Dawn Is Me

It’s been awhile, huh? Did I leave you hanging? I’m sooooo sorry …

So, yeah. It’s Ricky’s birthday. He’s 13 year old now, officially a teenager (as he has reminded me about 16 times already today). Having survived season one of As The Teens Turn, Ricky doesn’t scare me.

He couldn’t possibly out-do Psycho Boy. No way.

To bring you up to date, I have not only decided to go ahead and go back to school, I have applied to and been accepted by Hartwick College. They even gave me a fairly huge, 4-year scholarship to get me started.

Come September, I’m going back to school! I’m totally jazzed!

Of course, if either Kimmie or Gina winds up going there within the next few years, it’ll get just a tiny bit bizarre. I’ll enjoy it and I expect which ever of my girls is there will also enjoy it.

The City of Oneonta, on the other hand, may take some time to recover by the time we’re done.

That’s about the best thing going on with me right now. Physically, my world has been circumscribed by the fact that I blew my knee while FIRMing in a hotel room in Rye, NY.

(And what was I doing in a hotel room in Rye, NY? I was working out, of course! Oh, alright … I was down there for the nominating convention of the NYS Democratic Committee, where we officially designated Andrew Cuomo as our candidate for government. No suspense involved in that one at all … but I digress.)

And I’m still very depressed, although I don’t really know why. You’d think, with me gearing up to head back to school (something I expect to thoroughly enjoy), that I’d be aux anges but I’m down in the dumps instead.

Of course, my domestic situation continues to go quietly and cheerfully down the toilet. That might have something to do with it. Oh well.

Of all the things they tell you are difficult in life, one thing very few people mention: transitions.

Being in a rut can be quite painful.

Starting all over again can be fun but frightening.

Getting from point A to point B … painful, frightening, logistically tough, lonely … you name it.

My hope is that I’ll start having fun again … later.

Enough of that whiney stuff.

I can see that the school year will proceed according to schedule, with no real surprises and no startling new behaviors on the part of my children.

Three days into the school and Ricky wins this year’s award for most airheaded child of the Baker clan, hands down. Clearly, he hasn’t changed much over the years.

This child of mine, who once left his shoes in a tree (he’s never going to live that down), called me from school on Thursday morning (before homeroom had started) to tell me that he’d left home, headed for school, without his school bag.

As I have said repeatedly, my children are lucky that their mother has a sense of humor. Dutiful me climbed into the car and ferried the backpack to the middle school.

Kimmie seems to have undergone a major transition of some sort. Her birthday was almost ten days ago and it seems that she didn’t just turn 15. Seems she really turned fifteen! if you see what I mean (which you probably don’t).

I smell a breakthrough of some sort coming. Stay tuned.

Headline-grabbing Gina, not content with simply heading off to embark on her junior year at Ithaca (which is fairly exciting all by itself), is currently preoccupied with trying to not catch the H1N1 virus, aka swine flu.

See? I told you she’s smart.

Evidently, it’s all over the place on Cornell’s campus (you know those Ivies, they don’t do anything halfway) but there are only around 20 cases across town at Ithaca. We’ll hope it stays that way.

Who needs television? If I really want excitement, all I have to do is watch my kids.

Randomness.

—

Gina’s home. We helped her to load her stuff in the car when we went to get her yesterday. She packed in typical college student fashion, with an interesting mix of actually-packed stuff, loosely packed stuff and just stuff.

So, when I was trying to help her with her stuff and her attempts at juggling seemed poised for disaster, here is what my uber-cool college student daughter said to me:

“Nooooo! Not my teddy bear! Not my teddy bear!”

—

I guess I was wrong. Having health insurance really does make a difference to how much attention you pay to your health.

Major dental work is about to happen in the household. I’m tickled pink because I’m looking at a pain-free mouth with which I can eat the foods I prefer to eat.

Spouse is bummed because it’s all making him feel old.

Perspective is everything.

—

Kimmie says that she likes to chew on her boyfriend’s head when he lays it on her shoulder.

For the record, she doesn’t actually chew it. She sort of mouths it.

I asked her if that’s what she did when she was not in a position to interact with the guy’s other head.

She declined to answer. Well, actually, what she said was, “I hate you.”

—

Note from Ricky’s teacher:

Just a quick note to let you know that Richard was unprepared for class numerous times this week. His brain is swirling with information about minerals and crystals, but the papers and pencils are not there.

My response:

Guess he has trouble with graphite and wood, huh? I’ll exchange some words with him, thanks for letting me know.

That settles it. The boy needs a secretary.