Lots of Living Will Be Required

They are all adorable but mine is the best one.

This week's slate had two chorus performances (Laura's and Hank's), two class parties, two doctor's appointments (mine), and all the swim practice we could cram in. Plus lots of driving, cooking, trying, caring, and giving a damn. No more than anybody else is doing.  Just the usual stuff.  I really enjoy all the kid-holiday-running around stuff, even when the room mom of Laura's class sends me the following email:

Thank you for taking care of the paper products for the Winter Holiday Party for Ms. D’s class.  Please make sure the products are holiday themed and please have enough plates/naps for both the pizza and cookie decorating. 

Oh! You want the holiday party paper products to be holiday themed! Wait, so the NASCAR-themed plates I have left over from our wedding wouldn't be appropriate? And by "please have enough," you mean that every child should have plates and napkins?  In other words, please remember to DO WHAT I SAID I WOULD DO? Take a chill, room mom. I got this.

And, as Carrie said on Twitter, God forbid the little darlings should have to wipe frosting off their chins with plain napkins.  But I love all of it.

Here's Hank's preschool Christmas program.  He is the middle row, fifth from the right. Unlike last year, Hank sang every song and seemed to know the words. The whole thing was totally charming.  The program was in the chapel of the preschool's church. I snapped a pic before any of the kids came in because I really admired their decorations.  Simple and striking.  Those white cut-out banners are a pretty touch.

Processing into the chapel, needing a haircut.

Matt and I left straight from Hank's show and went to my oncologist's office.  I hadn't seen her since before I had my radiation, so it was necessary to touch base with her.  Everything was totally fine, but I told her that I was having a some anxious feelings and imagining that every ache and pain was a disease recurrence.  Then I detailed a few aches and pains for her.  She told me to chill and that this is to be expected, especially given that I'm finished with all the treatment now and trying to get back to a new normal.

I told her that I just needed some strategies for dealing with uncertainty, even though the odds are very, very in my favor, and she said that the best thing for us all is to just come to terms with our mortality.  Yes, she said that.  I laughed, it wasn't what I wanted to hear, even though I know it's true.

Matt and I remarked later that it reminded us of that joke:

A man goes to the doctor, and the doctor tells him that he is very sick.  The man asks whether there is anything for him to do, surely there must be something?  The doctor says, well, you could go to the spa and get a mudbath.  The man said, "Oh, you think that will help?"  The doctor says, "No, but you should get used to dirt."

So that was a good visit, I guess.  Let me repeat that everything is fine and the only thing in peril is my cognitive framework. You know how it goes.  And tomorrow is the honey-bunny gynecologist.

Then I went out in the freezing rain, only I didn't know it was freezing yet, and bought supplies for a craft I was supposed to do with Hank's class party today.  By the time Matt and I went to bed last night, having sipped the last cocktail, karaoked the last Christmas song, and chatted the last chat, they had closed the schools (and Hank's preschool), thus rendering my craft efforts moot, but not before I had given twenty wooden craft sticks two coats of tempera paint, glued magnets to the back of them, and cut out twenty tiny felt stovepipe hats.

But I love all of it, I really do.

Please have a nice evening and use caution when moving about on the roadways. xoxox-B