.  Times are a-changing, but they ain't gone yet.

Happy Halloween.  Make the most of it.

 

Viva Las Vegas

My girls just got back from living it up in Vegas with some friends.  Well, not too much living since no one in their crew is drinking or gambling age (and even if they were are remarkably responsible...and poor).  I'm a little jealous, but I got to go visit my friends in Vegas back in November so I can't complain too much.

The closest we got to the strip was the highway.  No complaints. There was also a car racing event downtown, so we just avoided the whole thing.

I've been to Vegas a couple of times in my life.  I'm largely not a fan.  It's desert, it's hot, and it's the number one destination for people who aren't great at holding their liquor, their money, or their clothes.  It takes a compelling reason to make the trip.  This time, it was the wedding of one of Rick's friends that prompted Rick, the number 2 kid, and I to make the 12-hour drive west.  The wedding itself was wonderful.  It didn't start out that way--it turns out someone (Rick) forgot to RSVP for both of us, but luckily someone else had canceled so I had a seat.  The bride and groom had a lovely ceremony out in a rose-trellised gazebo, then a reception that combined traditions from their Vietnamese and Korean heritages (including lion dancers).  It was awesome, and it was a privilege to share the evening with them. 

We went for the wedding, but the friends and family were the jewel of the trip.  We stayed with some of my very favorite people in the world.  Years ago we met up in Alaska; we both have six girls, both homeschool, and we hit it off pretty quickly.  There are very few people whose home I could comfortably invade, but these folks are on that elect list.

We picked right up where we'd left off.  Despite her swearing she's not the tour guide kind of host, she still chauffeured us out to Red Rocks for some hiking one day.  Despite the heat we did a couple of short hikes and also found some of the local burros.  Obviously, we chased them down for a picture.  

The next few adventures were much smaller--a bird rescue and a farmer's market down the street.  The bird rescue was wild.  It was full of rescued farm animals as well as two houses full of parrots, including some psychotic cockatoos who climbed down the walls of their cages to flirt with the girls and scream at the rest of us.  The farmer's market was overrun with barn cats and the occasional chicken.  We all made some furry friends.  Add in some yummy Greek food and some late-night gabbing, and it was a pretty good day.

Another highlight of the weekend was visiting Rick's fabulous cousin and her family.  (Apparently Vegas is where all the cool people live.)  His cousin and her husband are brilliant, hilarious, and know all the best food joints in town.  We had dinner at an Asian fusion joint and dessert at a coffee house, with a side of political discussion and medical provider anecdotes.

After a couple of whirlwind days without nearly enough sleep, it was time to go home. Courtesy of my number 2 kid being obsessed with musicals, we listened to Epic and discussed Greek mythology. We also read through a chunk of Let's Pretend This Never Happened by The Bloggess (Jenny Lawson). I love road trips with my crew.  Even if we don't get crazy (like I said before, we're unfortunately rather responsible and not big drinkers despite being legally old enough and then some) we always have a pretty good time.

A giant freaking stuffed rabbit at the farmer's market.  There's a cat underneath it.

And a pic from the girls' trip.  She thought she was funny.

If You Take Your Family Hiking

 If you take your family hiking, you'll have to make a plan. You'll start by picking a good trail.  Not too long, not too short, not too far away, not too steep, not too boring, not too popular.  You'll check the weather and pick a day that everyone's free.

When you find the right hike and pick the right day, you'll have to wake them up.  Some people will be helpful and take initiative, but others will start to complain even though you've been talking about this for three days.  They'll find a thousand reasons not to go, each stupider than the last.

When you counter all their reasons, they'll say they have nothing to wear.  You'll send them back to find the pants they never wear but that still wind up in the laundry every week. They'll complain about not being able to wear shorts, and you'll remind them--patiently, again--about cactus, rocks, and all the biting/stinging/venomous things that live where you'll be walking.

When they're finally dressed in weather and terrain appropriate clothes, they'll need to get some shoes.  Inevitably one kid's shoes are too hot, another wants to wear sandals, and a third kid can only find one of any given kind.  You'll help them look.

When everyone has their shoes on, you'll grab the backpack your surprisingly prescient youngest packed.  It's stocked with snacks, sunscreen, water-bottles, her sister's travel emergency kit, and spare toys if she gets bored.  Impressive.  You herd everyone to the car.

When they're getting buckled, someone will have to pee.  You'll have to unlock the house again, but at least you'll be able to drive straight to the hike.

When everyone is back in the car, you'll start driving.  Your husband will need snacks.  Good snacks, not the ones from the house.  So you'll pull over. Everybody will want snacks.  You've made it out the door, and you're not going back.  Snacks it is.  They will be eaten by the time you finish driving.

When you get to the trailhead, one kid will bolt down the trail, one will ask to stay in the car, and another will need to pee.   You will locate the port-a-potty and make everyone pee. Then you will summon the overly energetic child and hand them the backpack to slow them down; this will also encourage the stragglers to keep up if they want what's left of the good snacks. You will be proud of your problem-solving skills.

When you finally start hiking, someone will complain, loudly, about everything.  Several will probably take turns voicing their discomfort. It's hot.  Their feet hurt.  They could've been sleeping.  The sweat feels gross on their back. You will try to divert their attention by pointing out the flowers, the views, and--is that a deer?  They will refuse to be distracted.  You will tell them to deal with it, and the fastest way back to the van is to finish the hike.  No, they can't wait there while everyone else hikes.  Because, that's why.

When you start to make some distance, some of your crew will insist on climbing over every rock and jumping off every tree stump.  You will warn them that they will get tired. They will promise they won't.  You will know it is a lie.

While you are trying to slow down your explorers and encourage your stragglers, another child will be fascinated by every tiny flower, alienesque bug, bark texture, oddly colored rock, and weirdly shaped cactus.  They will want to take pictures of everything.  You will consider using a stick to hurry them up but will remind yourself that you are doing all of this to enjoy nature and your family.  Theoretically.

When you're two miles up the trail, someone will demand snacks because they are starving to the point of imminent death.  You will offer the mostly healthy, energizing snacks in the backpack.  Even though the snacks are what they eat every day at home, apparently they are now undesirable and possibly poisoned.  You will allow them to eat the sleeve of crackers and crumbs of the gas station snacks instead.

When they've eaten the crackers, they'll be thirsty.  You will encourage them to drink water.  One will chug the water until their stomach hurts, another will say they're not thirsty, and a third will say the water tastes weird.  You will make them drink it anyway.

When everyone has had a satisfactory amount of water, you'll get everyone back on their feet.  Without leaving the trail someone will manage to get a splinter.  You will look everywhere for the tweezers and discover that's the one thing not in the kit.  You promise yourself you'll get a pair just for hiking.  Meanwhile, your husband will whip out his folding pocket-sword with a six-inch blade and perform surgery on the trailside.

When the splinter has been extracted, someone will have to pee.  The only bushes around are knee-high, so they will refuse to go.  You will encourage them to go anyway because the only toilet for miles is back at the trailhead and no one else is around. They will refuse and bring it up frequently for the rest of the hike.

When you are three miles in, one of your kids will lie down in the middle of the trail and declare they live there now, just leave them there and pick them up on the way back.  You promise it's almost time to turn around.  They won't believe you. Your husband will poke them with a stick until they get up.

When you get to the main destination of your hike, everyone will be happy for about twenty minutes.  All fatigue, hunger, injustice and ennui will melt away as the kids scramble up to see the cliff-dwelling or the old abandoned mine or the 100-mile-mountain view.  You will feel vindicated.

When it's time to start back down, even as you have foretold the kids who have been darting off trail and scrambling over rocks and have walked roughly three times further than you have are suddenly exhausted.  You give them five minutes to rest and make them drink more water.  

When they've drunk, they'll have to pee even more.  Since there's still insufficient booty-cover, they will refuse again. However, they are walking faster now out of desperation to get back to the trailhead port-a-potty, so you don't press the issue. You're all almost back, even the one who is still working on their photo-documentary and the other who is still complaining about how much they don't want to be there. 

When one of your helpful children senses that her siblings aren't enjoying themselves as much as she is, she will offer unasked for encouragement and start singing and pointing out tiny flowers and oddly colored rocks.  Half of her siblings will sing along and ooh and aah at her discoveries.  The other half will silently plot her demise.  You will take the backpack with the keys in it and make a beeline for the parking lot.

When you finally get back to the car, you will reach for the keys but not be able to find them.  You will search three times through the backpack, a little more frantic each time as you wonder where they could have possibly fallen out on the trail.  Then you will find them wedged between the sunscreen and the mysteriously reappeared tweezers in a side pocket.  Just in time, too, because the kids are loudly on the edge of heat-stroke and dehydration.  You will usher them into the car.

As soon as everyone is buckled, someone will remember they have to pee.  You will get everyone out for a last visit to the bathroom and promise yourself you're never doing this again.

 When everyone is finally buckled and you're on the highway home, all of your kids without exception will start talking about what an amazing time they had.  One will talk about the big rocks they climbed.  Another will talk about the rabbit they saw.  The perpetual complainer will sigh about how pretty everything was.  Yet another will mention how good it felt to get out and move, and they'll all crowd around to look at the 200 pictures their sibling managed to take in a little over two hours. It will be the best day they've had in a long time. The one who asked to be left for dead will hug you and say, "Thanks for taking us hiking, Mom."  And then you'll start to think that the last couple hours might have been worth the hassle.  You'll remember this other trail that you wanted to do with a waterfall at the end.  Maybe, just maybe, you all should go hiking again next week.

And if you take your family hiking, you'll have to make a plan.