Probably Not Though

Friday.

Somehow.

Another week disappeared in what felt like a blink.

I'm tired.

The kids are tired.

The calendar is tired.

And David's phone is still missing.

We've been looking since Tuesday.

Bedrooms.

Couches.

Vehicles.

My office.

Under things.

Inside things.

Places where no reasonable human being would put a phone.

Nothing.

It has to be here somewhere.

I am not emotionally prepared to pay the insurance deductible yet.

So, until further notice, the phone is not lost.

It is...

aggressively misplaced.

Speaking of things that probably need intervention...

I checked my sleep numbers this morning.

One night this week, I got eight hours.

Eight!

Apparently, I briefly remembered how sleep works.

My average for the week?

Three hours and twelve minutes.

Ah.

That explains some things.

Maybe this weekend I'll take a nap.

Maybe I'll reset my sleep schedule.

Maybe I'll wake up Monday feeling completely rested and refreshed.

Probably not though.

School went well this week.

I'm really happy with what I submitted for both classes.

It's interesting taking two ethics courses simultaneously because they keep talking to each other in my head.

For public administration, I'm using our town as a case study to explore fiscal responsibility and some of the challenges communities face.

For anthropology, I'm digging into what happens when one part of a place's history becomes the history and everything else gets pushed aside.

I really should start archiving some of these papers and projects somewhere.

Maybe LinkedIn.

Maybe somewhere else.

Another project.

Exactly what I needed.

Tomorrow also brings another class.

Just not mine.

The kids'.

We're continuing our family study of the Apostles' Creed.

I've had more fun preparing these lessons than I expected.

Trying to explain faith logically.

Breaking ideas apart.

Letting the kids ask questions.

Watching them work through what they believe and why.

I printed tomorrow's packet.

I may have been slightly giddy about it.

Fine.

I was giddy.

But first...

Dinner.

Friday night dinner has become Dad's responsibility.

And apparently my wife and I have established that "responsibility for dinner" does not mean:

"I responsibly purchased dinner from somewhere else."

Unreasonable.

So tonight:

Sausage penne with marinara.

Salad.

Garlic bread.

Quick lemon pies.

And four sous-chefs of varying reliability.

The kids will chop, mix, measure, stir, assemble, taste, and almost certainly create substantially more dishes than the recipe requires.

My wife gets to sit back and watch.

That's the point.

Then Saturday brings baseball.

David's first practice of the fall season.

New team.

New schedule.

New chunk of the family calendar about to disappear.

But I've seen that kid around a baseball field.

Worth it.

Elsewhere in the family zoo, Gerald may finally be ready to move from his hospital tank back into his regular habitat.

Then the hospital tank becomes the new hermit crab tank.

The current hermit crab tank becomes a recovery tank.

Because apparently aquariums and terrariums in our house operate on the same principle as military equipment:

Nothing is ever retired.

It is reassigned.

Asher is doing really well with school.

The Great Search for David's Phone disrupted the schedule a little this week, but he's moving right along.

My wife also had one of those parenting realizations recently.

She's teaching one of our last elementary-aged kids.

Time has apparently decided subtlety is no longer necessary.

Zoey is doing well too.

A little tired.

We were briefly concerned.

Then we discovered she'd figured out how to bypass the phone cutoff at night.

Mystery solved.

I respect the ingenuity.

The cybersecurity vulnerability has been addressed.

Jacob keeps working.

His reading has come an incredible distance.

Spelling is still giving him trouble.

The approach we tried this week didn't land.

So next week?

New approach.

We'll keep trying until something clicks.

That's the deal.

He keeps working.

We keep helping.

Meanwhile...

Eggs.

Two to four a day now.

And more of the chickens are showing signs that they're getting ready to start laying.

Before long, ten chickens may be contributing to breakfast.

But my favorite part isn't actually the eggs.

It's watching my wife with them.

She'll sit down on a bucket and these ridiculous birds gather around her.

Some jump into her arms.

She pets them.

When she walks outside, they come running and start making noise at her.

Apparently my wife has become some kind of chicken Disney princess.

I'm okay with this development.

And soon we'll start building the garden.

We've changed the plan approximately seventeen times.

Size.

Layout.

Scale.

What we're growing.

Where things go.

The general concept remains intact.

October.

Hopefully.

Once North Carolina remembers that autumn is supposed to involve temperatures below 85 degrees and humidity levels that don't qualify as soup.

But that's later.

This weekend is here.

There will be reading.

Laughing.

Baseball.

Cooking.

Faith.

Animals.

Games.

Maybe the lake.

Time together.

Time apart.

Maybe even a nap.

Probably not though.

But we have the weekend.

And somewhere...

Somewhere in this house...

We probably still have David's phone.

Not every week needs a grand lesson. Sometimes everybody makes it to Friday, a few things worked, a few things didn't, and one incredibly expensive electronic device has apparently entered another dimension. That's life. We adjust the homework strategy. We fix the bedtime loophole. We try something new with spelling. We move the gecko. We collect the eggs. We make dinner. Then we take whatever rest the weekend is willing to give us. Progress doesn't always look particularly impressive while you're living it. Sometimes it looks like sausage penne, baseball practice, a bucket surrounded by chickens, and maybe, just maybe, a nap.

Much love.

Stay safe.

Wash your damn hands.

And I will see you, next time.