Good things about being a parent - book recommendations from your kids

I think it's really cool when my 11 year old recommends books to me, saying "mom you have to read this after I'm done - you'd like it" (or "you'd find it interesting," etc). It makes me think that maybe I have done something right as a parent. It's also just really cool to see them become their own people. I can't find the time to read all the books he thinks I should read, but just the idea that he is enthused about them and that he wants to share them with others, and especially that he wants to share them with me...

I wish I still had that kind of time to read for hours immersing myself in a book. Although I did manage to read Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows within 3 days after its release - which isn't bad, since JT had to read it first, and then I had to read it around everything else I was trying to do! But it's not the same as staying up reading a book until 3 or 4am - winding my way through the ups and downs of the narrative and soaking up the printed pages. But hey, sometimes the best life can offer is compromises. And compromise isn't always a bad thing.

The Frustration of the Mundane Tasks of Life - the GROCERY STORE

I think that grocery shopping has to be one of the more frustrating re-occurrences in my life. I have to go to the grocery store every week, and spend hours of my time engaged in the process from start to finish (from leaving my house, picking up my mother, driving to the store, shopping, returning home, and putting the groceries away). And it has to be done over and over again, requiring an on-going commitment of my time. I cannot choose not to do it. But the truly irksome part is that the stores themselves tend to be filled with annoyances.

So the rude clerk, or the high (stoned/whatever) bagger, or the outdated food, or the inability to find what I'm truly looking for, make the experience psychologically exhausting.

I found little amusement in the bagger Sunday, who was obviously high, and couldn't focus on even putting the groceries into the bags. I bring my own cloth bags, yet he kept trying to put the groceries into the store's plastic bags, realizing his mistake and muttering and moving them into my bags. Then he left half the bags sitting on the checkout counter as he went off to bag on another checkout!

Of course my on-going problem with baggers is the fact that they have never had a fresh fruit or vegetable in their life, so they have no clue as to how fragile fresh fruits and vegetables actually are and they shove them into bags with canned goods or other heavy items or things that have sharp edges. I get home with bruised or smushed things, and I am stuck making the best of a bad situation or paying for the gas to drive back to exchange things (which with current gas prices is just not worth it).

I think that grocery stores should make baggers eat all the fruit and veg that they mess up, so they might have some clue what their impact is!

Swimming

There is something incredibly grounding in the process of swimming. I feel like I could swim forever... the pull of my muscles as I move through the water and the water flows around me. And to swim the back stroke outdoors looking up at the clouds drifting past as I glide through the water is as close to heaven as I can imagine. Floating on my back just staring at the sky makes all the yuck disappear.

Growing Old

Growing old is painful. I watched yesterday as a store clerk was polite to my mother's face and then pulled faces and acted exasperated with her slowness behind her back. And I thought "I know I don't like the alternative to growing old but I think I still agree with the Who - I hope I die before I get old" (although some would say I'm already there).

I know that maybe I should have told the clerk off, but having over-reacted to another situation (that I had misread) a few days previously, I chose not to react externally at all this time. But I clearly filed it away in my head. It still bugs almost 24 hours later!