I just got back from a Track Meet. Well, I drove to the meet and waited in the car for nearly 2 hours. I watched the meet from my car because it was close to the field events and I could watch the track events through the chain link fence. I refused to pay $10.00 for John and I to simply cross the other side of a string of event flags to watch Sam heave heavy metal objects through the air. Those aren't chickens you hear, "cheap, cheap, cheap."

Sam loves to throw the discus. This is all he likes to do in track and field...throw the metal frisbee. This year he has to launch the shot put. He hates that and won't practice, but the discus; whole different story. I don't get it. I watch him spin around a couple of times and lob that thing about 130 feet and then do it again a couple more times. Once I watched him disqualify on a throw and almost wipe out 30 spectators. Now that was interesting.

I love the little interesting things that make us all different. I work with youth all day every day and for more fun I live with them too making this a 24/7 type of existence. I love the youth. I hated being one but I surely enjoy being with them (usually). I like their exhuberance and enthusiasm. I love the sure way they move, their bodies fresh and vibrant not bent up by the arthritis waiting right around the corner. I love the swing in their step and the smiles they unwittingly smile because life is good. They don't even know that's why they are smiling.

I especially love the "troubled" ones. Those who don't smile as much. Those with weird clothes and hair that dares you to find their faces. They probably touch me more because their story is usually more poignant and difficult. They are the victims of bad choices and usually those choices are not their choices. They are the unsuspecting recepients of consequences from their parent's poor choices. All to soon it seems those choices become their own.

I love those kids the most because I know that sometimes I'm probably the only one who even tries to say something pleasant to them. I try to let them know they are valuable. I try to enjoy them and believe me this is a trial sometimes but they are in sad situations. Sometimes it seems very unfair.

This is what I thought about today while my son, full of vigor and muscley arms threw his little metal frisbee. This is what I thought about as the lovely young people ran vigorously around the track with swift and expensive track shoes and loving parents and friends cheering them on. This is what my mind "chewed on" as I watch the groups laugh and prepare the for next event. I thought about those who don't have it quite as good right now....I hope I can cheer them on.

Well, I've got issues and if you've known me for more than 5 minutes this has been evident from the onset of our acquaintence.

You know I read "Twilight" during my short bout with pink-eye. You also are aware that I have a reading issue...I can't stop. So, I read "Twilight" on Thursday, the second in the series on Friday (I gave the first two to Reilly and I can't remember the actual title), began "Eclipse" on Friday, finished early Saturday morning, and began the final book "Breaking Dawn" on Saturday afternoon and finished in the wee hours of Monday morning. I fell off the wagon...I couldn't stop.

Mind you, this read-a-thon was was not because these books are particulary great literature. Okay, they grab you but let's say you aren't going to increase your vocabulary any by reading them. I loved them because I just wanted to know what happened next. They weren't deep, or I didn't think so but I JUST HAD TO KNOW WHAT WAS NEXT.

I think it was a great way for me to get away and live another life while still being on the premises to break up any fights. Sometimes you just have to take a break. But now that I'm back to reality I wish I would have read them slower. Two words - home disaster.

Oh well, every bit of junk around here is infinitely patient and will wait, eons if necessary, for me to take care of it. Ah, if only the family was as patient.

Good night I have get some serious sleep to make up for the tomfoolery of reading all weekend.

So...I guess a little illness isn't all that bad

We are going through some sort of germ warfare around here and lately the germs are winning. Reilly started it before she left on her trip, t hen John, then Sam and today me too...pink-eye. Who woulda thought.

It was Jay's second day home with whatever it is he has going on. I'm going to use this line as a segue to something else I've thought about the last few days. My kids are wonderfully loveable when they are ill; something that increases incrementally with with rising of the thermometer. Not that I like them ill (and this does not come into effect when it is a vomiting illness, no way) but that wildly on the go, hyperactive, semi-in-your-face behavior melts into the "I'll just lay here and let you rub my back and read to me" sort of behavior. It is sweet though short-lived.

At any rate, conjunctivits, thankfully, we have a little, teeny, tiny bottle of terrifically expensive drops from a previous round. So I just called in to my wonderful principal, seriously a considerate and helpful man, put the drops in and grabbed a book. It was a little difficult the first few hours when my eyes really did hurt but as time wore on I either noticed it less or it dissapated.

The book I started was "Twilight". I think every girl in the high school has read this book which honestly, made me a little circumspect about reading it since the quality of the books they read leave a lot to be imagined. Nonetheless, I thought, the author's LDS how bad could it be? I was hooked by the introduction and read the whole thing right through...about 4.5 hours later; I'm hooked. I want to read them all but this can't happen until Spring Break because I have a reading issue. When I read, the world as I know it ceases to exist, time stands still or runs on without me and the home starts to implode. For this very reason I've nearly given up recreational reading except during breaks. I need a 12 step program for bibliophiles...seriously, not a joke. My home is a regular library since once a book enters I cannot let it leave...sort of like foster care for literature. They are my little friends and I rarely part with them.

I think my behavior has made a poor impression on my children only Jay is a pathological reader. Will and Sam did before they discovered entertainment via video, Reilly never liked to sit still long enough to read more than the thinnest tome. I'm convinced it is similar to the children of alcoholics who swear off alcoholic libation for life because the impact on their lives.

Ah, to love a book.