Is June finally over??

Talk about exhausted. It has been a combustible month of emotions. My oldest son turned 18 and graduated from high school.

A lovely ceremony where I had the privilege of learning, at 48 years old, how to coax my 83 year old mother and her new hip up and down football stands in order to flee the rain. I did this in heels. She, as always, wore something more practical. Why would anyone wear heels at an outdoor ceremony? I don't know, I guess by the time I finally got to graduation day after having survived midterms, finals, prom, 18th birthday, selective service (%$%^# war), and the first college tuition payment - you have to pay in advance - I had officially lost my mind.

My mother didn't look any worse for the wear. She is truly a tough lady and wasn't going to let a few lightening bolts and buckets of rain ruin her day with her 4th grandchild! That smile is pure genuine grandmotherly love. My smile, on the other hand, is brought to you by Zoloft - nah just joking, but it would have helped!



So what was graduation day really like?

Well, it started really dumb. I volunteered to assist with the 'after party' preparations at 9:30 in the morning. Why I did this I'll have to undergo hypnosis to figure that out. I had a zillion relatives on their way and dummy me is in a gym monitoring the 'baby picture wall.

There were millions of these all over the halls leading to the gymnasium.


I'll spare you the details to the rest of the day but suffice it to say NOTHING went as planned starting with a frantic SOS I get from the soon-to-be graduate that he owes over $300 in book fines and his graduation admission tickets would not be released until more of his mother's anguish is extracted.

Then, this guys shows up.

It's my pool guy. I've only been asking for them to come for weeks but because I didn't make an "official" appointment back in February for pool service in early June, I was made to pay the penalty by having them show up exactly when I least had the time to deal with it.



This is what they left me with. That was on June 21st. Today, June 30, the last day of the month and a billion dollars in chemicals and mommy hours later, I just may have a picture of a clean pool by the 4th of July. If any of you ever dream about putting in a pool, CALL ME. I will send you my pool bills.

Meanwhile, my working-and-soon-to-be-16 year old is out stalking our backyard hawk.

This guy is literally littering my backyard with animal parts.

Then, my son discovers that this is a "baby" hawk. Look who took a dive at my son -

She be the mamma and she don't play!

And that's when this momma told her 6 foot son to stop playing with predatory animals, I didn't have time to go to the emergency room.

He did get some good shots though

The day continued to wear me out but some good things did happen. My pal Phyllis lent me her driveway to park for graduation; I remembered my tickets (yes I paid the fines); my husband arrived to the ceremony from work with time to spare and I got to be a proud and thankful mamma.

Priceless!