Not so young any more

This past week was the first week of classes at my school. The Student Life department is sponsoring what they call “WOW” (Weeks of Welcome). So, next week, we still have welcome activities. Our office jumped on the bandwagon with an ice cream social on Thursday. Our director, Paul, kept saying it was a waste of time—that no one would come. The newest coordinator in the office, Meggan, planned it. Being seven months pregnant, she had a doctor’s appointment on the morning of the big day. As I was coming into work, I thought we needed a big sign outside our building advertising the event, and that we needed more flyers around the classrooms.

When I got the office, there were no student workers, so Bernie the director’s secretary and I set about painting the sign. I taped it up outside the front door in a brisk breeze. Of course I was in a hurry and didn’t wait for the paint to dry, so the sign whipped up around me and I wound up with colorful spots all over my shirt and pants. It paid off though, when over 50 students came up to the Center and wolfed down gallons and gallons of runny generic ice cream.

The only bad part was that I forgot myself and ran around like a forty-year old and now I’m paying for it: just very tired this weekend.

This week Max and I were playing with paper airplanes in the driveway. Max drew “runways” up and down the driveway, putting “point” values in circles along the way. The object was to throw your plane so it landed in a high value circle. His dad said, “Max, you spend more time getting ready to play than actually playing.” Max was OK with that. Everything is play to him, I suppose. He came home with a new stuffed animal today: a little fat bird with glasses named Max. He was up early on Saturday, sleeping over at our house this weekend. He wakes up ready to rock, apparently. Kathy was playing games with him at 6:15. As he and his dad were leaving for a round of outings to the Children’s museum and the park, he said, “I don’t want to leave—this place is so much fun!”

I saw an interesting sight at the post office on Saturday. The guy in front of me had a softball bat in a clear plastic tube. I wondered if he planned to express his frustration with slow service by bashing a postal clerk or two, or if he was shipping the bat to a friend. Nothing like that. He went up to the clerk and said, “Can I get an official weight on this bat?”