All By Myself

The long expected day finally arrived; the day when their dad came to get them for over a month; the day when they find out that all his promises are true or not. I don't like putting them in that situation, but he has his rights and the youngest so wants to be with him. They listen to his grand ideas while he raises their expectations about some magical mystery job he has been going on about for two years with mysterious salaries that never materialize and they believe him. And I will be here to pick up the pieces when they come back with a new look at reality.

In the meantime, I will get Little Man's room ready with the sports theme that he has been wishing for. Maybe it will soften the blow. And in the same meantime, I will take my savings and go back to school shopping for both children to wipe out the memory of a year ago while we lived on public assistance when every other word I wanted to say was, "No, we can't afford it."

What got me through all of this? Aside from the helping the hands of loving family and friends? Art!

Over the past year, I have explored different media including doodles, sketching, water color, art journal and most recently Index Card a Day (ICaD) from Daisy Yellow. Although I am behind most of the people participating, I have tried to keep up with this challenge - 61 index cards in 61 days. (I started late.)

I love that this is a pretty open challenge with guidelines but no rules. I am the kind of person who when given rules will become so focused on them, that the creativity vanishes. On the other hand, without guidelines, I often stare at the blank page and get nothing - feeling jealous of those who just seem to have IT.

The following are cards I created (in no particular order)

One last thing for those who were following my son's team to the championship. Unfortunately, I came to discover that the coach's beliefs didn't gel with mine. In short, he felt that winning was more important than teaching children about good sportsmanship. I am not one of those parents who believe that his or her child is perfect and is going to be an athletic superstar. On the contrary, I know that my son struggles in this area. However, he was part of the team and he made 95% of the practices and EVERY game. BUT Coach felt that since he couldn't count on James to hit the ball every time or catch the ball 100% that he probably wasn't going to play him much if at all at the district playoffs. ****What kind of BS is that?! James was willing to delay his visit with his father in order to be a part of team he worked hard to play on yet this "man" couldn't see fit to put him on the roster - "For the good of the team." WHAT?! I explained that I didn't think it was fair that he would be a benchwarmer after doing his best. I also said that it was pretty crappy policy that the city was supporting his actions by allowing him to pick three "top" players from other teams who weren't going to district. These are eight year olds, not middle schoolers, not high schoolers, not college students. Your job is to teach them how to play and how to be good sports, not how to smash their hearts by leaving them sitting on the bench wondering what they have done wrong. In essence, this coach wasn't even man enough to say that's why he was leaving James off the roster. Instead, he blamed it on other coaches, on the city, even going as far as to blame in my son by saying he only plays because I asked him to which, by the way, didn't happen.

****Sorry, I wasn't going to there, but bringing up the subject brought back everything I was feeling that day.

In the end, I told James that he was not going to the playoffs because I didn't want him learning bad beliefs from his coach and so he could spend more time with his dad.