I am Lucy

I wrote last on this blog a week ago for those who are keeping score at home.

As usual, the clock’s moving at the speed of time, leaving me exhausted and wondering why we are going so fast.  For instance, on Monday my son starts his sophomore year of high school.  How can it be back-to-school time when summer just barely started?  Especially since my Baby Boy is five years old in my mind.

Last weekend, my 10-year old daughter had a soccer tournament.  This involved crawling out of bed super early on a Saturday morning and devoting the whole day to shin guards and soccer balls.  Before the first game, the referee (who I heard is a high-powered “bulldog” attorney in real life) insisted that my daughter remove her earrings before she could play.  Normally, girls with newly pierced ears just put Band-aids over their earrings, but we hadn’t remembered to do that and so she came running across the field to me, giving me a fright because of the upset panic all over her face.

She told me she had to remove them–which was a gigantic deal because she hadn’t removed them since getting them pierced awhile back.  I said in my calm mom-voice, “It’s okay.  I can take them out.”  And then I yanked them out as gently as I could and sent her back to the field.

The tournament lasted two days and the girls almost won first place.  (They lost the championship game against a team they’d beat the day before–and the final goal was scored by a girl who made a personal foul against the coach’s daughter, a foul which was overlooked by the referee.  It was tragic.)

Saturday night, we joined some families from church at the beach where they were having a giant camping trip.  That was exciting in its own way when my daughter disappeared from the campsite . . . we found her swimming in the ocean with two friends without any adult supervision.  At least she had the good sense to be sorry when she realized she forgot to ask permission. We stayed for three hours–long enough to eat dinner and watch the sunset–and I may or may not have semi-promised my daughter that next year we’ll try to spend the night, too.  In a tent.  And sleeping bags.  Have I mentioned that I am not the camping-type?)

This week has been busy with school preparation and a weird work schedule since I’m covering for another employee and working odd hours while my husband has taken the week off (mostly).  He’s spending time with each of our kids.

Today, a friend and I took my daughter to the jewelry store where she originally got her ears pierced.  The lady there thought it was impossible that the holes had closed so quickly, so she tried to wiggle the earrings in and finally used her piercing gun to get them back in place.  My poor daughter only cried a little and reported afterward that they didn’t really hurt after the fact.  (That is a relief since the original piercing hurt her a lot for a couple of days.)

Afterward, we had a hurried brunch before I had to return to work.

This weekend we have another soccer tournament and you can bet that we will be hypervigilant about covering those earrings with Band-aids.

I just wish we didn’t have to be at the soccer field at 7:15 AM.

And then Monday morning and the first day of school.

My life is pretty much a conveyor belt speeding up while I’m shoving chocolates in my shirt and my hat and my face as fast as I can.