the boys

Here's some things I've seen in the boys and keep meaning to write about, if I can remember them all. Cyndi, of course, is with them more, and would have plenty of other stories to tell about. I'd like her to do that sometime. I suspect she may have some observations very different from mine.

Jackson is in second grade. He goes twice a week in the mornings to run with the school running club. He fell once while running last week. I just noticed the scab on his thigh, and he told me he wants an inhaler without a mask to take with him. He does get asthma indications after running hard, but it doesn't stop him from being very active on the playground, where he plays a lot of soccer with his friends. For him, playing sports is a social event. He's still taking piano lessons, but that may come to an end soon. He's started cub scouts. At the pack meeting, he couldn't keep still. I can see that he loves it. He smiles a lot, he's quite charming, he's developed a loud, open laugh whenever he finds a story or a movie or something Ry says funny, and he still talks with everyone, whether a child or an adult. Sometimes I'll be looking for him and he'll be in some involved conservation with someone. Often, he'll be the one to start a conversation. He likes to get involved in activities. A good example is when we saw him playing volleyball with some college-age people at the beach. Noone knew who they were, but there he was in the midst of their game, rotating positions on one of the teams. He's doing a lot of paragraph writing in school and lots of addition and subtraction. He reads everything, but I've yet to see him reading a chapter book. Cyndi reads to the boys every night. He likes to do arts and crafts projects. He wants to be completely computer literate. He organizes his study desk, what he calls his office. On trips, he'll pack all sorts of useful and fun stuff to take along: a flashlight, a penknife, a whistle, hand cleanser, a game, his stuffed bunny. His wallet is fat with dollar bills and coins, and he wants to buy things on his own, counting out the money. He's planning an island, which has replaced his "Train with the Magical Wand." He loves the tween shows on Disney.com. He doesn't much like to go to the movie theater. He eats well, and loves to go out to eat. He's always trying to get us to go to Trombino's. He's getting very good at chess. He plans moves ahead and sees traps. I have to be more alert now when I play with him. He loves playing with his cousins, and he always remembers Ariel. He always greets his relatives, giving them a hug and a cuddle, and always remembers to tell his Papa, "Dios te bendiga y buena suerte." When I leave in the morning, he hugs me, if he's awake then, and says, "I love you. God bless you. Bye."

Rylee is counting and learning to add and subtract and spell words now. I'll hear him singing the alphabet song. He writes his name clearly. He loves to draw and color. He's learning big concepts, and he'll often repeat something he's heard or explain something he's figured out, just to see if he's gotten it right. Whenever I say, "that's right," he repeats it again or says, "yes, that's right", to etch it into his mind. Whenever I say, "well, that's not quite right", and tell him more, he'll say, "oh, yes, that's right, that's what I meant to say" and go on. One day he explained to me that he could be a "professional" (his word) anything when he grew up and then listed all the things he could do professionally. Many of them were sports. He is very accommodating, and is easy-going about sharing things. Likely, it is because many of his things are usually hand-me-downs. Lately, he's been insisting on his own things. He will discover old toys and then sit down with them on the floor, sort them out, and play with them, making them move about, talking and singing to himself as he does so. They will become his favorites for a time, to be replaced by another or be rediscovered later. At the same time, I've seen his temper whenever Jackson crosses the line with his teasing. Ry will unleash kicks and punches then, and his face gets red with fury. His physical and sports abilities come naturally. He observes other players, talks about what they are doing, and repeats their actions. I've talked plenty about his infatuation with baseball. Lately, it's been skateboarding. He has a bookmark on his computer home page that directs him to videos of skateboarders. Cyndi took him just yesterday to the skateboard park for the first time. He used Brendan's old skateboard. And now he skateboards in the kitchen every chance he gets. He says he knows five tricks; one is jumping up the threshold from the garage to the kitchen. His favorite sports at the moment are skateboarding, skimboarding and surfing, so he's been saying the last two days. That list changes, though. I've noticed it's not pride or selfishness that drives him in sports. When he picks up a skill on his own that others haven't yet mastered, he just remarks that the others haven't learned it yet. He knows how to set up the chess board, and he knows all the moves, except the knight is still a little puzzling. For Ry, there is a clear distinction between what men do and what women do. Some shows on tv are girl shows. When he eats, he eats well, preferring things like fruit and yogurt. Usually, when presented with a healthy alternative, he will take the healthy food. He'll relish a glass of water or milk, even if he had asked for something sugary. This is even more true lately because he's also excited to be trusted with a glass. At night, he and I are the last to sleep, and in the morning we are the first to get up.

Oh, there are some negatives, to be sure. Ry is going through a stage of whining, especially about toys he wants whenever he shops with Cyndi. Jack has been going through a stage of attitude and even anger, but I haven't seen it in a little while. He can be merciless to Ry with his teasing. Their play can get rough and, as anyone would guess, there comes a point when somebody gets hurt, someone cries, or one or both of the parents starts yelling to knock it off and it continues anyway until somebody gets hurt or someone cries.

They are very handsome boys, too.

the wedding time

wedding trip

We went to Terra's wedding in California this weekend.

We drove all day Thursday. I loaded the car in the wee hours with our bags and our bikes. The boys woke up as we put them in the car, and we drove along the vacant highway in the dark. I think we played Raffi, which we just rediscovered, 'cause I remember the "Numbers Rumba," which Jackson loved to hear in the car when he was little and Rylee is just now listening to. The boys eventually fell asleep again, and Cyndi tried to sleep, with little success. We were in Flagstaff so early that the place where we wanted to have breakfast wasn't open yet, so we gassed up and drove on to Williams. We had slam breakfasts at a roadside Denny's, which Rylee loved, and drove the short main road through Williams to see what we had missed. The center of town isn't that far from the highway. It sits on the south side of the highway, and there's a depot and a "resort" for the Grand Canyon train and a couple of local spots where we could have had breakfast. We started playing travel bingo somewhere between Kingman and Needles and that helped several hours go by. There aren't many cows, tollgates, or birds-on-a-wire as you travel across the Mojave, so it takes a while to get a bingo or fill in your entire card. (We worked on our travel bingo the rest of our trip, shouting "bingo" every time we saw another smokestack, flag, or bird-on-a-wire; we didn't see a "tollgate" until the parking lot at the wharves in Monterey.) At the Essex rest stop in the desert, about 40 miles outside Needles, we pulled the bikes off so the boys could ride around, and we stopped again at Ludlow, just for a little gas and the Dairy Queen.

It was there that we had our first trouble with a general block put on gas stations and a few other businesses in Arizona and California by "My Financial Institution" in New Mexico, or so the rep said on the phone on Thursday, but he said I should be able to use my bank card with my pin number for debit transactions. I never heard of such a thing. About two hours later I get a call on the road on my cell phone from the card service provider, checking on my use of my bank card. Great, I thought, thanks for checking. No problems using the bank card again until our return trip. I wanted to put some gas in as I passed through Needles, and the card was denied for both debit and credit use. It was 109 degrees, and I was with my wife and two small boys in a packed car on the road in the desert. It was a Sunday, and, of course, My Financial Institution was closed. I had passed on getting gas in Barstow, and I didn't have enough to make it to Kingman. The card service told me there was nothing that could be done about it, and I would have to talk to My Financial Institution on Monday. I was being left stranded in the desert in Needles without access to any of my money. My Financial Institution is going to hear about this in much more detail. A clerk at a gas station knew the trick: key in the amount of the purchase before running the card through as a debit. Of course, when we got to Kingman, there was no problem at all. I ran the card through the machine. It automatically went to credit and I keyed in my zipcode. I got all the gas I could ever want. At another stop, I didn't even have to key in the zipcode. So, My Financial Institution decided I could not get gas in the Mojave Desert. This is something I just would never have expected.

In Barstow, we stretched our legs at a new section of the outlet mall there and grabbed an In and Out Burger. In Tehachapi, the only mountain pass to Bakersfield, the highway was closed because of a tanker accident ahead. We pulled into town. There were hundreds of semis parked all over, waiting for the highway to re-open. Someone told me it would be at least two more hours before the highway would open again. I got some gas (the debit worked, but not the credit), and we were on our way to a park to bicycle and wait it out when I saw the city police station. I went in and asked if there was another route. Oh, yes, but it sounded like it would be a slow and tortuous drive behind a line of vehicles, or I could drive toward LA. A woman was there and offered to draw me a map of the route. Cyndi thought we should go for it, so we got the map and took the back road. There weren't any cars to speak of, no semis, and the winding and narrow road along the edge of the hills turned out to be a beautiful drive. We rejoined the highway quickly in Keene and headed to Bakersfield (or Bleichersville, as Rylee says), where we stopped at a park. There was a spray park there, too, and the water was running, but by now we had lost time and needed to keep going. The road out of Bakersfield in our direction is a nightmare of traffic signals. We hit every one, but we eventually connected to the highway to Paso Robles, where we had a really good burrito and a quesadilla underneath a sidewalk umbrella and I got Cyndi a cold beer. She had a good headache going, something unusual for her, that she thought was from the trouble she was having from her contacts. The boys were great on the drive, all things considered. They kept themselves amused and played a few movies on their player. Jack likes the "Home Alone" movies, and I heard his loud laugh whenever the boy hero outsmarted the adults. The laugh infected Ry, who would repeat the lines and laugh.

The place where we stayed in Seaside, at the city limits of Monterey, was very nice. The room was cramped but it was surrounded by a lovely lagoon. There was fog that night and the next morning. After we got all the stuff into the room, Jackson and I took a walk at night, exploring, and then went to bed.

The next two days were pretty packed with wedding events. I hadn't taken into account a bridal shower that took up the morning and early afternoon before the rehearsal, so there wasn't much time that first morning. We first walked to the Starbucks. Jackson was thrilled with the breakfast bar at the hotel and spent several minutes making a plate of scrambled eggs, a cinnamon roll, a banana, and toast and jam, along with a bowl of cereal and a cup of hot chocolate, all the while chatting with the other guests. The boys got to ride their bikes for a few minutes on a part of a path that goes around the lagoon. Beth picked up Cyndi and several other ladies staying at the hotel for the long drive into the Salinas Valley for the bridal shower at a winery. Lisa knew the owners, so I imagine it was very nice. Meanwhile, Jack, Ry and I stopped off at a Costco to get another warm layer for Cyndi. We knew it would be cool along the coast, but it was cooler than we imagined. The boys had their parkas from our last visit to Monterey, so they'd be fine. We got a nice red quilted vest for Cyndi to be comfortable in later that night and picked up some snacks and chocolate-milk-in-a-box. Costco has Christmas toys out already, and the boys checked those out and really wanted them NOW!

When we got to my folk's place, where the wedding was going to take place, a crew was setting up the tent in the parking area. My father was the only one there, and when the tent crew had finished and left, the boys, Dad, and I drove to get a sandwich together. That was just about perfect, I thought, but I made the mistake of letting the boys each have a bottle of Gatorade. They did eat a little. At the house, Rylee played with the dogs, while Jackson went exploring about the house and the spaces and outside areas underneath and in the back of the house.

Everyone arrived for the rehearsal. The ceremony itself was going to take place in Papa's Park, the area under the oak trees at the top of a little hill. Rylee was the ringbearer, and he took his role seriously. He had some knowledge about his role from a book Terra found for him, and Cyndi had been reading it to him several times before the trip. He made up a little song about it that ended, "and that's the way the wedding goes."

Ariel, meanwhile, was en route from NYC. Gary and Eric would be picking her up in Oakland that day (Friday), and when the rehearsal ended Beth told me they were on their way and may even arrive to the rehearsal dinner before we did.

The rehearsal dinner was going to take place at the Monterey State Beach, and it was our plan to ride our bikes to it from the hotel. The beach park stretches along the bay, and we have picnicked before at the same spot, just across from the Dennis the Menace Park, whenever I was doing the Big Sur Marathon. Back then, the cousins would wade into the ocean until they were soaked and we learned to bring towels and extra clothes along to change into. So after the rehearsal, we headed back to our room, taking Karl's mother (the groom's mother) back, too, dressed warmly, and took off on our bikes toward the spot at the park. It was foggy at the start. Our hotel is on a little spur of a bike trail that goes underneath the Pacific Coast Highway and then joins the main coastal recreation trail. The trail follows Del Monte, along some old railroad tracks, alongside sand dunes, and through groves of eucalyptus trees. I'd say we went about a mile-and-a-half, maybe a little more. Just as we arrived, Ariel arrived, and there were many hugs. There were tables at the spot, and a good crowd of wedding guests, drinking wine and beer. The caterer had hors d'oeuvres and an excellent spread of food there on the beach, and a bonfire was set inside the grates of a raised grill for people to gather around in the cool coastal air. We met many of Sandra's family, some of whom we hadn't seen since Dave and Sandra's wedding some 30 years ago. The fog had arrived with the night, but as it settled in it did seem to get a little warmer. We talked with Ariel, who was happy but also very tired from her journey and a bit overwhelmed as her program at NYU had just begun and it was intense, as well as exciting. She was already conducting telephonic interviews while on the road during this trip, and had another one scheduled Saturday morning, or maybe it was Sunday morning, before heading back to NYC on an overnight flight. Jackson climbed the trees and then joined a volleyball game with some twenty-year-olds nearby who were not part of our party. Cyndi was snug in her vest, and the boys rode around the bike path in the fog under the lights. We rode back to the hotel in the dark and the fog. There were street lamps on the path along the way, and the boys had their headlamps. I thought they'd be too tired, but the ride was great. Cyndi loved it. Jackson would cruise ahead with Cyndi. Ry would snake along the trail, while I'd tell him, "Stay on your right," and then he'd stand on his pedals and take off. Ry really needs a real bike, as he has to do a lot of work to keep that little bike, with its little wheels, going. It's fun to watch other people's reactions as this little tot zooms by on his bike, bouncing over the bumps. He later learned to spell "right."

Saturday morning we had breakfast again. Ry had banana, cereal, yogurt, and eggs, and Jack made his plates of toast and everything else while chatting with the other hotel guests again. We planned another bike ride, but Cyndi and I weren't sure how the boys would do again. So the plan was Cyndi would take the bike trail and head up the big sand dune where our spur joined the main trail and ride north for a few miles along the ocean on her own, while the boys and I would start a bit later and head towards Monterey again, and we would meet up somewhere after Cyndi turned around. This time, the boys and I went beyond the spot in the park where the beach luau had been held and continued to the Fisherman's Wharf, which wasn't that much further, and we arrived just before Cyndi arrived from her trip. It was early. The shop owners were outside, razzing each other about their fish, and delivery trucks were parked along the wharf. We walked our bikes along the wharf to the statue of the fisherman to see the marina and the pelicans, and then thought we better head back to get ready for the wedding...but not before stopping at a small restaurant on the wharf and getting a cup of clam chowder. The boys were upset with me for making them walk their bikes on the wharf, but got over it once we were riding again on the trail. Cyndi loved the whole morning.

The wedding was beautiful under the shade of the oak trees. Cyndi wore a beautiful midnight blue dress. Jackson had new clothes, with a button-down Oxford shirt and tie. Rylee wore the tux we got mail order through Amazon: a vest and matching slacks Cyndi had hemmed, a shirt that matched the bride pretty closely, a tie, and new shoes he can wear to school now. We met Ariel there. She was so beautiful. Stunning. Jackson and Ariel sat together for the ceremony, and Rylee lined up in front of Jenni and Terra carrying his ring pillow for his part of the procession. He did a short run at the back of the "aisle" between the chairs set up outside, regained a walking pace, and took his place next to the best man at the front. He didn't fidget during the entire ceremony, and he didn't snap his fingers. (We talked to him about that; it's something he just taught himself and practices all the time.) The bride was beautiful, everyone was beaming, and the ceremony was perfect. Mom sang a "pretty song" during the ceremony.

The reception took place below the hill in the tent and around the lower parking level near the house. It was hot. A heat wave had hit California in the past couple of weeks, bringing fires to many areas, but when finally the sun set below the trees and cast the reception in shade, a light breeze stirred and the temperature began to fall. Rylee, who had insisted we bring our baseball gloves, played some catch with Eric on the hill above, and Jackson joined them. Rylee did tricks with the little fans that were on the seats at the ceremony. Jackson showed Cyndi around the back of the house. He later laid down, not feeling well. It might have been a combination of the heat, the trip, the bike rides, the peanut butter M&M he ate, everyone thinking it was chocolate, or the Benadryl he took as a precaution afterwards. (Fortunately, he didn't have any manifest reaction, and I and others thought maybe it was because there wasn't actually any peanut product in the M&M.) It was a shame Jackson was not feeling well, because he was missed on the dance floor. Ry wouldn't do it. Ariel danced, Cyndi danced, even I danced ("We Are Family"), and we watched Dad, Sandra, and all the older crowd (over thirty) dancing the night away. Cyndi was radiant and in her element.

Cyndi had met some of the women at the bridal shower and had a chance to talk with Mom a bit then. A good group of family and friends of Sandra's (and Dave's) had come from several states, and I met several of them the night before. They were a fun and friendly group. I chatted a bit with Sandra's friend, whom I also knew in Panama, and we caught up a little on the passing of time and a few mutual friends. Ariel and I talked a bit about NYU. As I said, she was feeling a bit overwhelmed but so happy to be there at the wedding. I talked with Karl's father and stepmother to thank them for the luau. Gary and I shared a couple of glasses of good wine. And I snuck a few good moments with Beth and Lisa here and there. David was fairly preoccupied, but I remember a couple of nice moments with Sandra, who was busy introducing everybody to everyone. All in all, we didn't get a lot of time with family. There were no other children, but the boys seemed to have fun wandering about the crowd and ordering drinks at the open soda bar.

We began to say our goodbyes long before the shuttle arrived to pick up guests and take them back to the hotel. (We had driven.) I had a few minutes at the very end with Mom, who seemed very happy and well. David shook my hand, and we lamented not having much time to talk. Dad got us a box of picked apples, and I gathered up all of our stuff. Terra and Jenni had gifts for the boys. The gifts were a big hit that night in our hotel room and on the road. We said goodbye to Ariel, which was the saddest moment.

So we packed a little and went to bed and before dawn we were on the road again. It was a long, long day. The Starbucks in Paso Robles was open...just barely...and I wish I had picked up a NY Times there. Cyndi drove a couple of times, and I got two moments of actual sleep along the way. Ry was busy drawing and making a creative mini scrap book with the stuff he got from Terra and Jenni. Jackson did his school work. Ry wanted to go to a Denny's again for eggs and pancakes. When we passed Tehachapi, we drove in again and stopped at a bakery on the main street. A nice town. We later found a Denny's in Barstow, in that oasis of restaurants, gas stations, and outlet malls on the highway between LA and Las Vegas. Jack was in the mood for a grilled cheese. Cyndi and I swore that would be about the last time we made that stop. The temperature rose in the Mojave, and then we had that dreadful moment in Needles that began as we were buying fruit at the grocery store there. From there, we tried to make good time, stopping outside Flagstaff for just a few minutes in the cool mountain air, grabbing popcorn chicken from a KFC in Holbrook, pulling over at the closed gate to the Petrified Forest National Park, but still it took a lot of hours before we saw the lights of Albuquerque from Nine Mile Hill.

What was I thinking? I pushed this method of travel on Cyndi and the boys. There were some natural moans and groans as they tried to stay comfortable in the car, but no one really complained.

state fair

One good thing we did on Saturday was go to the fair. We saw the baby animals in the barn, the rabbits, guinea pigs and chickens, the sheep and goats, and the 4H cows. We had corn dogs and icees along the street, and a frito pie with green and red chile in the Hispanic Village, listening to music from the stage. We visited the exhibition hall and we looked for Lauren and Nicholas' lego entries. The weather was pleasant, cloudy when we started and sunny when we sat to eat. It was busy, lots of sideshows and street shows, people walking about from all the corners of the state. It's a good place to see what makes up New Mexico, the mix of native, Hispanic and Anglo, the people from the towns outside Albuquerque, from farms and from the pueblos and rez. The trio of ten-year-old boys in their boots, jeans, pearl-buttoned western shirts, and cowboy hats. The teenaged girls with big belt buckles. Lots of families with strollers. Nothing is cheap--the parking fees and gate fees, the hot dogs and sodas and Navajo tacos, a souvenir or two, add up--yet they come to spend their hard-earned money at the fall's big show.

Rylee soaked it in. He walked, holding his dad's or his mom's hand. Jackson brought his bag and desperately wanted to buy something, but he didn't. We kept it simple.

There was talk of rain this weekend. It is cooler today.

Labor Day (with postscript)

It’s Labor Day, and the boys and I are swimming. We’re meeting Elley and Nicholas and Loren any moment. Cyndi is working in the day care this morning at the club. The day is sunny but cool, probably in the 70s. The boys and I went to the park earlier where Jackson and Rylee rode around in circles for about an hour. Ry cranks his little bike (14”) hard, and Jack cruises in an easy gear at a fairly fast speed around and around the park. Some people were already saving tables for bbqs and get-togethers later in the day. Ariel is catching the train to Long Island at this moment for a party. Cyndi and the girls will go to the Bernalillo Wine Festival this afternoon. I don’t know what the boys and I will be doing. I hear there’s a family potluck and birthday cake for Dorie later this evening.

The weekend started with a little infusion of cash, so we could do a Costco run and catch up on a bunch of bills. The boys and I ran to Target, for nothing really, just toothpaste and shampoo, but we checked out skateboards there and a school backpack with wheels that Jackson wants but I’m working to discourage. He hasn’t mentioned it this weekend since I gave a little talk in the car. We stopped by a skateboard shop to scope out real skateboards. There’s a real difference in price, and I’m sure there’s a real difference in quality. We asked a lot of questions. We’re not in a hurry to get them...yet. We splurged a little by going to Bravo in ABQ uptown. I’ve talked about the place before. It’s a fairly good place for Italian. It’s a franchise, like PF Changs, and at under $100, with the least expensive bottle of wine, the bill and tip were about as much. I have to come up with a name for these kind of places. The boys had pasta and pizza and ate a bunch of bread with the olive oil served with sundried tomato paste, Cyndi ordered a few appetizers, including a lobster bisque, and I ordered a decent rosemary grilled shrimp on orzo, a salad with gorgonzola and bacon, and a tomato bisque. We checked out the Apple Store (Cyndi’s Anthropologie was already closed) and went to the Eddie Bauer’s, where Jack found a $24 headlamp on sale for $9. He got one with his birthday money (he took the wallet Ariel gave him for his birthday) and Ry got one, too, from his leftover birthday money. That was about it for our Friday night.

Saturday morning I attacked the garage and the yard, cleaning and reorganizing and pruning and weeding and even fertilizing. A lot of things have been neglected this summer. The boys loved it because they could play outside in the front yard all morning. After a small lunch, we headed down to Belen. Bennie’s doing much better. He still can’t walk, but you can see noticeable movement where there was none before, and I’m guessing there’s much less pain. We loaded up his ipod shuffle with a book on tape we got from the library (I’m going to load it on mine for the car trip to California) and grilled some brauts and hot dogs for supper. The boys got to ride some more.

Bennie and I talked a long time. He told me about going to California when he was 15 and living in Santa Monica with a friend who didn’t know how to cook. He had to go to school one day a week in Glendale, and he worked in a plant doing finishing assembly on B24s. I asked him when he first met Ursula. It was just before and after that time, but they hardly talked. He talked about the long hours he and Ursula spent upholstering in a shop smaller than his den. He told me a little about his brothers and sisters and the war. He told me about buying the movie theater that’s now his store. The building is over a hundred years old, and it was once the American Legion building where they held dances. The theater owners were asking something like $30K and sold it to him for $9K, but it took a lot of loans from family, friends and neighbors, many of whom agreed to co-sign the loans even though no-one had any collateral. He sold off the seats, seat by seat. People bought them to use outside their homes in Belen. He used the lumber from the raised floor to build a loft for more inventory.

It reminded me that I should write down the story my dad told me one lunch in a Salinas restaurant. It’s a classic story I tell: how he described himself as something of an underachiever in the Jesuit high school he went to and then worked for the American Can Company; how he and his friend went down to Chicago and enlisted in the Army; how his father was disappointed; how he went to Korea and met a guy there who liked to talk about how he was going to be a dentist, and my dad thought, well, if this guy can do that, I can do that; how he got accepted to Marquette (I think I remember another story how his dad, my grandpa, went with him to apply) and he studied hard and achieved top grades, got accepted to dental school in three years and started the program before ever completing his bachelor’s. Well, that’s one story.

On Sunday morning, Rylee and I went to the grocery store. I think Jackson stayed behind to do some crafts projects he designed on his own. We cooked up some bacon and eggs and cinnamon buns. The boys rode again in the front. (They can only go to the next driveway and back.) Then the dreaded shower and church. I took the boys to the children’s eulogy. Jackson has such a negative attitude about the whole church thing…except for the donuts afterwards, of course. I thought taking them to the children’s eulogy downstairs during mass might help. Maybe it will. I doubt any fellow churchgoers are reading this, so I can report that the children’s eulogy isn’t very interesting for the children attending it. The material and commentary are way over their heads, not to mention all over the place. Maybe it’s worthwhile if the boys learn a little church manners and etiquette. There isn’t much interaction among the children, which is what Jackson would love. The one thing I think is interesting is the few moments the children raise their hands to give intentions for prayer: an ill grandparent, a friend who broke their arm, a trip somewhere, a missing cat.

After the donuts, we went to the Explora museum near Old Town. That’s a good place and it was very popular, but not too crowded, on Sunday. The exhibits are fun and well-designed and constructed, and the boys can move at their own pace from station to station. There’s a puzzle café, a bubble pool, and a marble maze that were especially fun. A pretty top quality place. We spent a little over an hour there, and then had lunch at the Slate Street Café, a relatively new place near the courthouses downtown. I think I’d call it “creative comfort food.” Cyndi and I split a really nice fish and chips, with homemade chips and batter-fried salmon, served in a open paper bag. I also ordered a corn chowder, because I love a good corn chowder. The boys got a grilled cheese. It wasn’t on the menu, but the cooks graciously made one. The bill was quite reasonable for a nice Sunday lunch. It seemed like a good place for an evening beer and wine in the loft, and it had an outside patio, too. Locally owned, it’s not far from the Marble Brewery, another new place on the north side of Lomas downtown.

At this moment, I’m having trouble remembering what we did the rest of the day and it’s time to move on. The boys have played in the pools, Lauren and Nicholas have left already, and we’re ready to go.

P.S. I heard from Ariel as she was returning on the train. She sounded happy, and maybe a little anxious about starting a new life there, figuring out where everything will fit in. Later that night, the Albuquerque families got together, and the cousins played magnificently together, with a lot less shrieking, whining, and hurt feelings. The four boys played football in the grass for a while, which Loren opted out of. Ry skateboarded with Brendan, of course, making his first attempts at an ollie on the back porch. It's quite a thing to watch him kick and step on the the board with so much confidence, and I can imagine him in a skate park much sooner than later. Don told a story about how Jackson is helping Nicholas, his cousin, at school. I guess Nicholas has been telling Don how Jackson is showing him around and including him in things on the playground. It's Nicholas's first year there, and from what I hear he's really enjoying his new school and appreciates seeing his cousin there. The cousins are in different grades and don't share the same recess time, so I gather it must be before school that they can be together. Don mentioned that it was good to see all of the children growing up to be such good cousins to each other. I was proud of Jackson when I heard the story. He's going through a stage when sometimes he'll be mad and say harsh words and tease Ry (tho Ry is not afraid to fight back), but both of them are such sweet boys who show a lot of affection and appreciation. Bennie remarked again this weekend how good Jack's pronunciation of Spanish is.

it's fall, almost

School has begun and a new rhythm. Jackson is into his second week. We met his teacher last night at curriculum night, and the night before, after school and piano lessons, we went to a cub scout meeting with the idea to join a den. Rylee's second day of school is tomorrow. He drew pictures of bicycles and skateboards on his first day. Cyndi says Jack is also interested in a chess club at school, and we mean to get Ry into a YMCA sports program. Ariel is almost a week into NYC, hanging pictures in her room today when I called her. Some transition as she moves in and another roommate arrives very soon. Classes begin next week, but she is doing a workshop now to become familiar with the technology. Normally, we would be thinking about Dixon apples in a couple of weeks but Nana says there will be lots in California when we go for the wedding. The State Fair is around the corner, the Fiesta in Santa Fe, too, and then the Balloon Fiesta will be here before we know it. Already there is the great smell of green chiles roasting around the city (a sure sign of the season changing) and noticeably more produce, including the sweet corn from Moriarty. We may get some rain, judging from the darkening sky and the wind in the trees.