Benjamin Penguin

I’m still trying to get them.

Historically, this is always a busy time for me. All grant applications are generally due between the end of August to the end of October. So we’ve been writing frantically for weeks now in an effort to fund myself and another employee. The prospect of being able to eat and live in homes far overshadows the exhausting, stressful, time-consuming work that is the fall grants season. It will repeat itself in the spring. Plus, historically, my classes have been in full swing about this time and so I am in the thick of balancing work and school.

I was SUPPOSED to be going to DC this weekend to represent in the March for Equality. But the combination of grants season, school and not seeing my wee boychild very much during the course of the recent move – oh, and the move and subsequent slow unpacking – has conspired against me. It was a case of bad timing more than anything else, though I optimistically assumed that I could swing it when I first agreed to do it with my mother, aunt and auntie uncle. I’ll make the effort, instead, to tear away for a little bit this weekend to stand-in at the Chicago version of the march and think fondly of the awesome ladies holding a place for me in DC. Ladies – I am sad and sorry that I have to miss it! And I demand pictures.

Benjamin is doing well in the new place now. I think he realizes that this is not just a hotel room but actually our new place of residence. We had some backsliding on the pacifier use, but it’s hard to withhold a tried and true comfort item during a stressful transition. We’ll try again to pack away the pacifiers once we are truly settled in and everything starts to hum with a more recognizable normalcy. I understand his request – I myself have been indulging in the great comfort food of peanut butter for the past few weeks, a sure sign that I’m needing a little stress relief myself. I think I’ve eaten it every day for breakfast for the past 15 days.

We’re all settling in more and more and finding that the place feels more like home every day. The traffic – though still a nightmare – has become bearable through my use of audiobooks. I’ve gone through one already and just started another today. It’s actually a rather nice chunk of time to myself and I’ve always been able to whittle away the hours with a good book in my hands. Errrr… in this case, a good book being read into my ears.

That’s about all I am going to say about that right now.

Yeah, me neither. Do I have to trot out the same excuses again? OK, OK. Here goes.

Back in school? Check.

Working five days a week? Check.

Active child on the go? Check.

Time for internetin’?  <crickets chirping>

I am going to try, try, try to schedule in time to write the monthly letter, some varied posts and upload a bunch of pictures. I’m thinking I can do it if I can convince the universe that 26 hour days have a much nicer feel to them.

But, a short recap til then.

• Wedding was wonderful and Adam and I had a great time.
• Ben got to meet some family members that he had not met before and seemed to enjoy both the cat-in-residence and the very spacious kitchen. Point taken, little boy. Point taken.
• I am thinking of bicycling with Ben. I think he might like that.

Even if I didn’t have anything to say. I can always think of something Ben-related to talk about. Unless I am crazy tired. Which I am. We are trying to move and shake things at work and it’s taking a lot of my energy. But… snore! That’s boring.

This weekend I am going to be leaving town for a wedding. I am very excited to attend and am looking forward to seeing my cousin look wonderful. This weekend also marks the longest I’ll have been away from Ben without seeing him. I’ll be leaving Friday afternoon right from work and won’t see him again until Sunday morning. Since this has been a hectic week, I’ve not had as much time with him as I’d have liked, so I actually feel like I have not been around him in quite awhile. I’ll have to make up for it on Monday and spend lots of quality time with him. The interesting thing is that I think he holds little toddler grudges when he doesn’t see someone a lot, so I am not sure what to expect at the end of this weekend. On days when Adam is really busy and I am watching Ben, he has a tendency to stick to me and not interact with Adam as much throughout the day. Vice versa if I am the busy one. I think he’s smart enough to want to make us suffer for the indignity of not spending time with him. One has to approach him slowly and let him warm up to you before you can scoop him up into a massive hug and cuddle or else he will yell at you. One time I picked him up right when I got home from work after a longer day and he declared “No, Mama!” It’s really good for stoking the hot fire of maternal guilt.

I’m not doing a very good job of balancing my schedule just yet. I hope it all comes together soon. I’m feeling a little bit tossed about from one thing to another as of late.

It seems like, every few weeks or so, I have to reevaluate my ideas of what a day will proceed like. Just when I think I’ve got a handle on how things will be, something up and changes and I have to redo my thinking and my admittedly half-assed preplanning all over again. Most times, the change is never really anything all that big. School is ending and I need to put in four weeks of hell work. A big project is coming to a close at work, so the next two weeks will be brutal. Ben is desiring a nice jog around the world instead of a leisurely stroll. But even though the things seem small, they disrupt the days in large ways. Isn’t there that saying in chaos theory stating that when a butterfly flaps its little papery-thin wings somewhere, it can trigger a tornado halfway across the world? Yeah, it feels something like that.

So I’ve been getting tossed about the past few weeks trying to settle into the new “summer normal.” I have more time, which is great. This means more time to spend outside, more time with Ben and Adam, more time to travel and read books and enjoy myself. I still have to figure out a way to balance it with work and that dissertation proposal that isn’t going to write itself, no matter how much I bribe it with costume jewelry and ply it with cheap wine. But it’s good. These are nice things to have to wrestle with. Even in my most stressed moments, I know that these stressors are small in the grand scheme of things and I’d like to think this keeps me both humble and sane.

So, I’ll be returning to posting pics and posts with more frequency in the upcoming days and weeks once the swell of disarray seems to have settled down again.