Fruit Flies in My Nose

The Boy is home after his second week of school. We have a busy weekend planned. He absolutely has to re-pot his plants tomorrow. We are being overrun with fruit flies and they're coming from the soil in his house plants. He thought it would be a good idea last weekend to bring in a couple of small spiders to live in the office window next to the plants, and I gave him a week to see if it would work. I knew it wouldn't, but he can be stubborn, and he needs to see for himself before he'll let go of an idea. I've had fruit flies driving me crazy all week. For some reason, they seem to be attracted to the computer, which is not in the office. Apparantly they are also attracted to nostrils. They keep flying up my nose. But no more after this weekend! If re-potting doesn't work, the plants are going outside.

The job search is still dragging. The molecular lab won't need anyone until January at the earliest. I've applied to a broad spectrum of research and lab jobs, and now I'm just waiting and trying not to pull my hair out. The Vansome is worried I'm going to end up with second or third shift, and while that would certainly suck, I'd take it right now. I still haven't ruled out just waiting tables again, at least until January. Besides, it'd be good exercise.

I'm really pretty bored lately. You'd think that would lead me get my house cleaned, de-cluttered, and organized, but you'd be wrong. I've reached that stage where everything bores me, even stuff I like to do (not that I'm including cleaning in that.) I think that's a pretty good definition of depression, but I am on meds for that. I don't really feel like finishing this post, so I'm just going to quit and see if I can get my guys to cheer me up.

A Few of My Favorite Things

One of the other blogs I read on occasion is by a high school english teacher (cups of coffee) and she has Wednesday writing challenges. I always look at them and say I'm going to take her up one Wednesday, but so far I haven't. I think I'm going to this time. It's not Wednesday and I'm not even doing the one from this week, but this challenge from a past week piqued my interest, so I'm going to give it a go.

If you aren't already aware (and harboring a secret fantasy to end up in the audience,) Oprah has an annual "Favorite Things" episode around Christmas time in which she shows off her favorite material finds for the year, and she gives one of each item to every member of her audience. Im not giving anything away, but I'm going to introduce you to my favorite material possessions. I thought I'd do it ala Oprah, and list things you could buy for yourself, but I think I'll make it a little more personal. You could probably find these things if you tried hard enough (Ebay, anyone?) but they're not all new and shiny.

So, in no particular order, except the order that they popped into my head, is an incomplete list of my favorite material possessions.

1. My car. She's seven years old this month. She has 98,292 miles on her right now (I just checked.) Her name is Babette, as in "Babette the Sex Kitten" from late 80's SNL, but I don't really call her that. I named her that when I brought her home because she's a sexy little black sports car. She's a 5-speed manual with a V6. She has been to the shop one time in her whole life, and that was for a new transmission last month. The Vansome had been wanting to replace it for two years now, but I never had any problems with it myself. I think he just doesn't know how to drive her like I do. I've gotten used to the new transmission, but it took a couple of days to re-train her to shift the way I like. She was the first car I ever bought that was exactally what I wanted, and not just what I could afford at the time. I wouldn't trade her now for anything except maybe a brand spanking new Lexus convertible.

2. My great-grandmother's wedding dishes. The first Easter after I bought my house I brought dinner over to my great-aunt's house because that was the first year she just wasn't up to getting out. She had decided she was going to die that night for some reason (this was 8 1/2 years ago and she's still here) and so she was loading me down with family treasures. I absolutely love old family possessions. I love being able to touch and live with things that belonged to my ancestors. The most treasured things I took home that night were three plates from my great-grandmother's wedding dishes. I have them hanging on the back wall in my bookshelf in the living room.

3. My Harry Potter books. I love that world. I have all seven now in hardback. My dream is to own the British versions in hardback also, as well as the audio versions on CD (American and British.) And the movies on DVD. I have all the movies that are out so far. That's about as far as my obsession goes. I don't have any memoribilia or figurines or anything like that. I have no desire to own a replica of Harry's wand. That's just silly.

4. My Dan Mackin prints. He is far and away my favorite artist. Someday I'll have originals, but for now, I just have prints. These are over my fireplace and in my dining room, respectively.

5. My WDW monorail ornament. When you push one button on the top, lights come on inside. The best part is the other button, though. When you push that one, the real monorail voice comes on to say "Welcome aboard. On behalf of the cast of the Walt Disney World Resorts, we'd like to wish you a happy holiday season." It makes me shiver with excitement every.single.time. It feels almost like being there for Christmas again. Christmas and Disney World...ahhhh, perfection.

6. My external hard drive. More specifically, what's on the hard drive, which is a pretty massive music collection. But music doesn't really count because you can't touch it, so I love that I have a hard drive big enough to hold it all, and a neat little compact way to hold such a mass of emotions and memories.

7. My jean shorts. They're slightly stretchy, and no matter how much weight I gain and lose, they're always just a little bit loose.

8. TV Guide Fall Preview issue. I mentioned this a couple of blogs ago. I won't go into it again.

9. My Couple's Bible. I love my Concordia Self-Study Bible as well, but the Couple's Bible has helped me through countless rough patches, and it feels comforting in my hands.

10. My bathroom walls. I chose a deep tuquoise color from the water in my Mackin prints when we re-did our bathroom. It makes me happy every time I look in there. I don't know if it would work in a larger room, but I might give it a try sometime, just because I can't get enough of looking at it.

OK, that's ten, and that's a good place to stop. It is definately incomplete, though.

Names

I found a new blog today, and I love it. It's at the top of "Blogs I Read" on my sidebar. A followed a link on Two Peas to an Ebay description and discovered this hilarious woman. She had a link to her blog, and I've been reading it for hours. I am in awe of her humor writing abilities. And the fact that she can even find the right letters on her keyboard with six kids being, well, kids.

I loved growing up in a big family. Sure, they all got on my nerves most of the time, and I still crave alone time, but my overall memories are very fond. I would not change it for the world. I love the whole dynamic of big families. I am fascinated by the Duggars and their seventeen. I love the atmosphere of a full house and lots of children of varied ages running around.

I'm also fascinated by names. One of my favorite timewasters is to come up with lists of names for the big family in the book I'm never going to get around to writing. JK Rowling said once that she collects names, which is why so many of her characters have such unusual and yet fitting monikers. I tend to mentally collect groups of names. More specifically, I'm interested in naming patterns in siblings. That kind of makes it sound all scientific study-ish. It's not. It's just something I'm drawn to. When I find out someone has more than one child, I need to know their names. When someone has siblings, I need to know names and birth orders.

I am, at the same time, immensely grateful that I don't have lots of children. Naming them and raising them are pretty far apart on the spectrum. I'm content with what I have, thank you very much. And I'm pretty happy with how The Boy has turned out so far. I couldn't get that lucky a second time, much less taking four more chances after that. Nope, I've got a good life. This empty nesting thing is getting better and better every day. All I need now is a job.

Blah Blah Blog

I'm back to having a playlist going while I blog. I had stopped for a while after The Boy quit his job because he complained about most of what I played, and he was keeping me pretty busy anyway. Plus I really wasn't blogging there for a while, was I? In the mean time, the Vansome stole my speakers. He's using them with his laptop in the bedroom so he can listen to his fave iTunes radio stations in bed. I've got some rediculous over-the-ear headphones on (when they're not falling out of my ears) and that means I can only listen while I sit here. I'm thinking about stealing my speakers back, but I'm not really going to have time at home by myself anymore, so I guess I'll just stick with these things in my ears, hitting pause on the media player everytime I've got to get up to move laundry around or let kitties in the backdoor.

I'm down to only watching BB on Thursdays for the Live Eviction and HOH comp. My interest in that is even starting to lag. I'm ready for some good fall TV. I'm ready to get into my new, empty nested, routine. I haven't really looked into the new shows. I generally wait for the TV Guide Fall Preview issue, one of my favorite things since I was old enough to read. I can still remember the the exact picture on the page for "Mr. T and Tina." I bet most people don't even remember the show. I doubt it lasted the entire season, although back then networks weren't so quick to cancel. The Mr. T was played by Pat Morita, long before he was Mr. Miyagi, and before a very different Mr. T became a household name. That's how long ago that show was in the Fall Preview, and that's how long I've been devouring the annual issue and planning my evening viewing schedule.

As for The Boy, today was his first day of classes. At about 12:15, I was sitting on my couch thinking about where he was and what he was doing right then. It occured to me that I could just hop in my car and be up there in time to take him to lunch so he could tell me all about his first day. The urge was strong, and I came close to giving in, but I know it would have been The Wrong Thing To Do, so I didn't. But I wanted to. I distracted myself by going to Krog's to get pizza dough mix for his dinner this weekend. I called him after I ate my lunch.

Today he had Psych, Pre-Cal, Zoology, and some Intro to Biology class that all Bio majors are required to take. He already appreciates the difference between High School and College. He was almost gushing about how much he loves his classes. His Pre-Cal instructor sounds like the perfect person for the job. He has math anxiety and she could not be a better fit for him. Apparantly she is extremely relaxed about grades and homework, and she bends over backwards to help out her students. I was most nervous about this class of everything on his schedule, but I am so at ease about it now. He's at ease, too. Oh, and he was just starting on his first day's homework when I called. And he shaved, on his own, without being asked to.

He has turned over a new leaf and he sounds like he has all the confidence in the world to go along with his new determination to succeed. A few weeks ago, he told me that he wished he could go back and do high school over (the part before homeschooling.) First I told him that I've been there, not just about high school, but about so many of my college years. In fact, I did do over a lot of my college classes, but that is way too expensive both in time and money. Then I told him that it was wonderful that he came to that realization now, when he does kind of get a do-over. He will never have to worry about his high school grades again. He's got a clean slate. So I just told him to channel that regret into doing the job now that he wished he had done then, only better. I recognize his feelings so much, but I didn't get them until I went back to college after I had been out for a while. And I made all of one B from that point on, the rest were A's. He's determined not to make even one B. He'll need that kind of GPA to get into med school. He's going to be awesome. I'm already so proud I can't stand it.

I Need a J-O-B

I'm trying to go back to work, but I'm being thwarted at every turn. I interviewed for the cytogenetics job a few weeks ago, and although the interview went well, I left with a bad feeling about the job. I couldn't quite put my finger on what the problem was, because it looked and sounded very interesting. It was just a vague feeling of unease. It just felt wrong, and the Vansome and I are both firm believers in trusting our gut instincts about things, so after we discussed it for a couple of days, we decided I should turn down the second interview. I did, but man, that was hard to do. I felt literally sick at my stomach after I hung up the phone. I know it was the right decision, but I am in no position to be turning down employment opportunities.

I felt much better about it a couple of weekends ago when I attended the local annual cytology conference. I talked to old friends who knew others who had worked in that lab and the general concensus was that I had been right to trust my gut. The funny thing was, no one has been able to explain what was wrong with the job. Everyone just kind of felt like I did. The supervisor seemed to be a great guy, and liked by everyone I've talked to. The employees all seemed happy to be there. The job itself looked challenging enough to keep it from being boring. They do seem to have a lot of employee turnover, and that's usually a bad sign.

I hope that God was telling me no on that job because He has something better for me. I'm looking into the molecular lab at the Med Center. I talked to a former cytology school classmate at the conference. He's the cytology lab supervisor there now. The molecular lab is right next door to him so he knew who I should talk to. I called him this morning so I could get the ball rolling, and he said he had already told the supervisor to expect me. I was really excited and extremely grateful. I have been temporarily thwarted, though, because she's out of the lab until Thursday. So that means I have nothing really to do until then.

Hopefully, once I talk to her, things will move really fast. I am really ready to get back to work. I needed the two and a half years to de-tox, but I am fully recovered and anxious to get back into the working world. As little as two months ago, I was dreading the idea of going back to work. I really didn't know if I was capable of working a full time job again. I still felt like I needed more time at home. But now, I'm looking forward to it, and not just the paycheck. I don't feel that pull to be home, and I think that is due in a large part to knowing that The Boy is not here waiting for me. I'm ready to start my next new life.


I emailed The Boy this morning, but I'm not going to call again until tomorrow afternoon. I'm less sad today. I'm feeling a little more of a sense of freedom. And the excitement over the job prospect is helping.

My Nest is Officially Empty

I decided against going to church this morning. I debated, telling myself that being down is the best reason to go to church, but it came down to me hating to cry in public, and knowing I would cry as soon as I tried to talk to my sister. I'm doing better now, but just barely. The Vansome has made several comments about how quiet I am today. He brought me a white russian and a Hershey bar last night. He said he thought I needed both. He was right.

I called The Boy at 4:00 today, as planned. I also emailed him at 3:30, because I couldn't wait any more. He's doing fine. He sounded great. He sounded like an adult. His first question was to ask how I was holding up. I lied that I was just fine. His biggest problems right now are that he forgot his watch, there is no clock in his room, and there is no fan in the bathroom. The lack of a fan in the bathroom seems to be concerning him most. I advised him to buy a cheap watch and some air freshener at the bookstore.

I'm going out to get a job tomorrow. I'm not calling The Boy again until Tuesday.

A Pretty Crappy Motel Room, But Really Nice For a Dorm

The Boy is moved in. He has been left alone to fend for himself in the wilds of the University campus. Actually, he has to make his way across four lanes of traffic before he even gets to the wild campus. He is officially staying in a motel. And seeing as how I overheard someone in the the Student Accounts office say they had over 100 students in "overflow housing," I'm guessing he's going to be there for a while, possibly all semester. He's not hating it, though. He's actually pretty happy with the accomodations. He has a full sized bed, a bathroom right in his room that he only has to share with one other person, HBO on the TV, a Microwave and a Fridge, and semi-regular maid service.

Other than all that, they are trying to make the experience as dorm-like as possible. He has an RA (I wonder how he got stuck with that gig? Sorry, Dude, you drew the short straw, you get to RA in the motel) and a roommate. They will have a shuttle running back and forth on a set schedule so they can spend as much time on campus as they need to. I think part of the RA's job will be keeping them as involved with the rest of the campus as possible.

We met the roommate after lunch. As we were pulling into the parking lot, we saw a tall boy with long straight black hair getting something out of a car and I commented that he looked like The Boy's good friend Lee, and I was thinking how if he were like Lee, they might really get along well. Then we saw that The Boy's door was open, and we knew that this must be the guy. We went upstairs (he's on the second floor,) and the boys introduced themselves. His name is Richard. He seemed quiet and polite and intelligent. He had on a t-shirt with a clever saying on it, similar to the kind of shirt The Boy likes to wear. He also seemed much more independent minded than The Boy, so hopefully that will be a good thing. He was there with his girlfriend, who is in overflow housing at another motel, and her dad. I think he will prove to be a very good roommate. I felt better leaving after meeting him.

The Boy was ready for us to go, I think. He wouldn't hug me with the roomie there, but they all left before we did, so I was able to get one in anyway. I've been hugging him a lot the last few days. He didn't seem at all nervous. He was very calm and relaxed. He was getting his stuff together, going through his backpack, and going over his schedule again. He's really ready to get on with his life and I think he's going to do just fine. I only cried the teensiest bit on the way home, and again just a teensy bit talking to Grammy later. I'm holding up well, considering. Except that he didn't put his breakfast plate in the dishwasher before he left and I haven't been able to remove it from the bar yet myself. I don't know why I'm having such a hard time over a plate full of sugar, but every time I look at it, I think about how I used to fix him french toast for breakfast as a special treat, and how that was his last meal here before going off on his own. The Vansome may have to sneak it into the dishwasher tonight after I go to bed. I honestly don't think I'll be able to.

Emptying the Nest

Sorry it's been so long since I've posted here. I've been alternately too busy, too depressed, and too wigged out. The Boy moves into his hotel/temporary dorm tomorrow. It is a hotel room because they don't have any dorm rooms available just yet and it is temporary because they promise to have him in a real dorm within three weeks. It's a little bit The Boy's fault, a little bit my fault, and a whole lot the fault of the University that can never seem to get enough dorms built. Of course, the fault that's ours is that 1) The Boy didn't submit his dorm application until early summer and 2) I didn't follow up until late July. Truly, I didn't expect to hear from them until July anyway, so regardless of when The Boy applied, I would have waited until I thought there was a problem before calling, which is what I did. The problem was that he applied online and for whatever reason, it didn't go through. So when I called in late July, they had the application fee I had mailed in, but no application, and I had to resubmit and then call them back to verify that they really had it this time. I've been a bit of a basketcase ever since. We got the email confirming he's in a hotel on Wednesday.

I've been reverse nesting all week. I've washed all of his new towels and Twin XL sheets. I've got his new clean pillowcase on his new pillow, which he's not allowed to sleep on yet. His new blankie, I mean blanket, is all washed and neatly folded. I've packed everything except his clothes, and the washer is going with those right now. I've got to take him out to Target or WalMart in a bit so he can get some kind of toiletry/meds bag. He tried to get me to go alone, but I threatened to bring back something with Hello Kitty on it, and he said that would make him cry, because he wants something manly.

This afternoon I will make him re-pack. He doesn't need half of his stuff yet because of the hotel situation. So we will go through everything, re-pack what he needs for the upcoming week, and then box up the rest for when he gets into an actual dorm. I'm trying not to be too controlling, but it's not working very well. The more anxious I get, the greater my need to do it all for him. He doesn't seem to want to do anything yet, and I think it's because I've sapped all the fun out of getting ready for college for him by doing it all myself and then just telling him about it. It's so hard not to try to live vicariously through your kid. I can't imagine what a nightmare of a mother I'd be if I had a daughter.

The rest of the plan includes dinner tonight, his choice. He requested PF Chang's, which we've never done before. I had in mind cooking his favorite meal or taking him out to his favorite restaurant, something that would remind him of home. But then, it's not about me, is it? Tomorrow we will head up at about 8:30, check in at the housing office, pick up his pre-ordered books at the bookstore, buy his zoology books, move him into his hotel, eat lunch on campus, and attend various welcome activities. And then, according to the official Schedule of Events for Welcome Week, at 3:30 we parents say our "Final Goodbyes." And then I have to leave. I have to leave my baby in another city, an hour away from me, and I can't come back for an entire week. I have to step back and let him swim or drown. Does parenting ever get easier? No, it does not. It just gets hard in different ways.