Not Pathetic Enough

15 years ago, this past December 28, my sister Marianne married Robert.  Though we loved Robert (and still do), we were not happy about the wedding.  How could she desert us like that?  Never mind that we all three were in Provo at BYU together.  Never mind that in less than 3 months, I'd be engaged to Adam.  How dare she?

Marianne was the golden child in high school.  Star basketball player, valedictorian, charmer.  Her wedding reception in our hometown was huge...standing room only in the church gymnasium.  After all of the clean up, we got home about 2:00 a.m.  (It didn't help endear us to the wedding.)  I slept on the couch because we had guests in all the beds.  I remember my mom waking me up at 7:00 a.m. because we had breakfast guests driving up our lane.  I remember very little about the rest of it.  I think I was too tired.  I know we went to Orderville, UT for another reception.  I know I stood upright in my bridesmaid dress and I know that Enoch drove way way way too fast to get Olivia home to a New Year's Eve party.  (My parents were driving separately.)  I was so tired it was all a blur.  Happily we had a week before school started up again at BYU.  Olivia and I had time to lick our I-can't-believe-she-abandoned-us wounds and to recover from our weariness.  I think our mom was equally tired and for once in her life didn't urge us towards productivity.

We were Tired and school was Hard and we were Sad so we played Skip Bo and ate peanut M&Ms.  Pretty much for a week.

We'd play Skip Bo on Olivia's bed, cards spread out over the bedspread.  We'd play Skip Bo at the kitchen table, only getting up for more peanut M&Ms.  Finally, we started to feel pathetic.  And slothful.  In a peanut M&M haze we would murmur to each other that we really NEEDED to go back to school.  After awhile, our inactivity was getting us down.

Not a moment too soon, it was time to go back to BYU.  We were ready to conquer again. (And ready to hang out in Marianne and Robert's new apartment...she was not lost after all.)

The lesson learned:  when you're tired, take a break.  Take such a break that you WANT, desperately, to get back to normal.

I'm lamenting this vacation that is all too soon drawing to its close.  I'm Tired and homeschooling/swim team practice/what's for dinner/vacant eyes and casual shrugs when I ask Mark where his jacket is/everything is Hard.  I'm not ready to go back.

We've had a good vacation.  We've had a lot of parties.  I've worked on some things I never can do during the school year because I've been too busy.  We've had fun.

But I wish we'd been a little more lazy and a little less busy.  I need to play Skip Bo for hours with Olivia (even though she cheats) and eat artificially colored candies of goodness until I'm ready for the real world again.

Though it's small consolation, my sisters feel the same way.  Marianne has hosted half the free world this vacation...many of them sleeping over.  Olivia has been working on her Spanish curriculum for her bilingual children.  (Luckily the only foreign language I know is pig latin and my kids about have that covered.)  They're busy and about to get busier too.

Sigh.

Is this what it means to be a grown-up?

Rats.