It's all Greek to me

It's been a rough year for education in our house.  Between house renovations, depression, Rick's psycho schedule, a couple family emergencies, and acclimating to a new state, homeschooling has taken a bit of a hit.  Most of my efforts have been focused on helping the older two Bushbrats wade through high school.  The younger girls have had to make do with workbooks, documentaries, and whatever bits and pieces they gleaned from lectures to their older siblings.  It stinks, because when I had a whole horde of primary age kids we had a blast.  We always had some project or educational adventure going on. As the kids have gotten older, though, it's gotten harder to schedule the fun when there's always some obligation or disparate academic need in the way.

This last week, though, my oldest three girls went to a youth camp with our church, and I seized the opportunity.  My girls have always loved themed-days, and since we were studying ancient Greece, the activities practically planned themselves.

On the first day we read Greek myths, decorated terracotta plates, did Greek-themed wordsearches and colored maps of the Mediterranean while watching documentaries.  The second day, we held our own Olympics.

*Aside: For those of you who are yourselves Grecophiles, you would be technically correct to point out that we couldn't have our own Olympics because we are all *ahem* female and THAT JUST ISN'T DONE.  However, my delightfully pedantic friends, I am pleased to inform you that while we called it the Olympics to keep things simple, we know it was more accurately a Heraia, the games in honor of Hera that were reserved specifically for unmarried girls, who would compete in loose one-armed chitons with their hair unbound.  As a married woman, I did not participate.  So there.*

In the interest of historical accuracy (and because my children are all firebugs) we naturally started with the lighting of the sacred flame, which would burn throughout the games.  Then, using what we could find around the house, we held our five events in the backyard.

First was the discus throw, made possible courtesy of a five-pound weight from Rick's workout bench.  The discus was followed by the shot put (weighted ball), javelin throw (Rick's walking stick), and wrestling (first person to step over the hose and out of the loop loses, best two out of three).  We ended with a footrace (three laps around the gazebo) and crowned our victors with laurels.

 

We ended the celebrations by wearing our finest bedsheet chitons to a feast from Zino's Greek Restaurant--gyros, spanakopita, baba ganoush, dolmades (stuffed grape leaves) and some baklava, with fresh grapes, cucumbers, and bowls of grape "wine".  As you can expect, my kids ate mostly grapes and the side of fries because they're terrible ingrates.  It didn't ruin the day, though, and now we know that none of us like baba ganoush because eggplants are the devil.

I'm really proud of these couple days.  This isn't what homeschooling always looks like.  There's often a lot more yelling and workbooks.   This, however, was a win that we all needed. It was a good day.

One Fish, Two Fish...

 I always encourage people to get out of their houses.  I do this because I look back on the first several places we lived and realize how much I missed out on.  I used to tell myself that it was because we were busy, but it was really because of two things: I didn’t know where to go, and I was worried about the excursion being a dreadful failure and everyone having a miserable time.  As I’ve gotten older, I’ve learned that those are terrible excuses for missing out.  There are really cool things in even the most boring places.  You just have to look and be willing to risk a dud—and even duds beat staying at home watching Adventure Time on repeat.

Everyone in El Paso knows about Balmorhea State Park.  It isn’t exactly a hidden gem, but a two-and-a-half-hour drive on I-10 through flat scrubland in the middle of nowhere discourages most travelers.  It was one of the Civilian Conservation Corps projects in the 1930s; a pool was built around San Solomon Springs, with the overflow going into a protected cienega, an alkaline freshwater wetland unique to the southwest.  Several small adobe buildings flank the main pool, which covers almost 2 acres and is 25 feet deep at its deepest point. Between 22 and 28 MILLION gallons flow through the pool every day, keeping the water fresh, cool, and providing a natural habitat for the various water plants, fish, and turtles that live there.

Frelling awesome.

Several stone staircases descend into the pool at various points, shaded by massive sprawling trees.  The red adobe and white concrete lend the park the feel of a Roman bath.  The shallow end of the pool looks generic and familiar, but then the floor plunges suddenly to a deep, translucent sapphire with a natural rocky bottom carpeted with algae and small water plants.  Fish nibble your toes around the steps and trail you through the water, your own personal entourage.  In the deepest sections, larger fish are quick shadows rippling below you.

Rick and the older girls slapped on sunscreen, snapped their goggles into place, and splashed in.  I barely saw them for the next two hours.  The smalls weren’t released until their life jackets were begrudgingly adjusted and securely clicked.  Echo immediately dog paddled off to the deep end to join her sisters, but Claudia was happiest bobbing in the shallows where her toes could still touch.

Even in the shallows, it took me a good 10 minutes to convince myself to go all the way in.  The water is approximately 78 degrees year round, but I’ve been in Texas long enough that that qualifies as kinda cold.  I got there…eventually. 

For the most part I wallowed in the shallows with Claudia, but I stole away long enough to take a quick swim over the deep section.  I regretted my choice almost immediately for two reasons—first, because I’m neither in shape nor a good swimmer, and I had grossly underestimated the size of the pool; and second, because the small primate part of my brain doesn’t trust any water deeper than waist-high and constantly expects to be hauled under and eaten by some terrible aquatic predator that is always just at the very edge of being seen.  Despite irrational expectations of pool monsters, I made it to the other side (perhaps puffing a little more than I want to admit). After a break, I pulled myself out and walked around the edge back to the shallow end.  Rick was very good and didn’t judge me too loudly.

After a couple hours we called our protesting daughters to shore, roughly toweled them off, and started the drive home.  Courtesy of SPF 70, nobody was burned, and despite drinking a bunch of water that fish had crapped in, Claudia felt fine.  It had been a good day.

I’ve said it before, but it keeps proving to be true so I’ll say it again—listen to the locals, be willing to drive a little, and just get out of your house.  You won’t regret it.  And if you do, well, that’s still a story, too…and often a better one than everything going right.