Back to Normal

School started today. So, once again, life is back to normal.

Anna is back in Bellingham, settling into her new (very old) house on High Street.

Nora Jane is back at Downing Elementary, a proud member of the fourth-grade crowd.

Dave is back at work, and I am here, at the computer, looking at a screen that looks completely strange and foreign in all of its whiteness. Just as my girls will be adjusting to their new roles at school, I, too, will have to readjust to my life, my quiet life, my writing life. The life I stayed away from all summer. Because it was summer. Because it was time to be a family.

It was time for bike riding,

and boating.

It was time to barbecue, and go camping. It was time to stay up late, and time to sleep in. It was time to be mom without distraction. And it was time to say goodbye to my best boy Jack.


But now summer, in all of its glory, is over. And, boy, will I miss it!  Just as I will miss Jack. And Anna and Nora. For unlike the cashier at the grocery store, who said to me last week, "it's time. They're sick of me and I'm sick of them." I will never be one of those moms who can't wait for the first day of school. Time just goes by too quickly to think like that.

So, although I will miss summer, I welcome Fall. For Fall brings new things; rainy soccer games, pumpkins, and running trails that are calling me home. But not today. Today, for Nora, I am baking chocolate chip cookies and making macaroni and cheese for dinner. But, for Dave, it will be home-made. Not from the blue box.

Sorry Nora.