I think I've pulled my man into my mid-thirties crisis. We've been out dancing past our bedtime several times in the past couple years; I'm starting to layer silver chains around my neck for special occasions; and just this past Saturday we went to a concert that had a mosh pit. If my guy starts painting his face with black make-up and wearing high-heeled boots like his once-favorite band Kiss, then I'll know we've gone too far.
Speaking of that Saturday concert, it was totally worth it until Matthew and I had to wake up early the next morning for church with bags under our eyes and slush in our veins. It occurred to us then that instead of going to a concert that started at 9:30 at night, we should have gone to one that ended by eight. We would have been home in time to watch our Brit-coms on PBS!
But we just couldn't miss this band. During his college days Matthew was big into Ska music, and the first concert he ever went to was Reel Big Fish, a Ska band. He still has the T-shirt, in fact.
Our cool friends, Holly and her husband Chip, who started dating in high school and attended two proms together (how many married couples can say that?), once upon a time followed Reel Big Fish (RBF) around the East Coast from one venue to another. Holly heard that RBF was playing Octoberfest in town and invited us to come along for a night filled with dark beer and deafening music.
Like a bunch of college kids, we waited in long, packed lines for beer from plastic cups and messy food served on floppy plates, and I really began to regret my wardrobe choice of skinny jeans, cowboy boots and a jacket on a very warm first night of October crowded with festival-goers.
Somewhere around nine, we found seats not far from the stage. In the spirit of Octoberfest, we procured more beer and ate warm, sticky fry bread with powdered sugar as we chatted and waited for the band to take the stage.
Being the only one in the group unfamiliar with the band, I listened as Holly and Chip recounted the concerts they had attended, then told of a handwritten note in Sharpie from the band's Hawaii-shirt-and-checkered-sunglasses-wearing lead singer and of how Chip checker boarded the hood of his car in high school with permanent marker to show his devotion to the band.
Then Holly told us about a recent Madonna spectacle; Matthew and Chip mildly debated the merits of Def Leopard as live performers; and I said we should all go to a Tom Petty concert if we ever got the chance.
At last, with instruments held high, RBF jogged out to cheers and applause from an exuberant crowd. Ska music, combining elements of reggae and rhythm and blues, is nothing if not good for dancing, so everyone began to move as soon as the trumpet player blew that first note, and the mosh pit quickly developed into a cyclone of jumping, jostling young men - one with green and purple spiked hair at least a foot high. Soon everyone was flattening folding chairs and pushing them into piles like unruly fire wood. I shoved my suffocating jacket off one shoulder, swinging my hips. Matthew, Holly and Chip sang catchy lyrics, flashing broad smiles of nostalgia at one another, and I joined the rambunctious choruses.
Of course, as Holly promised, the members of the band were also great showmen. Several times they started to play huge radio hits from the 1990s, putting their own punk style into the arrangements, and then stopped and announced, "Oh, that wasn't us! That was so and so," purposefully naming the wrong famous group, causing the crowd to laugh and whistle. The lead singer also teased his bandmate about how many trumpet solos he was racking up.
Matthew had kept his hair natural and free for the occasion - no spray gel! - so he kept pushing his left hand through his thick mop to keep it off his forehead as he danced. I found it sexy and adorable; it made him look like that college boy I never actually got to spend time with. From my man I turned often to look at Holly and Chip jumping up and down to the beat like a couple of teenagers and dancing together virtually nonstop, obviously reliving high school days. Chip even braved the mosh pit, though Matthew warned that he wouldn't rescue him, but soon returned with this critique: "It smells in there!"
Though I thoroughly enjoyed the music, if not always the rambunctious crowd and warm weather, my favorite part of the night was watching how much fun Matthew, Holly and Chip were having together at the concert of a favorite band.
Observing my enthusiasm as I danced and sang along, especially when they covered Morrison's "Brown-eyed Girl", Matthew asked me if I still wanted him to get rid of his RBF T-shirt from college, full of holes and faded from years of faithful wearing.
I quickly shook my head and grinned.
"No," I assured him.
Showing posts with label date nights. Show all posts
Showing posts with label date nights. Show all posts
Thursday, October 6, 2016
Monday, September 2, 2013
A Day in the Life
This weekend I have been busy living my large, blessed life. On Friday it was very busy and full of love:
---Feed My Starving Children is a great organization. I don't feel my family has volunteered our time nearly enough, but, thanks to a friend, our Mom's group has volunteered for this charity a couple times now. The work is simple - for kids - but the adults have the job of supervising those kids as they deposit spoonfuls and cupfuls of vitamins, veggies, soy and rice into plastic bags to be sealed. Over and over you find yourself saying with forced cheer and goodwill, "No - a full cup, sweetie; Get it full...to the top, to the top!" Kids get distracted singing and shimmying along to the pop song over the loudspeakers, and then they dump in half cups over and over and over. The bags of dehydrated food have to weigh at least 380-400g before being sealed. We had to repeatedly bring the weight up with added rice until, at last! One bag came through that was perfect, and I exclaimed:
"The angels are intervening! Even they can't bear to watch!"
Whenever a full cup came through, we praised exuberantly, "Good Job! That was a good, full cup!"
The time flies amid all the combining and weighing of ingredients, the sealing of bags and boxes. Before you know it, it's time to clean up, and you are truly astounded, if volunteering with children, at the mess about your hands and feet from food that failed to launch where it should have.
Of course, many people volunteer with church groups or businesses or sports clubs, and they pack four times as much food as we did with only a fifth of the mess. One young lady there had brought her gymnastics team to celebrate her birthday by packing food for starving kids - a beautiful girl, a beautiful thing to do.
But I am not faint of heart. I plan to take my kids again. They have a blast every time, and I am always eager to return with them. The feeling of joy we all get afterward as we pray for the boxes' safe arrival to orphanages, schools and missions around the world is an antidote to the hairy task of packing with little ones.
I can't wait for our next adventure in loving others.
Please consider giving your time to this brilliant organization.
---My man and I had a date with two other couples from his work. I came home, showered, applied my evening face and fixed my hair. Egads! I fixed my hair! Normally I just let it hang stick straight as it is or I fold it up in an elastic, but this night I put it in a loose side ponytail and wound it up into a bun that I fixed with bobby pins. It looked elegant but carefree.
It is a very rare treat for Matthew and I to go out, and the conversation on Friday with our friends was lively. One gentleman in the hotel business told horror stories about guests and the atrocious things they do and attempt to do in "guest accommodations". I wondered how he kept his faith in humanity, but he pointed out that it's only about one percent of guests who are sadly memorable.
One of the ladies, a good friend, said to me, "I have something for you. I heard you've been hit by the house bug." So she drew out an ad that showed extravagant estates for sale, all in excess of 400,000 sq. feet.
"You'd have to invite all your relatives to live with you in a place like that," I said. Still, I confided that I do wish I had a larger, nicer home like any little person, how I felt a failure when I stepped into other people's grand manors. I confided that I felt my oldest should have his own room as a bona-fide teenager.
Then they all made me feel better, and humbled, by sharing about the homes in which they grew up. My husband didn't get his own room until he was in high school when older brothers moved out. His co-worker from out of town spoke about her sister's family of nine living in a three bedroom, two bath house. His friend told us that he didn't get his own room until college, and that the room he shared with siblings when younger was, as his wife described it, a "shoebox". He had to stand to the side when he opened his dresser, because the bunk beds were right there. And his parents took in dozens of foster kids over many years in their small home!
This gentleman even spoke about how he was the first in his family to graduate high school.
"And what's more, you went to college, too," I said with admiration.
All this wonderful conversation, and the beer sampler, had loosened my tongue and made me bold in the company of accomplished, educated friends. I spoke of my regret that I had not gone to college, how though I am technically "published" on humor sites, I don't see how I will ever earn money at writing, and how I wish for just $50 a year!
Then they began to rain encouragement on my head, lifted me up, and my cup ran over. They pointed out how, unlike many eighteen-year-olds, I know what I love and wish to pursue; how there are so many options nowadays; How I could likely pass competency testing for certain classes and forgo them; and that I don't need to sacrifice my dreams in order for my kids to follow theirs.
"I think I'll do it," I said, the rumbling of a resolution, a buoy in the not-too-distant future.
"Well, you better after this conversation," said the gentleman with the childhood room like a shoebox.
"I really think I will....I will."
And then my husband saw it was 11:45 on his watch, and we panicked about leaving the new babysitter much longer than anticipated with the kids. We all wished each other good night in the rain-drenched parking lot with hopes of getting together again soon.
---Feed My Starving Children is a great organization. I don't feel my family has volunteered our time nearly enough, but, thanks to a friend, our Mom's group has volunteered for this charity a couple times now. The work is simple - for kids - but the adults have the job of supervising those kids as they deposit spoonfuls and cupfuls of vitamins, veggies, soy and rice into plastic bags to be sealed. Over and over you find yourself saying with forced cheer and goodwill, "No - a full cup, sweetie; Get it full...to the top, to the top!" Kids get distracted singing and shimmying along to the pop song over the loudspeakers, and then they dump in half cups over and over and over. The bags of dehydrated food have to weigh at least 380-400g before being sealed. We had to repeatedly bring the weight up with added rice until, at last! One bag came through that was perfect, and I exclaimed:
"The angels are intervening! Even they can't bear to watch!"
Whenever a full cup came through, we praised exuberantly, "Good Job! That was a good, full cup!"
The time flies amid all the combining and weighing of ingredients, the sealing of bags and boxes. Before you know it, it's time to clean up, and you are truly astounded, if volunteering with children, at the mess about your hands and feet from food that failed to launch where it should have.
Of course, many people volunteer with church groups or businesses or sports clubs, and they pack four times as much food as we did with only a fifth of the mess. One young lady there had brought her gymnastics team to celebrate her birthday by packing food for starving kids - a beautiful girl, a beautiful thing to do.
But I am not faint of heart. I plan to take my kids again. They have a blast every time, and I am always eager to return with them. The feeling of joy we all get afterward as we pray for the boxes' safe arrival to orphanages, schools and missions around the world is an antidote to the hairy task of packing with little ones.
I can't wait for our next adventure in loving others.
Please consider giving your time to this brilliant organization.
---My man and I had a date with two other couples from his work. I came home, showered, applied my evening face and fixed my hair. Egads! I fixed my hair! Normally I just let it hang stick straight as it is or I fold it up in an elastic, but this night I put it in a loose side ponytail and wound it up into a bun that I fixed with bobby pins. It looked elegant but carefree.
It is a very rare treat for Matthew and I to go out, and the conversation on Friday with our friends was lively. One gentleman in the hotel business told horror stories about guests and the atrocious things they do and attempt to do in "guest accommodations". I wondered how he kept his faith in humanity, but he pointed out that it's only about one percent of guests who are sadly memorable.
One of the ladies, a good friend, said to me, "I have something for you. I heard you've been hit by the house bug." So she drew out an ad that showed extravagant estates for sale, all in excess of 400,000 sq. feet.
"You'd have to invite all your relatives to live with you in a place like that," I said. Still, I confided that I do wish I had a larger, nicer home like any little person, how I felt a failure when I stepped into other people's grand manors. I confided that I felt my oldest should have his own room as a bona-fide teenager.
Then they all made me feel better, and humbled, by sharing about the homes in which they grew up. My husband didn't get his own room until he was in high school when older brothers moved out. His co-worker from out of town spoke about her sister's family of nine living in a three bedroom, two bath house. His friend told us that he didn't get his own room until college, and that the room he shared with siblings when younger was, as his wife described it, a "shoebox". He had to stand to the side when he opened his dresser, because the bunk beds were right there. And his parents took in dozens of foster kids over many years in their small home!
This gentleman even spoke about how he was the first in his family to graduate high school.
"And what's more, you went to college, too," I said with admiration.
All this wonderful conversation, and the beer sampler, had loosened my tongue and made me bold in the company of accomplished, educated friends. I spoke of my regret that I had not gone to college, how though I am technically "published" on humor sites, I don't see how I will ever earn money at writing, and how I wish for just $50 a year!
Then they began to rain encouragement on my head, lifted me up, and my cup ran over. They pointed out how, unlike many eighteen-year-olds, I know what I love and wish to pursue; how there are so many options nowadays; How I could likely pass competency testing for certain classes and forgo them; and that I don't need to sacrifice my dreams in order for my kids to follow theirs.
"I think I'll do it," I said, the rumbling of a resolution, a buoy in the not-too-distant future.
"Well, you better after this conversation," said the gentleman with the childhood room like a shoebox.
"I really think I will....I will."
And then my husband saw it was 11:45 on his watch, and we panicked about leaving the new babysitter much longer than anticipated with the kids. We all wished each other good night in the rain-drenched parking lot with hopes of getting together again soon.
Thursday, August 9, 2012
Romance Cravings
I have been bitten by the green ogre of jealousy where it concerns a few of our friends. They have family in town. If you are a parent with young kids, you understand my envy.
At a swim party, my girlfriend brought up a conference she attended recently for her job. It lasted three days, and her mom needed to watch the kids from about 8am to 4pm. But since her mom lives an hour away, she offered to just take the kids for the whole entire time to stay at her place. My friend and her husband had three consecutive date nights. They probably camped out at the local casino with a couple kegs of beer.
Upon hearing this I raised my fist from the pool and shook it around at anyone who even looked like they had the in-town support of relatives and said, "Grrrr! That's why I'm jealous of you guys who have family in town!"
Obviously, we have none. Well, get a babysitter! you're telling me. No, no. My Man and I are very careful about who watches our kids. There is no way in hell we will leave them with someone without knowing that person(s) for a minimum of five years. That's the bare requirement. Seven is more ideal. And, okay, yes we have good friends we have known for the specified amount of time, but it's a fair-trade barter system. We are always there for each other in case of emergency, and that certainly eases the mind. As for a date night, they babysit for us, and then we wait for them to ask us to babysit for them. If they don't ask we have to start dropping subtle hints: You guys should have a date night. When was the last time you went out? Gosh, I don't even remember...so long ago. Did you hear about that new restaurant by you? I bet you guys would like it. Classy place. Of course, it's not kid-friendly...But, hey! We'll watch them for you! What time?
During my Man's company Christmas party last year, our longtime friends watched the kids. Our youngest was only 18 months, and my friend had to walk and sing him to sleep. When she stopped singing he kicked her, she told me, so she sang til he drifted off. It was great knowing our children were with people we trusted, people who would sing bedtime lullabies.
Still, the night wasn't what it could have been. I spent half the party in the restroom because of tummy troubles, and the other half of the time my husband and I waited around for the DJ to play a song we would actually dance to instead of the ridiculous hip-hop that mostly got played. We felt very anxious about the music selection, because we enjoy dancing and we knew time was marching. I also made a disparaging comment over dinner about not ever wanting to live in California to one of my husband's co-workers who grew up there and loved it. My adult manners were out of practice; my husband, the sophisticated guy, had to remind me about the formal place settings as if I was at etiquette class. Mostly, we felt this huge pressure to get the best out of our rare, limited date. Maybe that accounted for my stomach issues. Anyway, we hurried out of the shindig later than we meant to, despairing of our chance to dance to one more swing song and worried that our friends were tired or our kids unsettled.
Everything was fine. The kids were all asleep. But the date would have been better if, like some of my husband's co-workers, we knew that the kids were safely tucked in at Grandma's house, and there was no need to pick them up until the morning. We could have had a few drinks and stayed at the hotel where the party was, stumbling up to our room in the small hours. With friends, even close friends as ours are, you feel that it would be such a huge imposition to ask them to keep your kids overnight and part of the next day, too.
And there's where the ogre finds me and begins to gnaw. I have a fantasy about going to one of these ultra-fancy resorts here in town with my husband during the summer. You can get excellent deals, because no one likes vacationing next door to hell, and that's exactly where this desert valley is from June to October. Anyway, all the locals have their staycations when the hotels offer their cut rate deals to fill the rooms. Staying at one of the most glamorous with my husband for the whole weekend - swimming in the luxury pools together, drinking cocktails, sleeping in to the ungodly and now unheard of hour of 9am, eating meals in nice clothes and with adult decorum - it sounds like an enchanted tale of marriage-enhancing romance, and my lust for it is rapidly growing. But we have no family in town.
"Aren't you jealous of our friends?" I asked my husband passionately a couple of days after our friend's disclosure.
"No."
"Why not? Three days! They got three whole days!"
"Because if we had that many date nights, we'd have six kids by now. We do fine without the date nights."
I saw his point and felt slightly better. And, thankfully, our friends agreed to give us a date night in the next weekend. Nevertheless, as Scarlett O'Hara is my witness, next summer I'll be lounging by a ridiculously lux pool, cocktail in hand, flirting with my shirtless husband.
At a swim party, my girlfriend brought up a conference she attended recently for her job. It lasted three days, and her mom needed to watch the kids from about 8am to 4pm. But since her mom lives an hour away, she offered to just take the kids for the whole entire time to stay at her place. My friend and her husband had three consecutive date nights. They probably camped out at the local casino with a couple kegs of beer.
Upon hearing this I raised my fist from the pool and shook it around at anyone who even looked like they had the in-town support of relatives and said, "Grrrr! That's why I'm jealous of you guys who have family in town!"
Obviously, we have none. Well, get a babysitter! you're telling me. No, no. My Man and I are very careful about who watches our kids. There is no way in hell we will leave them with someone without knowing that person(s) for a minimum of five years. That's the bare requirement. Seven is more ideal. And, okay, yes we have good friends we have known for the specified amount of time, but it's a fair-trade barter system. We are always there for each other in case of emergency, and that certainly eases the mind. As for a date night, they babysit for us, and then we wait for them to ask us to babysit for them. If they don't ask we have to start dropping subtle hints: You guys should have a date night. When was the last time you went out? Gosh, I don't even remember...so long ago. Did you hear about that new restaurant by you? I bet you guys would like it. Classy place. Of course, it's not kid-friendly...But, hey! We'll watch them for you! What time?
During my Man's company Christmas party last year, our longtime friends watched the kids. Our youngest was only 18 months, and my friend had to walk and sing him to sleep. When she stopped singing he kicked her, she told me, so she sang til he drifted off. It was great knowing our children were with people we trusted, people who would sing bedtime lullabies.
Still, the night wasn't what it could have been. I spent half the party in the restroom because of tummy troubles, and the other half of the time my husband and I waited around for the DJ to play a song we would actually dance to instead of the ridiculous hip-hop that mostly got played. We felt very anxious about the music selection, because we enjoy dancing and we knew time was marching. I also made a disparaging comment over dinner about not ever wanting to live in California to one of my husband's co-workers who grew up there and loved it. My adult manners were out of practice; my husband, the sophisticated guy, had to remind me about the formal place settings as if I was at etiquette class. Mostly, we felt this huge pressure to get the best out of our rare, limited date. Maybe that accounted for my stomach issues. Anyway, we hurried out of the shindig later than we meant to, despairing of our chance to dance to one more swing song and worried that our friends were tired or our kids unsettled.
Everything was fine. The kids were all asleep. But the date would have been better if, like some of my husband's co-workers, we knew that the kids were safely tucked in at Grandma's house, and there was no need to pick them up until the morning. We could have had a few drinks and stayed at the hotel where the party was, stumbling up to our room in the small hours. With friends, even close friends as ours are, you feel that it would be such a huge imposition to ask them to keep your kids overnight and part of the next day, too.
And there's where the ogre finds me and begins to gnaw. I have a fantasy about going to one of these ultra-fancy resorts here in town with my husband during the summer. You can get excellent deals, because no one likes vacationing next door to hell, and that's exactly where this desert valley is from June to October. Anyway, all the locals have their staycations when the hotels offer their cut rate deals to fill the rooms. Staying at one of the most glamorous with my husband for the whole weekend - swimming in the luxury pools together, drinking cocktails, sleeping in to the ungodly and now unheard of hour of 9am, eating meals in nice clothes and with adult decorum - it sounds like an enchanted tale of marriage-enhancing romance, and my lust for it is rapidly growing. But we have no family in town.
"Aren't you jealous of our friends?" I asked my husband passionately a couple of days after our friend's disclosure.
"No."
"Why not? Three days! They got three whole days!"
"Because if we had that many date nights, we'd have six kids by now. We do fine without the date nights."
I saw his point and felt slightly better. And, thankfully, our friends agreed to give us a date night in the next weekend. Nevertheless, as Scarlett O'Hara is my witness, next summer I'll be lounging by a ridiculously lux pool, cocktail in hand, flirting with my shirtless husband.
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