L'aventure américaine

 This morning started off a little rough.  Someone at Milo's school has COVID and so his school is closed.  We are keeping Marian home until we learn more.  I have a lot of work to finish up and so does Randal.  It's not a great time for this!  But then, this happened: [And a side bar...  Marian is extremely verbal and has an impressive vocabulary, but hasn't said, "I love you," to anyone.  (Even prompted...  she just avoids it.)] So, this morning, while I'm trying to feverishly send some emails before the kids start bugging me, I hear Marian walk up to Milo and say, "I want to give you a hug?"  So, he lets her hug him - a long hug - and she says, "I love you." And my heart exploded. And then Marian walked away.  And then came back to give him another one and he said, "You just did.  Do it later."  So, there's that.

I listened to a podcast about the outrage that pings back and forth between political parties right now and it made me tired.  It also made me think of how little outrage accomplishes. It’s so hard to know the best way to make the world a better place! So, we continue in our little corner trying to spread love. I wrote postcards for a month and have moved to Christmas cards now. And today, we pulled down the Biden signposts down from our little corner of property in Greene county (randal and I bought 8 acres this year). (The Biden sign itself came down after the election.) In its place, we planted a Christmas tree - white pine transplanted from mom and dad’s crop. The kids and I picked up litter along the road and then we decorated our new tree.  I don’t think that the neighbors have forgotten that we’re Biden supporters; there weren’t a lot of friendly looks (zero to be precise). But, the tree looks beautiful and festive and after we put up lights, hopefully they’ll be happy ...

 I am taking a break from the news.  My new goal is to put more positivity and love because we're all just so angry.  For the past week, I have been mailing one postcard a day where I aim to say at least one positive thing about the recipient.  It has made me feel so much better.   In other important news, Marian is starting to learn her colors.  This is just a baffling new milestone.  After a year of her misnaming colors and all of a sudden, she gets them right 75% of the time.  Brains are fascinating.  It is just fascinating that last week, all of a sudden, she can tell you that a shirt is green or she wants the pink hat, when the week prior, she would tell you that everything was black or brown or purple. It is also fascinating how different she and Milo are.  She holds her baby dolls, pats them, coos to them, puts them to sleep.  She loves to draw and color and points out what her creations are.  Milo?  He asked h...

 I was at Mom and Dad's when Joe Biden was declared President-Elect.  After a week of universal fatigue and restless sleep, it was such a relief to get the news. But, I haven't felt much better since then and I have been trying to pinpoint why. I think it's for many reasons...  One, the good news was tempered with coverage of Donald Trump on his golf course, refusing to concede the election.  Instead of focusing on a Biden celebration, the conversation was focused on the negative.  What do you do with a President who is making false claims and refuses to follow the civil, good precedent of his predecessors?  I continue to get depressed when I see Republicans backing up his claims and giving them credence.  Is winning more important than dignity?  Is retaining power more important than integrity?  It seems that it is. It's also because 71 million Americans still support Trump.  When I ask people (in a calmer frame of mind) why they suppor...

I get very homesick for Klamath Falls at Halloween.  Our street when we lived there was THE destination for trick-or-treaters and we always hosted a party for our friends while handing out treats to the 600-1000 kids who traipsed through our neighborhood.   COVID-19 would have changed all that, so it was easier to miss the holiday this year and we hunkered down for an intimate Halloween in Bloomington.  Mom brought dinner and we traipsed down two streets in our neighborhood who had tables out for a socially-distanced trick-or-treat.  Like my childhood Halloweens, we all piled into the car and visited some dear friends. The main purpose was to showcase the kids' incredible Halloween costumes.  Randal, Milo and I spent several hours working on Dogman and Marian's little stuffed Toto.  (Okay, Toto only took one hour and I worked on it by myself, hence the disparity in quality is quite evident.) While the adults' costumes paled in comparison to the kids, R...

I have had to turn down the news this week.  I am doing a 7-day meditation challenge.  I am focusing on Halloween.  I feel like I am taking a deep breath before next Tuesday. So, here are some highlights from our Halloween prep this week.  Stay tuned for some pretty great costumes on Saturday. The creativity expert of the family gathers his troops. He does not like drawing, but he drew this fabulous face!   Marian was an art director for her pumpkin.  She directed us (as she does multiple times a day) to "draw kitty." And here are our beauties!  I am inordinately proud of my donkey, which I did ALL BY MYSELF.  (Okay, I can't always avoid politics.) Milo is very proud of his pumpkin too.  We are obviously a family of jack-o-lantern artists. And we got this amazing package from Cory that was chocked full of Halloween goodies, including these great socks for the whole family.  Please ignore how I am holding Marian for the picture (it's...

 It is a busy, beautiful fall.  We have been trying to enjoy the outdoors before a dreary winter sets in, working steadily, and celebrating birthdays. The kids are still in school, but we wait with bated breath for the first email that says that we have to quarantine for two weeks because someone tested positive.  (Someone in Marian's school tested positive last week, but not in her class, which is separated.). They love their schools and I love their schools and everyone is happy that they're there: learning, playing, and getting some time away from their parents. Midterms are over and they went pretty well.  Whew!  I would have liked a week off, but the classes keep on coming. My birthday was quite fun and Mom's birthday is today.  Happy Birthday, Mom!  We were reminiscing about our trip to Wales last year for her birthday.  I am SO glad we took advantage while we had the chance. And we are following the election.  Time is ticking!  Ra...

I cried a little last night when I read about RBG. Not much- a friend was coming over for a socially-distanced glass of wine, so I couldn’t fall too far in a morass of fear for the future.  In the Twittersphere, I was drawn to the posts that said, “today we mourn. Tomorrow we fight.” I feel like on November 4th, I want to know that I have done all I could do to get out the vote. But, I honestly am not sure what to do. In this time of covid, how do I register more people to vote? How do I get more people to the polls? How do I do it amidst everything I have going on right now? But, isn’t this election like preventive health? If I do it now, I will have so much less to do in the future.  Please feel free to send suggestions.  Please vote.  And thank you to Ruth Bader Ginsburg for fighting the fight and being an example for all of us. I am honored to have had you as a Supreme Court Justice in my lifetime.  (My “dissent” necklace, thanks to Cookie. Worn for RBG.)

 Happy Birthday to my favorite five-year old.  I woke up earlier than my alarm this morning because I too was so excited about your birthday.  Today will be a good day, thanks to you.  The past five years have been full of good days, thanks to you. Milo, I love the many things that encompass YOU.  I love your passion for costumes and character play.  I love it when you say, "Guess who I am?" and I have to make a quick assessment of your outfit (blue rainboots?  Elsa.  Red sweatshirt with hood up? Elliott.  Red sweatshirt with hood down?  Annie.  Green outfit? Chris Kratt. Red shoes? Ted ("The Lorax").  It gets tricky when your outfit isn't any different or when you're a character from a show I haven't seen, but I love it even when you get really frustrated that I don't know the name and just shout: "Just tell me who I am!" I love your ability to do puzzles and put Legos together that is beyond your years and I love that you cor...

 It was our seven-year anniversary on Monday.  We didn't forget - we have always taken an overnight trip for our anniversary and this year we decided we would go camping at Mom and Dad's in light of COVID - but, it was about 10am on Monday morning before one of us said, "Oh!  Happy Anniversary!"  (By the way, it was Randal.) We had lunch together at home and split a beer to celebrate.  At dinner, we looked at each other from across the table while Milo refused to eat his dinner and Marian screamed "Unbuckle me!" and smiled at each other at the chaos that we have successfully created in the past seven years.  We ate ice cream to celebrate.  Happy Anniversary to us.

It’s been a busy week for the Popes. And it’s a big week for the Popes! Because for 75% of us, we had our first day of school! I started on Tuesday morning with my Biostats class. Here I am, ready to learn! And the kids started preschool this morning. (A chaotic morning! It is an adjustment to get out of the house before 8am.) Milo has “0% nervousness” and Marian doesn’t either (but also thought she was going to grandma’s).  Happy first days of preschool and PhD to us! (And thanks to Randal for coping with all of it.)

We are in the last leg of our journey. We have about three hours left until Bloomington and I think we’re ready.  Milo woke up and announced that today was the day we got back to Indiana and randal announced that tiny house living was not for him.  We are tired, but it’s been a good couple of days. Actually, it got a little hard a couple times, but it’s on the up and up.  As I mentioned, we had a few problems with the RV and we were getting slightly frustrated. This was exacerbated when we arrived at our site in Waubonsie Stare Park in southwestern Iowa the night before last and I proceeded to open all of the windows like I normally do. As I slid back the window in the bedroom, the glass shattered all over. (And the kids heard a simultaneous “oh sh$*” from Randal and me.) I was bummed and worried about the cost and feeling frustrated and the kids were loud and I was just trying to watch the d#*% convention. And then the convention showed a story of a Mexican woman whose d...

It’s a far cry from our family trips as a kid when we were on the road by 7am at the latest and had miles behind us by noon.  It’s 1:10pm and we are finally rolling out onto I80. It still feels wrong to be leaving so late, but I can’t pin my nose on why. We’re not utilizing any services, so don’t need business hours, the traffic isn’t bad at any time, and morning is when the kids are most energetic, so it seems like a good time for them to run around.  It also allows randal and I to do a few hours of work in the morning and to show up for zoom meetings as necessary. While I wouldn’t say that this has been the most productive period, I am increasingly efficient.  Yesterday, we woke up in our remote boondock site and headed East. Everyone was a little cranky, so I found a surprise lunch spot to visit. (I didn’t know that it was 2 miles off of a gravel road, which is a real pain in an RV.) But, we found the Ames Monument. It is a monument commissioned in the 1860s to commemo...