I’m stuck at home today, because the line of thunderstorms! and tornadoes! is rapidly approaching, and you know, I get freaked out about street flooding. The TV weather guy said I should stay put, so I am. I just hope it hurries up so that I don’t have to abandon the kids at school at pickup time, and I’m secretly hoping Ruby’s drumming class gets canceled this afternoon. It’s a lovely class and I appreciate having time to sit there and read or answer e-mail while she’s in it, but Carl gripes about having to take her and so I end up having to entertain/discipline/distract him instead.
Date night Friday was an utter disaster. Let’s see, we spent about $175, I think: $65 for the babysitter, $20 for the kid/babysitter pizza, $10 parking, $80 on dinner, $15 or so on after dinner beer…all so that Rod and I could make each other miserable. If you had seen us at dinner (the one bright spot: good Indian food!) you’d have said, jeez, people, next time skip the reservations and book the couples counselor instead, because you’re a mess.
It was infuriating, sad and depressing, although the more so because neither of us intended it to be that way. And it took me until the next afternoon to buck up and decide to move on from the pain, by sheer force of will. But by Saturday night, when the kids went to a sleepover at their pals’ house, everything was all kissy-kissy and Rod and I went out again and had an excellent time. Truly, I swear. Lovely. So, if you are a person in a long-term romantic relationship and have ever had a rotten evening together when you intended the opposite, well, now you know you have company. And if you can’t identify, that’s great and you are lucky, but don’t tell me about it.
Moving on:
Ruby is almost done with occupational therapy. Despite the massive expense and considerable hassle of getting to and from therapy, I wish she could keep going. The therapist feels like she’s done what she can and that Ruby is doing okay, that she just needs to keep doing the exercises and techniques they’ve been working on. I think am going to try to find her a tutor, someone with some dysgraphia/dyslexia experience, to try to cheerlead and keep Ruby organized and moving forward. There are days when Ruby seems like a nice bright normal kid, but I am not good at dealing with the times when she’s not, and Rod isn’t, either. Having a third party helps us all maintain a little more perspective.
I got some new software that I am hoping will help Ruby manage her math homework a little better and free me up from having to scribe for her every night, but I’m still sorting out how it works. She also needs to practice her typing more and I want to get her some word prediction software, but it’s expensive, and she’s very negative about anything having to do with writing, so I’ve been holding off.
Ruby just doesn’t seem very happy a good deal of the time. She has a couple of close-ish friends and a huge pile of acquaintances, but not as many close girlfriends as she would like. She likes her teacher, but not her class at school, and I don’t sense that she’s as captivated by what she’s learning as I would like. Sometimes she’s very adult and perceptive and wise when you talk to her, and sometimes she’s so goofy and moody and clueless about social cues that I worry for her. She enjoys her after school activities, but being so heavily scheduled also stresses her out. She needs more sleep (despite our being fierce defenders of bedtime) and more exercise. I am in so far over my head with her.
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