Letter Home #1



I began this blog as a way to keep our California peeps up to date with all the news from The Woods, and I've been remiss in that endeavor of late. So here's the latest and greatest from the Fish Head family:

R fears he's become the guy who talks obsessively about one subject; namely, bees. Yet, he can't help himself because bees are so darn fascinating. He did read, however, that a beekeeper is stung regularly despite the fancy suit and hat, and oddly enough, R has the most incredible fear of being stung, so he's somewhat discouraged but plans to soldier on with his apiary dreams. He's been told that an electric fence is necessary to protect the hives from bears, so that's on our list of items to purchase. Ooh, maybe we can find one on Freecycle!

Sweet P organized a skating party and invited nine girls from school to attend on New Year's Day. We're very pleased to see her leaping over the social hurdle of shyness. I even had to ask her recently to stop texting during dinner.


She's leaping over horse hurdles as well-- actually, the horse leaps, and she hangs on-- riding bare back-- a bit painful, I'm told-- and is about to hit the slopes for ski lessons. I hope her first ski experience is better than mine; that's a story for another day. But why must skiing be so expensive?

Buckaroo continues merrily at preschool two mornings a week. He's learned to spell his name in a sing-song way that R taught him. In fact he's full of singsong these days. He's also full of feist, regularly shouting "I can do whatever I want!" or "I'm not going to play with you ever again!" Where does he learn these ornery quips? His mood is improved tenfold with a bit of snowplay; unfortunately, I have not grown a deep and enduring love of winter as I'd once hoped I would, so Buckaroo is often trapped in the snowless indoors.

And me? I've been somewhat lethargic since Frog Mama moved away. She was my walking buddy, and later my gym buddy, and without her I lost the drive to exercise. Exercising alone is, well, lonely. Poor Bella Dog is suffering from the lack of a daily walk, but did I mention the chilly weather? It's no help.

My body, though, tells me it's time to get back to it, Frog Mama or no, so today the lot of us hiked across the ice to the islands, and Bella frolicked with a spaniel from the other side. Later, the children and I yoga-ed ourselves silly. Buckaroo provided most of the silly. It's a start anyway.

I've wallowed in the mire with my writing as well, and it's time to grab the branch of a nearby tree and pull myself out of the muck. I'm still in search of a branch at this point, but I'm instituting a "Facebook Fridays" policy for myself in the new year-- meaning I'm only allowed to visit Facebook on Fridays. My hope is that without the FB time suck I'll have a plethora of time in which to be creative, to see the forest of branches before me. I dare to dream!

Mary Oliver said at the Wellesley reading, "The angel won't sit on your shoulder unless the pencil is in your hand." The problem is that my pencil (keyboard) is attached to the internet, where I find so many ways to be diverted. No matter. There's always right now.

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