Wednesday, December 28, 2011

Where did September go? 10/10/05

With all the excitement of my student evacuee home from New Orleans and simultaneously getting settled into our new apartment (not to mention fall baseball - playing and umpiring - starting up for the youngest), I forgot September Dispatches. That just flew flat out of my head in Katrina's wake. This will have to suffice.

I confess that I like having the middle one home. He is sweet-natured and funny, very easy to be around, and while I wish for him that he was still in his house in New Orleans, attending his classes at his university, I know for sure that his loss is my gain. It won't be much longer that any of my sons will be with me for any length of time (the oldest has been gone for years), so I savor every delicious moment that is left of being a Mom in residence.

The bad news is that to keep his wonderful apartment (one of three in an old house, high and dry), we have to pay rent, even for September, when he could not occupy it. Now, there have been plenty times in my life I could write that check without blinking, but this isn't one of them, so I'm trying to work it out, but it's gonna hurt. I would really love to go down there, clean up, get some stuff and try to sublet the place, furnished, with the owners' permission, until mid-January, when we'll need it again. *sigh*

Our baseball season has started back up. We are, to say the least, uneven. We have some of the best players in the league, and some of the worst. I am not expecting that we'll be winning any championships this fall, but we have really great folks on this team (including a NOLA evacuee who has become a good friend to son #3) and are having fun. It's fall. We're outside. It's wholesome. The boys are getting to keep in practice at their positions and at the plate. The food rocks (if you like hot dogs, hamburgers and fries). What more could anyone want?

Speaking of baseball, did anyone see the Braves and Astros last night? Holy Cow! It's hard to find the words to describe the double header played as one game. 18 innings. I was exhausted just from watching. Houston came away victorious, a sad fact for Braves' fans (like me), but you have to hand it to them. They deserved to win and will be "my team" for the remainder of the post season. It occurred to me that perhaps the City of Houston was being "rewarded" by the Baseball Gods for their generosity to New Orleans' poor, because part of me fears those folks would still be at the Convention Center and the Superdome if Houston hadn't stepped up to the plate and taken the most hopelessly displaced of Katrina's victims.

Finally, I love our new apartment. It's wonderful having a washer & dryer again (a "laundry room"!), especially given baseball season, and the additional space and extra bathroom are amazing, but the best thing is the view. It's like living in a tree house, above grade in a forest, completely private and surrounded by trees, lots of 'em, with the creek tumbling into the spillway at the very bottom of the steep slope on which we sit. I feel like I'm getting away with something, living in the mountains inside of 285.

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