Apparently if I'm not alone in a hotel room I'm less likely to blog. Living my life as I usually do in a furious rush to not screw up a deadline or have overdue library books or have someone run out of clean underwear (and usually failing in at least one direction). Sometimes there are so many simultaneous lists happening I have to make a list of the lists. Today I am having a leisurely morning on the couch, Amos is at a sleepover, Dane went to buy gold clubs, and I'm looking at a DVD of casting, 6 to 9 year olds. Always a heartbreaking process. Some of them have the most luminous eyes - what is that? Lack of fear? Or fear? That makes the pupils dilate to planet-sized proportions?
Last night we met friends from NYC at The Shady Maple Smorgasbord. BUSLOADS of people were lined up outside. It's a Las-Vegas-hotel sized building smack in the middle of manure-smelling Lancaster county farm country, buggies lined up at the side, and vast steaming buffets lined up inside. All the "shleck" you can pile on your plate. Very few anorexic-looking people there. Overheard a conversation about how hard it is to find a job when you have a record. "Half the people in the country have a record. How can you get reformed if no one will hire you?" the guy (neck tattoos) asked. Well, I can think of one suggestion...
That was after a funfilled afternoon at Orion's birthday party where Autumn and Rory had the brilliant idea of hiring (well, borrowing from Rory's work) a white, stretch LIMO to pick up all the seven-year-olds and cruise them back to the party. I got elected to be the backseat chaperone. It was like being caught inside a squirrel cage. But louder. They loved it. So did I actually. And thankfully no one got carsick. And Orion had an EXCELLENT "O"val- racetrack-shaped bday cake. And his mom and dad even had enough energy left over to have Amos overnight????
Yesterday got the sad news our friend Eileen died. HIV positive and HepC, her liver gave out. She was in her 40s. Two of the last things she did: gave Vikki twenty bucks from her wallet ("I'm not gonna need it, and it costs gas to get here...") and made Vikki find Betty's phone number she had written down, so that she could remind Liz to use it and call her sponsor. She was (at this point in her life) really the essence of love and recovery. The girls at Rosie's are going to miss her. So are we all. She used to bring the girls over here periodically to bounce on the trampoline... we'll bounce for ya, Eileen.
Off to LA tonight: Sunset Marquis. Charging up the phone, camea and 'puter. Oh boy. And then back for alpaca baby season and show season, and end of Delaware school year.
