SUMMER LOVIN'

Swim team has ended and so has structured Monday through Thursday workouts and activities.  Since Cayman has decided that he's a "night person," he thinks he must (and deeply wants to) stay up every night until at least midnight.

"I come alive at night."

I sleep like a log at night....until the light is turned on and he wakes me up to tell me something that I have deemed a non-emergency.

We have started fencing on Saturday mornings.  No, not fencing is the street sense of the word as in receiving stolen goods.  The foil or sabre, the cool mask and coat that goes between your legs and zips up the side.  The chest plate so you don't end up with a sword through your heart type of fencing.  I could definitely see continuing that throughout the year.  But that's for one hour, one day a week.  With Cayman's friends spread all over the place and none really in our hood, it has made summer entertainment difficult.  We do go to the movies twice a week but again, that's for an hour, hour and a half max.

I tried to introduce him to the way grown-ups spend their off time (or at least how this grown-up would like to spend some of her off time).  We went to Borders, sat in the aisles reading, got a Starbucks coffee and continued to read.  I might as well have thrown him into a pit of despair.  BORING.

Visalia is surrounded by land for miles around but the idea of surfing sounded cool.  And there is a sports park with some type of indoor surfing park going up in Lindsay, but it's not up yet. 

Friends are away on summer vacation....what's a curious 12 yr. old boy to do?  He hates summer camps and there aren't any groovy ones in this area.  The thought of trouncing up and down a field playing football in 101 degree heat isn't thrilling him either.  The other day he actually confessed that he's looking forward to school starting.

Oh my God!

....or a job overseas where he can explore new cities and see what new thrilling things they have to offer is more of his style.  Then we hit on something.......something we forgot about for some reason.

We're going to build a go-kart.  1950's style.  From scratch.  He and I doing it together.  I've watched enough HGTV to be able to handle a screwdriver....I think.  We have the wood and nails but we need to find some tires.  That's what the internet is for.....freecycle.com, my new fave website.  We'll deal with where he's going to drive the thing after it's built.

Maybe summer isn't so boring after all.