Post Grandson And Buddies Blues

Chris, Peyton, And NicK: On The Road Again, To Kansas City

8:13

8:14

It's just about 8:00 and I have been out watering the lawn; I have been up since 6:00, not early enough to see the sunrise, as when I walked downstairs, the entire living room was drenched in sunlight.  And the bass boats were taking off, their roar heard up and down the lake.  It's another great morning, the lake a sparkling blue, a few wrinkles and at the moment, a pleasant 60º although it will get up into the mid 80's later in the day.

Sticky Buns By Nick, Chris And Peyton

Yesterday began with sadness, as the boys were up around 8:00, Peyton earlier to take a run, the other two, to swim and then pack their car.  Evie had another big breakfast ready for them and had packed some peanut butter and jelly sandwiches for the road.  Before they left, Evie checked the room to see if they left anything behind, found Peyton's power cord for his computer but that was about it for then. Later, we found water shoes, a few other things they left behind.  So they drove off, leaving us bereft, seemingly out of gas, with nothing fun to do, nothing on our plate for the day.  So when we feel this way, especially when Evie feels this emptiness, she deals with it by getting right to work on cleaning up the house, the kitchen, the bedrooms, etc, to keep her mind off the boys hitting the road for KC.  By noon, sheets were off the beds, in the washing machine, comforters were in the yard, being aired, windows washed, and I was washing screens, straightening the yard, paddling the wake board back to our neighbors, straightening up the yard, doing some weeding and finally, taking a swim to cool off.  So that was our morning.

Blue Heron Fishing

We tended to relax some in the afternoon, though Evie always found something to do, to keep her mind busy.  I made my lunch and ate it by myself, no boys to harass or kid, and watched the Turkey/ Spain soccer game.  I also took a delicious nap, catching up a bit on sleep, talked with my good friend Ron, who is recovering from back surgery in Oxford, Maine.  And both Evie and I got some sun bathing in on the dock, though neither one of us seemed good at relaxing.  We wanted to doing something, playing bean bag, hiking the Gorge, visiting Niagara Falls.

Our Panacea

We were going to make a wok dinner of leftovers but said the heck with it.  Neither of us felt like fussing in the kitchen so I ordered a pizza from Coppola's and drove over to Bemus Point and picked it up.  We did relax on the front porch with a Manhattan, some cheese and crackers, and Evie heated up some stuffed eggplant rounds she had made earlier in the summer, to see if they were good heated up after being frozen.  They were.

Late Afternoon Shadows As Seen From Our Porch

And we noted the irony of the day, the afternoon, perhaps the nicest day in a week and the boys were not here to enjoy it.  We had our pizza, watched the seven part O. J. series on ESPN, but were not much into it though I assume we will stick with it.  By 9:30, we were both extraordinarily tired, and went up to bed, after getting a text from the boys to say they were five minutes from home.  

A happy ending to a busy and fun week with Nick, Chris, and Peyton, three extraordinary young men, ready for college, and a tribute to their parents for having raised such curious, thoughtful, gentlemen.  We hear adults our age complaining about the youth of today, wondering 'why can't they be like we were.'  Well, these guys are a welcome antidote to that way of thinking.  And thank goodness they are not like 'we were.'  They are much better than we were (at least I was)!

A final thought: we both commented on the fact that not once did we think 'isn't it about time for them to hit the road.' It was that kind of week.