full circle

it is beginning. 
the last family with young kids has left.  the campus feels empty.  my children are crawling the walls bored and sad and the worst part is tomorrow there is no school.  which means they will be driving me crazy. all. day. 

we had a plan. it involved an hour drive, and a pool, and sunshine.  but.  right after our friends drove away, it began to pour.  it rained so loudly that we couldn't hear each other.  it rained our plans right out the window.  so we ate lunch and baked a cake, because chocolate cake always makes us feel better.  then the power went out so we sat in the gloomy dark house and played monopoly, and felt like real missionaries.  no lights, no friends around, playing board games with the family.

because it was dark and i was kind of bored and sad that people are gone, and everyone was feeling crabby, and i had another migraine, i indulged in feeling sorry for myself.  i allowed myself to miss everyone and everything. i wanted to go to the fernbank and dr. bombays underwater tea house and eat rainbow ice cream.  i wanted to feel the heat of georgia and swim at the emory pool and see people that look like me and know me.  i wanted to go to target to buy a sparkly tank top and stop by the king-of-pops and have a mexican chocolate popsicle and eat it on the curb of the gas station parking lot in a race before it melts and wins.  i wanted to go to yeah burger and eat the bacon sauce.  i wanted to walk to john howell park and watch the sky through the leaves of all the trees while the kids run and play.  i wanted to have a TV and turn on 'noggin' for them when we get home and then i wanted my friends to come over and sit on the porch and drink cold white wine and eat potato chips in our mosquito free yard (thanks to 'junior' who would have just sprayed us free of them). 

i miss the ease, and the familiar, and yes, sometimes i even miss the consumption.  i miss the normal of it, and the options- the endless options of things to do, rain or shine.  the options of so many friends and family to be with, to talk to, to share life with. 

then i indulged further - online people magazine- in an attempt to feel normal and american again.  but. as usual it sends me back here- where i belong. because seeing pages of sunglassed- made up hollywood stars reminds me that i don't need a sparkly tank top, or bacon sauce or popsicles to feel good or be happy. 

i have all that i need.  i even have all that i want.
i'm just a little lonely and wanting some sun.
so it comes full circle.
and here comes the sun.
but i still miss you all.