Not Just Another One

6:24? Already? I thought it was just 6:20 when I looked at the clock on the stove just before I opened this up. No way.  Amena is still in her room. Her lunch is ready. I hope she is almost ready because there is no way we can take her to school. More about that later if I remember.

Today is the day I get to take the ASCP phlebotomy certification exam. I’m not sure that feel ready entirely. I’m not sure I ever would. I am going to review this morning but no heavy beat-myself-up-if-I-don’t-remember-something studying. Should be awesome and groovy. Paul is staying and working from home today. I think he is planning on taking me down. More about that if I remember.

I have been missing Daniel a lot these past few days. Amena took responsibility for decorating the Christmas tree and that was fine. I don’t know if my memories of Daniel decorating are ever going to fade to the point that . . . well, to some point. I don’t want them to and yet I can’t do it. I think this is something that I really should let go of but I’m not entirely sure how. I’ve always liked Christmas to some degree or another. I was often disappointed when the children were younger because I wasn’t able to get them what I really wanted to but Christmas always turned out pretty well in spite of that. Now it’s one of the times when memories of Daniel weigh heavy on my mind and allergy attacks become several times a day occurrences.

It’s time to rouse the boys from bed. I think they were all hoping that school would be cancelled for today. Based on what has happened previously, it’s somewhat surprising that it isn’t cancelled, or at least delayed by two hours, this morning. It did snow more last night and the roads can’t be completely cleared off.

It’s kind of strange how the mind works. I was just thinking about snowy roads and then about McCloud where there was just one bus; everyone else drove or walked and there were a lot of students who walked. Quite honestly, I think it was kind of dumb to even want to drive from my house to the high school since it was so close—unless it was really foggy or snowing really hard, it was visible from my house. I think it took all of maybe five minutes to walk. From there I was thinking about parking at school if a person were to drive. I think when there were more students, more drove. The parking lot in front of the school was for faculty and seniors. I don’t remember if the paved parking lot behind that or the graveled one was for juniors. I remember walking to elementary school by the shop and the tennis courts and the edge of the graveled parking lot. Then there was a trail amongst a few trees, one was a pussy willow, and then there was a ditch just before the fence. The ditch was cool sometimes because in the spring there would be water running off from the melting snow. When I got to the middle grades, I would walk up and across the football field and climb the fence because it was shorter. When there was snow on the ground and it was solid enough to walk on, I could walk right over the fence. That was cool.

There are things I miss about living in a small town like McCloud. I really never did feel like I fit in but that was as much my own doing as anyone else’s. I certainly could have done more and could have been more outgoing. I had everything I really needed—my immediate family, my grandparents, and sometimes an aunt and a cousin or an aunt, uncle and two cousins.

There are things I miss about living in an even smaller town in Idaho. After all, how many elementary schools have cross-country skis for their second grade students? And, even though I was putting my 4^th grader, 1^st grader, and kindergartener in school after having homeschooled, each of them knew at least one student in their class from church which was nice and they all made other friends and if it weren’t for the fact that one of my girls had too much unwanted attention, life really was pretty good. We had a grandmother living with us and an aunt and uncle not too far away. Life really was pretty good. But not perfect.

Until we moved here, I’d never lived in a town that required six buses to take all the students to the local elementary school. And there are a fair amount who don’t ride the bus for whatever reason. There were a couple of buses for the school in Naples but that was something of a necessity because most of the students lived a distance from the school. We were four miles away and had to go a mile to get to the end of a dirt road for the bus. There were a lot of families whose children utilized that stop; I think there were at least six. Families. More than twice that many students.

I miss various things about most of the places I’ve lived. Mostly I think I miss things about McCloud and Naples. One thing I don’t miss about any place I’ve lived and one thing that annoys me about living here is the narrow-mindedness of people who have lived in just one place their entire lives; people who even though they may have travelled a bit still have such a narrow view of life that they can’t or don’t or won’t allow that things are different in other places or that the place they live isn’t the be-all and end-all of existence or that the rest of the world is actually different from how they perceive it to be.

Monday, Blair sideswiped the Jetta. I never got a look at it but Paul says that both passenger side doors were banged up and the mirror as well. He drove it to work yesterday and was planning on leaving early to get home in time to be here so I could drive the Jetta to the hospital for my childbirth education class. Class ended up cancelled but Paul left early anyway at 4:00. He didn’t get home until after 7:00. It was snowing and he got stuck behind a car on 68 going 20 miles per hour. On the last hill before the center of Hubbardston, the Jetta died. Because he was going uphill and had no speed due to being stuck behind a really slow car, he wasn’t able to finish ascending the hill. He’s not sure what’s wrong with it for this to happen because the sideswipe wouldn’t have anything to do with the engine. Anyway, he was on the side of the road and had one bar on his phone so he called Ray and asked him to come tow him to his garage. Paul said Ray was almost there when a police officer stopped. Paul said that he could either call a flat bed or wait three or four or five hours or have Ray tow him and be out of there in just a few minutes. It’s illegal to tow with a strap or rope but the officer said to go ahead and get towed; another other decision would have been folly with the driving conditions last night.

So, with no Jetta, we’ve only got the truck and the van running and the van seems to need something. Not sure what. The bug, I think I mentioned a day or two ago, has a busted fuel line. The green car needs a new battery. For now, the truck is our most reliable transportation and with the plow on the front, I wouldn’t want to drive Amena to school with it right now.

As for my test, Amena has Mutual tonight and I’ve asked Julia for a ride for her. If Paul takes me to my test, we really need to take the boys with us because they can’t stay home alone and even if Amena were to stay home from church with them, that’s not really the best option either because she and Cedric tend to fight too much too often for me to be terribly comfortable leaving them for more than a few minutes. I guess the options are to let me drive the truck down, which I’d rather not do, or take the boys and entertain them while I’m taking my test. I don’t like either option very much and the only other real alternative even less. Isn’t life grand?

Have a splendiferous day!