Rowen and I declared another after-school play day on
account of having another beautiful day and rain in the forecast for the rest
of the week.
It was a perfect, sunny, and warm morning for Tai Chi by the
river too, and that got my day off to a really great start. Rowen met up with me this morning, and for
the second day in a row we walked most of the way to school with Michael. We found out right away that ‘the kiss’ news
had hit the grapevine at school, and though I don’t have any regrets; the jokes
about it got old fast. Lisa was a bit
frosty with me this morning, but after keeping an eye on us for a while without
seeing any of the boyfriend-girlfriend signs; she moved on and seemed to be
fine by the time we started our afternoon classes. Other than that, there really isn’t much to
report from school. We had a test,
worked on a couple of projects, and had our art class outdoors.
The matchmaking conspiracy continued when I found out that
Tim, Rowen, and I had accepted an invitation to do our homework at Michael’s
house with him. I did actually get an
invitation too, but not until after Rowen had already accepted the offer for
both of us. Since Miranda was grinning
way too suspiciously, I’m sure that the Olde Bakery snack choices weren’t a
coincidence, and neither was being on our own while we did our homework. Jake and Stephanie went to study with Dillon
and some of their friends, and Jacob and Miranda needed to be somewhere
unspecified and probably fictional while we worked at the kitchen table.
I was a little surprised that Nora wasn’t with us today, but
she didn’t look like she was upset with Tim when she kissed him goodbye after
school; so maybe she was busy doing something else anyway. Since Tim had been all for another bike ride,
and had more fun doing that when Nora wasn’t with him; he wasn’t showing any
signs of missing out on some girlfriend time for the second day in a row. Then again, for all I know, he spent both
evenings with her after dinner. I don’t
exactly spend a lot of time or effort talking with Tim about his love life; and
shockingly, not every detail of everyone’s every move makes the school or town
gossip network.
So we biked over to the park to hit the trails again after
getting our homework done, but started out with a little play time with Ethan
and Ehlana when we saw that they were at the playground with Alicia. We spent about twenty minutes running around
with them, and then hit the trails. They
were busy again today, and we spent nearly as much time waiting around for our
turns and talking with the other tweens and teens as we did racing the trails;
doing the jumps; and trying different bike tricks.
I only stopped at Michael’s house long enough to grab my
computer bag, and then went home after leaving the park even though Rowen and
Tim were staying to get drinks before moving on too. The nice weather had prompted Mom and Dad to
put together a ‘bring-what-you-have’ barbeque pot-luck; and I was drafted to
help Dad and Uncle Nick with setting up tables and chairs in the back
yard. Aunt Deborah, Aunt Leanne,
Grandma, and Grandpa were all there too, and Miranda and Jacob probably just
forgot to mention that they’d been invited too.
Add in the Emersons, Drapers, and Seagers; and we practically had a
party going on. The dinner plans had
been news for Rowen too, and she and Patrick biked over ahead of their
parents. Patricia and Owen joined the
party after closing the computer store; and it wasn’t long after that that
Uncle Adam, the Seagers, Stones, and Drapers made it over too. There was time for a little visit while the
grilling was finished and the pot-luck dishes were set out on the back porch
patio table.
There were chairs and tables available for all of the kids
and teens, but Michael, Rowen, Patrick, and I decided to take our plates and
drinks and sit on the dock to eat instead while the parents and grandparents
took care of feeding Ethan, Ehlana, Naomi, Hailey, and Aiden. Jake and Stephanie opted to hang out with the
adults too. Baby talk, and lots of jokes
about how to induce labor for Aunt Deborah, was the top conversation topic with
the adults, but we mostly talked about biking, canoeing, and other spring and
summer fun. Patrick had the best
construction updates; and he’s apparently been keeping a close eye on the two
houses being built behind them. I didn’t
even have some of the details he did, and I read the progress reports from all
of the construction projects regularly.
Then again, some of the things he’s seen with the construction workers
wouldn’t be included in any business reports.
The good news after dinner was that kids, grandparents, and
pregnant women were exempted from the cleanup.
There wasn’t really any bad news, but I’m sure that there was an
ulterior motive for why Michael and I were drafted to help out with toddler
park play time. Rowen and Patrick came
with us, but they were volunteers. It
was another beautiful evening to be outdoors, and I love playing with my
brother, sister, and their friends.
Keeping up with four toddlers can also be exhausting, and I was good
with being relieved of duty when Mom, Dad, and some of the other parents came
over to the park too. Once we were set
free, Michael, Patrick, Rowen, and I decided to do a little more biking; and
left the park to get our bikes so we could do that. We did a little tour of the new section of
town and the lab construction site first; and then we had time to spend about
three-quarters of an hour on the trails in the woods before it was time to go
home for the night.
I’d like to take a short side-trip here to mention again
just how great Michael is with younger kids – even when they’re fairly close to
our age like Patrick is. Rowen’s brother
probably didn’t even notice, but Michael made sure that we didn’t try any of
the trails or jumps that would be too hard for Patrick to do with us. I’m sure that Patrick, Scott, and the rest of
their buddies have likely tried to ride every trail in the woods, but that’s
not the same as trying to keep up with older, stronger kids or trying to
impress – especially when there are girls around. Michael even toned down his own riding; and
complimented Patrick every time he pulled off a good jump or trick. Even in Witch Falls,
a lot of the guys wouldn’t even think about little things like that; and I
think it’s really special that Michael does.
Then again, Jake and Stephanie are exactly like that too, so
Michael has had really good role models to learn from.
From my perspective, this was another really good day, with
minimal tween drama. Aunt Leanne seems
to think every day that I don’t cave in, cross over, and get a boyfriend is a
lost opportunity; and she was disappointed to find out that nothing even
remotely romantic happened while I was spending all of that time with Michael. Fortunately for me, Uncle Adam took her home
shortly after I got back from the park; and she didn’t have much time to tease
me about it.
The rest of my night has been almost an exact repeat of last
night – including being awake and working until after two o’clock. I only had Rebecca to chat with tonight
because Jenny and Shane were hanging out in his room when I caught Rebecca
online. The news from Sunday night had
finally reached them in Washington,
and Rebecca earned some bonus friend points by not really teasing me much about
kissing her brother. Maybe that’s
because she’s not having as much fun with the boy-watching as Jenny is –
possibly because it sounds like every guy Jenny has just gone up to and
introduced Rebecca to are more Jenny’s type than Rebecca’s.
It seems to be going by very fast so far, but Rebecca,
Jenny, and the rest of their classmates are already halfway through their trip,
and they only have two more sightseeing days left before having another travel
day on Friday. Their tours today were to
the Capitol and more of the Monuments around the National Mall. Rebecca didn’t say anything last night when
Jenny was with her, and she’s not sure if Jenny was joking or not; but she
either really was, or pretended to be, disappointed to find out that the
National Mall was, in fact, a park.
Either way, they will be doing some shopping, so that will make all of
the girls happy even if the boys could care less about that sort of thing.
Tomorrow, they’ll be doing an armed-forces themed day that
will include visiting the Pentagon, war memorials, and one of the military
museums. Since we have rain on the way,
and the temperature is supposed to drop like a rock between now and Thursday;
I’ll guess that they’ll have more fun tomorrow than I will – plus I have the
make-up work night too. I should
probably get to sleep even though I don’t have anything exciting going on to
rest up for, so...
...until next time, this is Magi Master Cassie Proctor;
logging out!
