Cleaning is hard

I cleaned 14 years of road dirt out of the tent trailer today. So. Tired. But it looks good. Then I closed it up. It's not the last time--we'll open it up again to give our friends who are buying it a setup/takedown lesson--but it was the last time with it as *ours*. Bittersweet.

BUT that gets us one big step closer to moving it out of the back yard and moving the new trailer in. We pick up the new one tomorrow!!

After cleaning, I took Rigby to the vet for her annual exam and vaccinations. I've also (today and previously) stocked up on food, flea meds, and kitty toothpaste, so she is cleared for launch! I'm really hoping she'll immediately find the new trailer homey and more secure than she found the tent trailer. (Have I mentioned it has walls?!) I trust she'll adapt in any case. What choice does she have?

I was going to wash the exterior of the tent trailer tonight (we have light until 9:30 these days), but I am beat. ¡Mañana!

Instead, I vacuumed out the basement bedroom, which we have been readying for our summer guest, Koyo. He's a student here and a friend of Frank's from Kendo. He'll stay with us for two months, starting next week, until he moves to his new school in North Dakota (brrr). I'm nervous about having someone in our space again, especially given how busy this summer is, but he's extremely nice and Frank and I are both really looking forward to learning more about Nihon.

And now I'm drinking some of the beer our bandmates left as tribute and pondering all the goodness of the weeks ahead, god willing and the creek don't rise.

Do you really want to be that guy?

We all have our preferences. Frank hates finding electronics left on in an empty room. I hate reaching for the scissors only to discover that whoever used them last didn't put them away.

When I was growing up, it often seemed that our house revolved around the preferences of my former stepfather. We weren't to have snacks after school for fear of spoiling our dinner, even though lunch had been several hours before. My mother was not to drive us to school because it would do us good to walk. The primary result of his tyranny was a lot of quiet rebellion: Mom drove us to school anyway (despite his occasionally spying on her to "catch her" doing it!), and my sister and I had snacks anyway.

The secondary result was that we all lived in fear of his anger. He was that guy, the one whose family dreaded his arrival home from work, the one whose family was quietly relieved when he went away again.

I think a lot of families have a guy like that. I have been that guy, and I don't mean before unschooling. Up until a couple years ago, I was going into work every day and then arriving home to whatever state the house was in. My unschooling readers—especially the working parents among my unschooling readers, and doubly especially my mom who occasionally drops by my house—can understand what it's like to walk into an unschooling house at some random moment. To the untrained eye, it's chaotic. To the trained eye—meaning the eye of a person like me who knows that life and learning are messy...

It's still chaotic.

There is a rhythm to an unschooling day, but you kind of have to be in it to see it. When I'm in the house with her, I know that Chloe's pile of notebooks is spread across the couch while she herself is painting at the kitchen table because something she discovered or thought of while working in those notebooks inspired her, and she rode that inspiration straight to her easel. Or maybe she was writing and needed to look something up on the Internet, and then she got drawn into a really fun Facebook conversation with her friends (socialization!).

When I'm home with her, I understand how this happens. I see the sparks. I hear her peals of laughter from the computer, or I see a painting in progress and hear her animated descriptions of her vision. And I know that she knows the notebooks are there, and I know she has every intention of getting back to them. It all makes sense. There's no chaos. The abandoned-for-the-moment notebooks are part of the rhythm. Do I know there might come a time when I need to ask her to clear the couch so we can sit down? Sure. But there's typically no urgency around that awareness.

When I'm working away from home, it's easy to forget all that. It's easy to walk in the front door and see

M E S S

"Come on, guys," I whine or snarl (depending on how tired I am). "Can you clean up a little, please?"

What changes for my family is the insertion of that guy into their happy unschooling rhythm. I become the random moment at which they must interrupt their flow and take care of MY needs.

In a little more than a week, I am starting a new job that will take me out of the house again. This post is my statement of intention to not return to being that guy. I am resolved to enter my home as if I'm an explorer, one who has every expectation of discovering all the wonder and creativity and unique joy that I missed while I was away.

The [Big] Doings Report

Last I heard, Frank and Chloe and MJ are all doing NaNoWriMo. I have been writing some fiction, and I think I'm going to characterize it that way so it stays fun.

Work has been somewhat intense recently, but I've been really pleased with the work I'm doing. I'm making a significant contribution. (Yeah, yeah, it'll all be obsolete in a year, but if people in the computer industry were to think about that for too long, there might not be a computer industry.)

Chloe went to Corvallis for Halloween, where much fun was had by all.

Qacei and Chloe in Corvallis
Photo credit: Mary Gold

Chloe got home yesterday and promptly announced that she wants to go back in less than two weeks for another costume event: the premiere of Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows, Part 1. Ah, well, it's her money.

MJ and Sean and Anders and Jamie were here for Halloween. They came up for a big camper Halloween party in Seattle, and spent Halloween day with cardboard and spraypaint and makeup. I was a bad mom/hostess and didn't get photos of them in their costumes. Sean and Anders were skyscrapers, and Jamie was a airplane. MJ was very scary.

MJ De Vil
Photo credit: Pat Punteney

And the big news is...

MJ and Sean are engaged!

Photo credit: Lynelle Wilcox

MJ has a lovely engagement ring (which I also failed to photograph) and seems really, really happy. (In fact, I had commented on her happiness before she showed me the ring.) They are only barely thinking about wedding planning at this point. MJ says it will probably not take place for a couple of years.

But that hasn't stopped me from thinking about shopping for wedding dresses... Heh heh heh.

Life's unexpected little twists and turns

I blame unschooling. It's not rational, but I do it anyway. I know intellectually that life was as unpredictable in the time before unschooling as it is now, and I know intellectually that many of the things that surprise me in life are completely unrelated to unschooling. But damn! There sure seem to be a lot of them.

I guess I could instead blame teenagers. It's hardly original—people in our society blame teenagers for a lot—but it's handy. And doing that is at least somewhat grounded in reality, since my teenagers' idea of making a plan often involves a last-minute phone call.

But really, life just happens, with or without unschooling and with or without teenagers.

MJ has been home for oral surgery and ortho appointments. She went home today, which was supposed to mark the actual beginning of our trial empty nest phase. And it does, except that our trial is going to last all of three days. Chloe is coming home. Her host/boss has a family emergency that requires travel, so she isn't going to need Chloe for an indefinite time period.

We're happy to be getting Chloe back, of course, but something about these sudden changes of plans is just hard for me. Have they always been, or am I just weary right now? Who knows, except maybe my mom.

As for Chloe, she seems to be taking it in stride and is excitedly making new and different but typically nebulous, teenager-style plans for fun stuff to do once she's home.

And life goes on.

Morning musings

I've been doing morning pages again after a couple months without. I really love it. The idea is to write three pages longhand. Today, I went on to a fourth page, and WOW! Some really good insights.

Remember that little meme I did a couple days ago, where I looked up an old blog post and it supposedly revealed my true nature? Well, it hit me this morning that it worked! My true nature is to report. And that is why I love blogging, Facebook, Twitter, morning pages, journaling, writing, writing, writing. Oh, yeah, and talking. And speaking to an audience.

I also realized one of my own deepest fears, but I just tried to report on that, and no, it's private at this point.

Anyway, morning pages are great!

As I continue musing and reporting, I'm sipping my breakfast green smoothie. Lots of strawberries in this one (because they're starting to turn), and it is really yummy. So, the Increasing Raw Diet continues. Hmm. Diet in the sense of "what I eat." I'm not dieting in the sense of "trying to lose weight." Although of course I won't complain if that happens. :-)

The most surprising thing about the changes I'm making is that it's totally easy. I don't crave anything, I never have to go hungry, and I'm not missing the things I've stopped eating because if I want them, I eat them. What's remarkable is how little I want them. Carbs, for instance. I've gone from carb-junkie to carb-take-them-or-leave-them in a week, with no suffering whatsoever. And junk food? It doesn't taste very good to me anymore. I have a bite or two and I'm done.

In other words, eating healthier feeds itself. My body likes it. The stuff that's good for me has begun to give me the same high as (or better than) the other stuff.

I finished up my contract with the HealthVault team yesterday. I'm a bit sad; it was an interesting product to work on. But today I return to the Retail team, my old stomping grounds, and will have lots of friends and familiarity to enjoy.

Frank's efforts on the housepainting continue now that the rain has stopped/paused. We have our fingers crossed for a sunny September.

Texts from last night

...and the rest of yesterday, which was our 20th anniversary.

7:43 a.m. Dropped off the camper and now questing for pancakes with her hubby of TWENTY years
MJ got to NBTSC with her Oregon roomie, Sean, but Chloe still had to do the dawn train run. Then Frank and I went for breakfast at IHOP, using our Seahawks ticket stubs to get free short stacks.

10:54 a.m. Jamming at the EMP
Despite being locals who have a lot of out-of-town visitors, Frank and I had never been to the Experience Music Project. It was very cool, especially the guitar gallery, which is worth the price of admission all by itself. They have a lab where you can play instruments and sing; we spent a fair amount of time in there.

12:39 p.m. Seriously tempted by Firefly action figures and an Alien lunchbox at the Sci-Fi Museum store.
Admission to EMP also gets you into the adjacent Science Fiction Museum and Hall of Fame. It was so fun! It was also entertaining to see how much of their collection is on loan from Paul Allen. The dude knows how to spend his money! No Firefly, Galactica, or Back to the Future materials on display, which struck us as odd. But they did have Firefly gear at the store. I resisted. Barely.

1:22 p.m. Checked into our hotel room! View of Sound, islands, ferries, Pike Place Market. Awesome sauce!
Part 1 of Frank's surprise. I used hotel points to get us a room at the Red Lion downtown. We were on the top (20th) floor with a spectacular view of a spectacular day on Puget Sound. Sailboats, parasailers, shipping traffic, and ferries on the water. Planes and helicopters of all shapes and sizes in the air. Busy tourists down on the street. Loved it!

1:51 p.m. Hey, Frank brought the wine!
Frank surprised me with a nice bottle of Merlot (my favorite). We ordered up a room-service snack and spent a blissful couple of hours eating, sipping wine, and watching the world go by.

7:28 p.m. Napped to recover from an early wakeup and a bottle of red. Now at Ruth's Chris for free dinner.
Part 2 of Frank's surprise: I used credit-card points to get gift certificates to Ruth's Chris Steak House, far and away the best place to get a really good steak but with prices that are usually out of our reach. Not last night! Although we did go over and a bit, so it wasn't purely free: we had to supplement the tip with $3 cash...

We had crab cocktail in remoulade sauce, steak, lobster, beautifully prepared asparagus and broccoli, and bread pudding dessert. Everything was SO yummy.

We realized after dinner that we were sipping our complementary anniversary champagne at about the exact moment of our anniversary. Nice!

9:49 p.m. Watching the lights and the nightlife (yes, Seattle has some). This day has been everything I hoped for.
After a lovely post-prandial stroll through the bustling city streets, we settled back in front of the window. It was a wonderful day, and a wonderful way to commemorate twenty years with my wonderful man.

Here's to the next 20!

The Doings Report

Ah, Sunday. We are basking (suffering) in a bit of a heat wave. It hit 90 today and is forecast to be "much warmer" tomorrow. How will we ever survive????

Perhaps by imagining what it would be like tomorrow if we were in the south or southwest. :-)

Chloe is visiting friends in Victoria, BC, for a few days. They have two kids, a girl not quite 2 and a boy not quite 5. Her visit is sort of a job interview, or maybe a mutual interview. If all parties are amenable, she will be their au pair for an undetermined while. Chloe wrote her own (very business-like) emails, made her own arrangements, rode the ferry and went through customs alone, et cetera. (Does anybody know where Chloe learned to write with a formal tone? Sometimes—oftentimes—unschooling amazes even me.)

If all parties are amenable, Frank and I will have an empty nest for a while. Jeezum Pete.

My sister is in town. We had a family gathering today, and I got to visit a bit with her and her family. Loved it!

We are also enjoying a visit from MJ, who came up for the aforementioned gathering and for an orthodontic appointment. She likes it here well enough, but she is glowingly happy in her new digs/life and will return there in the next couple of days.

Frank continues prepping two sides of our house for exterior paint. We settled on two sides as an achievable/adequate goal for this summer. We'll do the other two sides next summer. He has scraped and pressure washed and is now sanding. Then primer, then paint. Colors are either decided (if everyone goes along with my green-with-blue-trim preference) or under negotiation. You be the judge.

I continue working. It seems I will finish one contract on Aug. 31 and start the next on Sept. 1. Continuity is a good thing, but I am lately engaged in detailed fantasies of extended roadtrips. Perhaps something can be arranged, since I work from home mostly anyway. It's the "mostly" that's a stumbling block: "mostly" is not the same as "always."

The girls head to camp next week Tuesday with a hundred or so of their closest friends. Camp has been restructured from two one-week sessions to one two-week session, so they won't be home (Chloe to here and MJ to Salem) until after Labor Day. Judging by chatter here and on Facebook, they and the aforementioned friends are all extremely excited. Extremely. Excited. NBTSC is evidently heaven on earth, more fun than anything else (except perhaps a good year at LIFE is Good), but we parents can only imagine since we are not invited. *sigh*

After that, Chloe comes home or heads to Victoria, depending, and MJ heads to Chautauqua.

It's really a shame how isolated and overprotected unschoolers are. Poor, deprived children.

Also next Tuesday (a week from Tuesday) marks the 20th anniversary of my wedding to Frank. Yes, 20 years. Wowza. I have Big Plans for the day, but Frank has not been apprised of these, so I'm not telling. Yet.

Frank and I attended our first Seahawks game yesterday, a preseason battle with the Tennessee Titans. The game was fine, fun, blah blah blah, but the game viewing experience was, in a word, HOT. Our seats are on the sunny side of the stadium, which is a good thing come November but which makes for a bakefest on a summer evening. We sweated it out with about 25,000 fellow fans, watched the Hawks win, and left disgruntled because the Hawks took a knee instead of going for an easy field goal that would have netted each of us a short stack of pancakes at IHOP. Very bad coaching decision that, but I bet IHOP didn't suffer much since by game's end we were all craving pancakes.

Our next game is next Saturday evening. Frank and I are thinking of staying away until about 7:30, when the shade hits our seats.

For the sake of frugality/greed for other things, I'm going to put all of our regular season tickets up for sale. Whichever games don't sell, we'll attend. If any of you have a game you'd particularly like to go to, let me know; friends and family get good prices and first dibs.

I'm off now for a sunset walk. It is *beautiful* out there now, rosy and warm and a reminder of why we put up with the gray skies all winter. Summer in the northwest is how summer was meant to be.

True friends write your blog posts for you

Mary has posted photos of my tattooing and my tattoo here, and I've added a comment to the post about why I chose this tattoo.

Thanks to my amazing coaching team: Chloe, Qacei, Annie, and Mary.

The tattoo artist was Anji at High Priestess.

Moving Miss MJ

Evidently the doings of my life are not as obvious to everyone else as they are to me. Evidently I have been a bit obscure. Sorry, everyone! Here's the scoop:

MJ, our oldest, who will be 18 in September, is soon leaving on a big adventure: living elsewhere. She is packing up to move down to Salem, Oregon, where she will be living with her boyfriend, Sean, and his family. In true unschooler fashion, their plans are loose but include, among other things, the possibility of moving back into our house later.

So, Moving Day #1 will take place within a week or two.

Frank and Chloe and I are still figuring out what this means for us for the time she is gone. We will have a dedicated guestroom for a while, that's for sure, so let us know if you want to come visit. :-)

My emotions are mixed, as I'm sure you can imagine. I can tell you that this feels nothing like I imagined it would when she was little. I expected to be terribly sad and lonely, and maybe I'll get there, but mostly I'm really calm about it. I like that she's starting out by living with a family and especially with people I like. I like that she'll be so close to families in Corvallis whom we count among our dearest friends. And I know she's ready. She's been ready for some time; if we'd had the financial resources, she and Chloe would have had their own apartment more than a year ago. So, this feels like a pretty natural transition, and I have the comfort of the possibility that she'll be back.

In the meantime, legally she remains our dependent, of course, and financially, she is. But she's taking the reins. She'll do her own budgeting and make her own plans and let us know what she needs.

And I'll try to keep you (better) posted on what this transition looks like.

The Doings Report

That LIFE is Good writeup is still coming. Maybe. But right now I just feel like rambling. Aimlessly. Without purpose. Maybe this won't even be a Doings Report but a Lack-of-Doings Report.

I think—and I squirm as I write this out of fear of angering the schedule gods—that we have a completely commitment-free weekend ahead. Holy loose ends, Batman!

I have a cold, one of two variants of the Conference Crud that are going around. Boy, did I get lucky, because the other one involves vomit. I'll take my annoyingly drippy nose any day.

MJ came home for one day and then went back to Oregon. I think her at-home time is less than her away time these days. So far I'm doing okay with this transition. I spoke to Cherie (my friend and former stepmother) on the phone today, and she pointed out that these separations are the natural result of raising independent kids. "We reap what we sow," I said. "Yes." And perhaps that is why I'm doing okay with this transition. For our kids to have the confidence and connections and motivation to build their own lives has been one of our goals all along.

Two of my very favorite authors (Julia Quinn and Lisa Kleypas) had book releases on my birthday. I bought the books and then went to LIFE is Good. Not much reading time there. So, I've spent some of my sickie time this week reading them and am very pleased with both.

New books always run out of pages too fast.

I am still processing my LiG talk. I think it went well, but I am too close to it to know for sure. I wish I could have filmed the audience while I delivered it so that (now that I am out of the semi-fugue state I enter when I'm speaking publicly) I could go back and check out reactions.

I had a big deadline before LiG. Deadline, LiG, Conference Crud. That's my last few weeks in a nutshell.

I am thinking about writing a novel. I am often thinking about writing a novel. In fact, in my years on this planet, I have done WAY more thinking about writing a novel than actual writing of said novel. But there are intriguing chapters tucked here and there. And one of these times when I think about writing a novel I know I will actually do it.

"I know I will actually do it." That is true, but I did not know it until I typed it. Interesting.

I made a bazillion friends at the conference. That is a slight exaggeration. But I did. The tribe just keeps on growing...

Speaking of which, unschooling is back in the news. Nightline (with Juju again, ick) and The View. I haven't been able to bring myself to watch the hatchet jobs clips. I want the media to forget they ever heard of unschooling. They are making the traditionalists nervous. That is never a good thing.

Fear is the mother of morality. ~ Nietzsche

Ja.

Done rambling. Auf Wiedersehen.

The Doings Report

A quiet evening for the Maier Krewe:

• Chloe is translating and diagramming Latin sentences. (Yes, really.) She has been taking walks to the library and coming home with interesting choices like "First Year Latin" and "A Global History of Architecture."
• MJ is spending the night at Grandma and Grandpa's because spending the weekend with them only whetted her appetite.
• Frank was watching TV, but Chloe and I kept talking to him too much so he switched to the Internet, which evidently allows for more multitasking.
• I have been cruising Facebook (where I have really been enjoying "May the Fourth Be With You" day) and the LIFE is Good Yahoo! group (which is quite lively three weeks out from the conference).

Umm... THREE WEEKS OUT FROM THE CONFERENCE?!?! Holy socks, I'd better get my talk written.

The Doings Report

One of my intentions for 2010 is to beware of extra.

Um, yeaaaah. FAIL.

In January, I started a new job. I also rehearsed (in another country) and played (in another state) a gig. This was a joy, but... Extra!

In February, we welcomed niece and new unschooler Emma into our daily routine. This is a continuing joy, but... Extra!

Also in February, I presented a little intro to meditation to my grandma and some of her friends. This was a joy and a real learning experience, but... Extra!

In March, my grandma was hospitalized with a badly broken shoulder. Not a joy. I began visiting her several times per week, and then moved in with her for a week in hopes of helping her transition back to independent living. Glad to do it, but... Extra!

Also in March, we traveled to that other country again for a 5Rhythms workshop and more rehearsal, celebrated Chloe's 16th birthday, and welcomed beloved houseguests. More joy, and more and more and more, but... Extra!

And now it is April. I spent the entire weekend at SakuraCon with MJ, Chloe, and Emma. MJ's boyfriend, Sean, is arriving for a visit. We're headed back to Canada for more rehearsal. There's a Non-Con to attend and several birthdays to observe. I'm thinking about enrolling in another meditation class. Oh, yes, and the @#^&%! taxes are due.

EX-FREAKING-TRA!

But I'm sure May will be different.

Things we're looking forward to

We're going to be busy, busy, busy in the next sixth months. But compared to last year? We're taking it easy!

1/23 — Heather's Non-non-con Birthday Potluck, featuring her special guest, The Coffee Goddess! Thank god, because (a) I shouldn't have to go a week without seeing other unschoolers, and (b) I'm almost out of coffee.

1/27 — "Meet Me in St. Louis" at the Village Theatre.

1/29 to 1/31 — Zenmomma's Non-Con and 50th Birthday Extravaganza, featuring The Greybeards! Sort of! (We have some talented guys standing in for beloved bandmates Alex, Jeff, and Marc, who couldn't make the trip up from California.)

1/31 to 2/7 or 2/8
- Chloe stays behind in Corvallis to hang out with the Golds. They'll bring her back to us eventually. I hope.
- A visit from Sean (17), except we probably won't get to see much of him because he and MJ will be dogsitting for Grandma.

2/26 — Naomi Aldort talk in Snohomish, and it looks like we might have a few (12?) unschooling houseguests that night who are traveling in to see her. Yay!

3/6 — Surprise birthday party for a friend who shall remain nameless even though I don't think this person reads my blog.

3/11 — Holy mother of god, Chloe turns 16.

3/24 — "Lost in Yonkers" at the Village Theatre.

4/1 to 4/4 — SakuraCon Anime Convention in downtown Seattle. I reserved a hotel room just in case we've won the lottery by then, but we'll probably commute.

4/24 or 4/25 — World Rhythm Festival at the Seattle Center.

4/27 — Frank's birthday.

5/15 or 5/16 — University of Washington Street Fair.

5/19 — "The Gypsy King" at the Village Theatre.

5/25 — My birthday.

5/26 to 6/1 — LIFE is Good 2010 (with extra days on either side for extra fun).

And in June, I get my teeth cleaned. Phew!

You know, once upon a time "taking it easy" meant something entirely different around here.

The Doings Report

MJ and I went up to Vancouver Island to visit Effie, Fergus, Craig, and Gillian for a couple of days. It was a lovely little retreat. We were in the midst of a cold (for us) snap, so our walks on the nature trail adjacent to their house were frosty and intriguing, with fabulous ice sculptures decorating the rocky areas and ice thick enough to stand on over some (but not all) of the ponds and puddles. But the best times were indoors, where we played games and talked and laughed and made concoctions and just generally bonded. Craig posted some photos here.

We got back to the mainland ferry dock to find the MR2 had a flat. MJ and I got the car jacked up and the lug nuts loosened (aka, the hard parts), and then a BC Ferries guy showed up to help. This was fine and nice of him except he was the type to lecture while he worked. "You know, you oughta..." I would have preferred to finish up myself and skip the lecture.

We had a pretty quiet week at home after that, doing a little Christmas shopping and I don't remember what else. Then we had baking day in anticipation of a cookie exchange at Randi and Kauleen's house. Frank and I continued north from there for Greybeards rehearsals at the Anguishes' house. It was really fun to see everybody, and I fell in love all over again with making music.

(In case you hadn't heard, a variant of the Greybeards are playing at Zenmomma's Non-Con and 50th Birthday Bash Extravaganza. Alex and Jeff and Marc can't make it up, so Scotty and future Greybeards Matteo and Chris are filling in. Should be a fun party!)

The border guards are beginning to take mild interest in the frequency with which we cross the border. "When was the last time you visited Canada?" they ask, I suppose to see if we evince any nervousness about replying. Should I have warned them we're probably going back up for more rehearsal in mid-January? :-)

While we were gone, MJ and Chloe had a party. Yes, we knew about it, and I made a point of letting our neighbors know we knew about it. Seems like it ended up more girls' sleepover than the dreaded wild teen party.

This week has been about finishing up the shopping. I'm really pleased with how much Christmas we've been able to squeeze out of our limited budget, but it means I have too much wrapping to do! At some point, I started a little tradition of providing my nieces and daughters with a couple of small gifts to help them survive the endless hours until the official gift-opening time Christmas Eve. We're up to eight girls now, so that tradition alone leads to a lot of wrapping. Oh, well, I love it anyway!

Our holiday letter

I am once again foregoing holiday cards. But here's the letter I would have included had I been sending them out, with the added bonus of links to more details.



"Let the unexpected changes of 2009 commence!"
Ronnie the Fate Tempter
January 9, 2009

Dear family and friends,

Holiday greetings from the Maier family! I'm sitting here, listening to the rain, thinking back over a challenging and amazing year and feeling glad so many of you were a part of it.

We started the year with both girls away from home, something that happens more and more as they get older, due in no small part to the fact that our unschooling lifestyle has led to our having friends all over the country. This time it was the Santa Cruz area, south of San Francisco, where they celebrated the arrival of the New Year at friend Harper's. Chloe (15) came home with bus-driver Frank soon after (he spent the interim sailing and having some alone time), but MJ (17) stayed forever, or so it felt to me at the time. She did some camping and learned to shoot large guns. Yes, really.

And then we hit a sad note with the death of Frank's dad, Marty. He had been pretty frail for a while and just sort of faded away, fortunately with all of his kids by his side. The girls and I joined Frank in New Orleans for the funeral, and Frank's brother Chuck's family came into town from Houston, too. It was a huge comfort to have the whole family together.

We got home and immediately (and I do mean immediately) learned that I had been laid off from my shiny new job at Microsoft. And thus we discovered that grief and stress really do not go well together.

Compared to those tough times, the rest of the year has been a lark!

After six years as an unschooler, Chloe decided to give the local high school a whirl. She took a variety of classes, ranging from guitar and drama to Algebra and science. It only took her a couple of weeks to get what she wanted out of the deal (mostly the assurance that (1) she can excel in school if she wants to, and (2) she hasn't been missing anything she cares about very much), but she chose to stay and complete the six-week grading period. Then, in true unschooler fashion, she promptly flew to Georgia to hang out with friends.

But before that, some other friends came to visit. This set a pattern for the year: we have had unschoolers here just about every month, and if we didn't, it was because we went to them. In fact, Frank and I just thought it through, and some number of us "went to them" in every month except February. We're ending the year in kind, with MJ and me just back from a visit to Vancouver Island and the girls planning to spend New Year's Eve in Salem, Oregon.

But we can stop anytime we want. Really.

It's been a big year for conferences. In April, a much-altered Chloe and I attended Sakura Con, Seattle's annual anime and manga convention. May brought our annual jaunt to Vancouver, Wash., for the LIFE is Good Unschooling Conference, and in September we traveled to the Good Vibrations Unschooling Conference in San Diego. Between the two conferences, I gave two speeches and hosted two funshops, and Frank sat on the Dads Panel in S.D., which all went well and was fun (at least after the fact), but the main high at these events is always the chance to connect with so many wonderful people who parent with joy and kindness. Not to mention the amazing kids they travel with!

We've also had several chances to connect with family this year, having hosted Frank's nephew Jerry, his wife, Cori, and their wonderful 3-year-old bundle of energy, Molly, for two weeks this summer, with Jerry's sister, Lori, and her husband, Bobby, in for a couple of (hot!) days at the end, all in advance of the big Maier Family Reunion in Manzanita. After that, my dad and his wife, Reneé, came for a too brief visit, sadly interrupted by my unfortunate need to complete a work contract.

And did I mention the unschooler party on Vancouver Island, or the numerous trips to Oregon, or MJ and Chloe's trip to South Carolina for another unschooler party? No? I must have been too tired!

As you can see, we've been very busy this year. It's probably a good thing I haven't been able to find much work; I wouldn't have known where to fit it in! Still, I'm very glad to report that it looks like I have a long-term contract lined up for the new year.

This is getting long, but how can I close without talking about the music... And the words (MJ completed NaNoWriMo). And the meditation. And the driver's license. And the babies (Gabriella, Rudy, Jackson, Ryan, Connor, and probably a couple more new friends all arrived in 2009). And then there's the college planning both girls are doing (MJ is thinking psychology and Chloe is thinking set design) and the hints we're getting about what the next several years might look like.

It's a lot, and it all adds up to a happy, healthy, busy life with more fun and adventure than we sometimes know what to do with. But that's not a bad thing to cope with, eh?

Wishing you all a happy, healthy, and not too busy holiday season and a New Year that is very fun and as adventurous as you would choose it to be!

Ronnie and the krewe

The Doings Report

Time flies. It's been two weeks since my last Doings Report. This means three things:

• My days and weeks are even more unstructured than I thought.
• Thanksgiving is in two and a half days.
• Christmas is really %*#(@# close.

But this is no time to panic!

We are really liking having an additional licensed driver in the house. MJ and Chloe get to go places, and Frank and I can stay home! Wow, wow, wow! They are no longer dependent on our energy and willingness, and we are guilt-free since they find going off on their own really fun! So far, we haven't had any car conflicts, but that might get a little trickier once I am back at work.

Which leads to that bit of news: It looks like I have a job. Nothing is finalized yet, but I hope to be returning to my old team for a longish-term writing project within the next couple of weeks. I have some mixed feelings, of course, because I LOVE being home with my family. But paychecks are good, too.

With their new freedom of the road, MJ and Chloe have been getting out and about some. They've done a little shopping, a little visiting of friends and family, and a little roadtripping. MJ has actually been up to Bellingham twice this week, once for an unschooler gathering at Village Books, and once with Chloe for a friend's music show at a coffeeshop. Due to some sort of mixup, the show didn't happen, but they had cocoa and a roadtrip together and it was all good.

The unschooler gathering MJ went to was notable because it was a visit with some women and their smaller children that was originally on my calendar. Then I came down with this cold and couldn't go. MJ decided to go up anyway, even though she expected to be the only teenager there. She had a good time and got to record her first solo roadtrip in her (imaginary) driving log.

Last night, the four of us went down to Seattle and had Thai food in Fremont. We met up with TJ, an unschooling dad from Vermont who has been here scouting out a new home for his family. His wife's brother Shane and Shane's girlfriend, Kalena, joined us. We missed Heather and the boys, but we had lots of good conversation and delicious food. It will be so nice having another unschooling family in the northwest fold!

MJ's NaNoWriMo effort continues. She announced this morning that she has to kill someone today. :-) Chloe has, I think, shifted her writing energy to the stage. She installed some script-writing software on the laptop, anyway! She's also been doing research into stage design. This included attending "Chasing Nicolette" at the Village Theatre with my grandma, and then returning on her own for a repeat performance. The set for the play is evidently pretty fascinating, being a rotating castle. She was thrilled at yesterday's performance when they experienced some technical difficulties with the set, and she got glimpses from her front-row seat of their busy repair efforts.

Frank has been writing, writing, writing. He's been blogging, beautifully, about things he's grateful for. I can't wait to see this Wednesday's effort! He's also been arguing a little politics and advocating a little unschooling, doing his part to make the world a better place. He's gaining quite a following in the unschooling community, something I find gratifying but he's not entirely comfortable with.

As for me, from one perspective, I have been doing next to nothing. From another, I have been learning a lot. It didn't really happen during our busy summer, but I think I've been discovering unschooling these last weeks, or at least deschooling. I read and read and read—a mix of fiction and non—and I watch a big variety of stuff on the television, and I look up all kinds of stuff on the Internet. I am aware of being idle, and a part of me (the schooled part?) is going, "DO SOMETHING," but I have never felt more engaged with my own brain. I think if I had more time without work demands I might move into the kind of creativity and activity that I see in my kids. Ah, well, maybe I can keep work from taking over too much.

Tom update: The radiation therapy is not agreeing with his guts at all. They have postponed his next round until his system settles down a bit. Please send him lots of "feel better" thoughts.

The Doings Report

Oh, where to start?

As mentioned previously, MJ is now a licensed driver. She is very excited, and we are already reaping the benefits: she gassed up the car and made a run to the library one day, and today she took herself off to the beach for a last-minute gathering there that Frank and I c/wouldn't muster the gumption to attend.

Papa Tom received a cancer diagnosis that was initially pretty scary, but the news since then has all been good. It hasn't spread to his organs and it is a slow mover, which means he can live with it for years and years. He'll have one round of radiation next week to kill a tumor on or near his spine that is causing him pain. Other than that, his treatment will be drug-based, noninvasive and pretty easy. We are all so relieved!

The girls and I spent Halloween in Oregon while Frank held down the fort here. Halloween night, the girls were trick-or-treating with friends at "The Winch," a house in Portland occupied by once and future NBTSC'ers. Aside from MJ the Very Sexy Cop, they were all characters from their friend Zephyr's recent and much-loved novel, The Tomato Soup Chronicles. Chloe was Dr. Vincent and Lani and Qacei were Toxic Teen Lesbian Zombie Vampire Chainsaw Bitches. Yes, really.



I spent Halloween night at the Wahoo Winkler Bed and Breakfast and got to go trick-or-treating with two of my favorite girls, Vivian and Sabine. It was lovely! This is how conversations at doorsteps went:

Neighbor: "Oh, a zebra and a fairy!"
Vivian (firmly): "I'm a pixie." Then candy would exchange hands and the girls would run down the walk to greet us.
Sabine: "This is SO fun!"

Sunday, MJ, Chloe, Qacei, and I continued down to Corvallis for a visit with the Golds. Mary cooked (!), Karma the dog entertained, and some of us got a decent start on our NaNoWriMo attempts.

Monday, we attended a party at Diana's to celebrate Holly's 18th birthday. Scotty and his friend Jack played some music, I ran around with Jack's son, Miles (~4), and we all ate goodies and wished Holly a fond farewell. She is moving on to England for her next adventure.

I had a date with niece Ella Tuesday night, a belated celebration of her sixth birthday. We went shopping at Toys'R'Us and then came back here for some mac'n'cheese. It was so fun, I've decided to make Birthday Date Night a tradition with those nieces and daughters who are interested.

Chloe came down with the flu. It must have been the swine flu since, according to CDC stats, that's just about the only flu out there right now. She had fever for one day and head and body aches for three. That was it. So far, the rest of us are fine.

We have been in self-imposed quarantine the rest of this week, though. It's been pretty nice!

The Doings Report

We're finishing up our quiet, empty-nest week. We barely did anything, a true vacation. It's been lovely.

Thursday evening, I helped out at a special event at Belle Provence, a lovely Mill Creek gift store run by some friends. I enjoy these occasional forays into retail, but boy, did I have sore feet by the end of it. Gotta get some dressy flats!

Friday night, Frank and I went out for dinner together at Romio's. I do like going there, it's such a neighborhood joint despite being part of a chain. I've run into my doctor there previously, and Friday we saw a couple of teachers from Whittier Elementary, the girls' old stomping grounds. And Costa, the manager, greets us as if we're regulars. Plus, the food is yummy. I had GASP pizza (garlic, artichoke hearts, sun-dried tomatoes, and pesto), and Frank had chicken fettucini.

Frank has a cold, so I went down and sold our Seahawks tickets. What a good decision! Terrible, terrible game. Frank and I are watching from the comfort of our livingroom and have some cash to show for it. I feel sort of bad for the dad and lad who bought our tickets, though.

The girls finished up their week on the South Carolina beach yesterday and are now back in Gainesville, Georgia. They have been having a really, really good time.

We do our reverse-airport-run tomorrow. We'll drop off the Zen car at the hotel where the Golds are spending Monday night, visit with them for a while, pick up MJ and Chloe, and pick up the Mayers. I'm looking forward to it!

The Doings Report

We spent much of last week playing with friends and doing airport runs. It was really fun! But we've decided three trips to the airport in two days is our max.

Wednesday evening, Mary, Jon, and Qacei Gold arrived and the fun commenced. Thursday morning, Randi and baby Rudy came over for breakfast. Thursday afternoon, Frank drove Mary and Jon to the airport for their much envied flight to Paris. Thursday evening, Craig, Gillian, Effie, and Fergus arrived for some wrasslin, slidin, and heart-shaped birthday cake eatin.

Friday morning, Frank and I drove MJ, Chloe, and Qacei to the airport for their flight to the South (to see friends in Atlanta and then caravan to Isle of Palms, South Carolina, for an unschooler gathering). All three of them got hassled going through security, I guess 'cause teenaged girls are so terribly scary.

Friday afternoon, Frank and I drove the Mayers to the airport for their flight to Chicago to visit Max and Otto. And Rachel and Martin, of course.

Friday night, because I hadn't had enough fun (or driving) yet, I went up to Bellingham to hang out with friends and hear Alfie Kohn speak. Alfie's talk was interesting and entertaining but also kind of a bummer because he still believes schools can be fixed. They would certainly be better if Alfie's ideas were implemented, but I wish he could make that last leap and question whether the institutions are really necessary for the type of learning he is promoting.

Anyway, I got to see a nice crowd of unschoolers I know there, and then a bunch of us went to Casa Que Pasa for tacos and drinks. After, Shonna and Jacinta and I shared a hotel room and talked into the wee hours. It was good.

Since then, Frank and I have been enjoying our temporarily empty nest. The Seahawks kicked all Jaguar buttocks. I've been reading a lot and mostly ignoring the Internet til now. The house is clean and staying that way. But it sure is quiet around here.

The Doings Report

Greetings, all!

Last week, I finished up my Monday meditation class, so I find myself with a little spare time tonight. How lovely! Let's blog.

The big announcement: The Maier family is experiencing a lull in their social calendar!! Shocking, I know. This lull is scheduled to last for four more days.

What preceded the lull was a visit from my dad and Renee'. It was a good time! I had to work during the days they were here, but they hung out with Frank and the girls and did a group trip to the Seattle Aquarium. In the evenings, we ate. We had too much Thai food one night and steaks the other. Yum!

On Friday, they headed off to visit my dad's best buddy from high school (also named Bill) and begin their reunion festivities. This meant that I was free to go to the all day meditation event that took place on Saturday, but instead...

I lazed about!

Wow! I haven't gotten to do that for a while. It was really nice. MJ was under the weather, so she and I sat together in the livingroom watching movies and reading and just generally being slug-like.

What else has been going on... MJ and Chloe are both involved in writing projects. MJ is writing fiction, but she won't say more than that. She has also been making these little signs that are really pretty. They are sort of like paper samplers, with art and a lovely quote. She left one tacked to the front door one night for me to discover when I left for work.

Chloe is writing a reference guide to plants with magical properties. She's been researching and organizing and cranking out content. I told her tonight that her process greatly resembles my own at work. She says she is not sure she would enjoy tech writing long term, but she seems to be having a pretty good time with it on a limited basis.

Frank has been sending out e-mail messages and otherwise brainstorming over the Greybeards lack of a drummer for their Good Vibrations performance. He got a very promising nibble today from an unschooler with five years' experience, so please keep your fingers crossed on that! In his spare time in and around his hosting duties, he's been practicing on the keyboard and keeping the house guest-ready.

Aaaand... We've been watching football!! Wahoo!! The Seahawks had their first preseason game yesterday. They looked relaxed and fit and reasonably competent, and they won, so we were happy. Their first home game is next Saturday. We're really looking forward to watching them from our very own seats.