Raining

It's raining today and I've been a lazy flower, absorbing the wet and trying to ease the various skirmishes in the house here and there by smiling. I vacillate between sadness and exhileration at the rainy weather. On the one hand, the dark mood keeps me in the house and on my bed watching television as I write on my laptop, pretending that I don't have a household to run. On the other, I'm reminded of traveling through England and am dying to go outside and do something that might involve picture taking and running to the nearest eave to stay dry. Admittedly, I'm not thinking about a family trip.

I'm working on a novel - as I typed about emotional angst in Chapter 2, drawing from memories of my father's funeral in 1995, I half-watched the Rundown, focusing on a comic scene where the Rock (the definition of "guilty pleasure") falls down a cliff in an agonizingly long clip and survives in perfect form only to face a now-coming-down red Jeep. I'm sure there's something deep buried in that clash of concepts. I just had to laugh and get back to the wind whipping the girl as she buried her mother and thought she'd never be happy again. Later, ironically, the kids giggled at Sponge Bob - all I kept hearing was a fish saying, "I'm going to kick your butt."

Tomorrow, I go to my son's second grade class to help for an hour or so. Then I'll come back and prepare for teaching my evening class. I'll make dinner after the homework crunch. Then I'm off to school - I'll face students who are "frustrated with the material." Which always translates into, "Teacher, you're not doing such a great job." I'll try not to believe that.

Why do these bits of responsibility feel so butt-kicking?

I'm ordering pizza. Screw cooking.