Treasure

My friend Michelle is teaching me to geocache.

Mostly I join her on hikes, hunting around whenever she tells me that we're near the cache. Sort of the lazy girl's version of geocaching.

My sons have begged to go along, and today after school, Michelle and her daughter indulged them.

Along the way, we found a tree with tiny, ripe plums. Berg and I each brought home a pocket full. Just enough to make this tart.

Who doesn't love treasure?

Squirrel!

"Mom, I hit a tree."
I stayed calm, despite the enormous amount of blood.
Because even small head wounds bleed a lot.
Because head wounds are not uncommon here.
Because flailing my arms might have ruined the pizza dough.
"OK, honey, go to the bathroom so we can clean you up and see how bad it is."
Berg had a small puncture, right between the eyes. I cleaned it up, put on a Steri-Strip, and asked him what happened.
"Well, I was running laps (around the house), and I got distracted by a baby squirrel, and I ran into an aspen tree, and a branch poked me in the head."
No response from Mom.
"Do I have to clean up my own blood?"

All Tuckered Out

This is Tucker.

His owner, "Coach" Richard Dispenza, had lived in our neighborhood since before we bought our home, 11 years ago. Coach died suddenly on Sunday.

Coach was in Utah at the time, and Tucker was in a kennel in Woodland Park. No one knew where Tucker was, but the neighbors rallied, and tracked him down. Of course we took him. Because really, once you have two small boys and two large dogs, what more harm can be done?

We went straight to Wag-N-Wash, owned by my friends Jef and Dan. I've been taking Artichoke there since 1999, when we moved to Colorado and Wag-N-Wash was just one store on Uintah. The boys picked out a new collar for Tucker, with a matching tag just in case he got out of our yard. They also got him a few toys, which have since been shredded in my living room. With the help of Dan's staff, we spent an hour and a half washing Tucker and combing out matted fur.

He's gorgeous.

No less than six people stopped by the house yesterday afternoon, thanking me for taking Tucker, especially considering what a handful he's always been for Coach. They have no idea.

We are the lucky ones.

Other than a few manners, which we're working on in 5-minute increments, Tucker is a great dog. And despite spending the majority if his time tied to a tree while Coach was at work, Tucker understands that he has to work within the ranks. He learned this morning to sit while everyone else went through the door ahead of him (a necessity in a house where the youngest creature is a 4-year-old boy and the oldest - apart from management - is a 14-year-old dog who could be blown away in a stout breeze).

He spent today with five (FIVE!) children under the age of 7, all of whom wanted to take turns combing Tucker, and walking Tucker on a leash, and making Tucker sit, and teaching Tucker to ride a scooter.

This dog is a freaking saint.

By the end of the day, the old dogs were passed out on the couch with Mom. Tucker was sitting in front of the boys' bedroom door, wondering why they went to bed without him.

If you're in the market for a dog who needs nothing more than love, some good food and a little patience, Tucker might just be yours.

If all that is too much to ask, he may just need to be ours.

To market, to market ...

Basil and beets, potatoes and peas, cheese from a goat and honey from bees!

I love the Woodland Park Farmer’s Market.

We pet the dogs from the no-kill shelter.
We watch Robillard’s honey bees hustle through a display.
We point out the newest blooms at Karen Anderson’s stand, and throw bean bags through rings to get a junior firefighter badge from the Four-Mile Fire Protection District crew.

There are vegetables to touch and watermelons to taste. We buy goat cheese from the Canyon City dairy, and mushrooms from Black Mountain Mushrooms in Guffey.

We say hello to neighbors we see only at the Friday market, and try to carry on conversations with other parents, watching our children pool together and race through the crowd.

After a couple of hours, the boys and I head home, loaded with bags of produce from the people who actually grow and make our food. We talk about our menu for the week, made up entirely of the day’s purchases. We shell peas and make pesto, and laugh about how pink our fingers turn when we pickle the beets.

Like most children, mine refuse vegetables regularly.

With patience, I hope they will one day learn to love them, as they are learning now to love their farmers.

Dismantle the Sun

A few houses up the street, there is a home filled with unbearable silence.

My neighbors were in the process of moving from Colorado to California. Larry had been at a new job there for just a week. Michelle and their son, Alex, had just returned here from visiting him. They were looking for a new home, trying to find a neighborhood that reminded them of Woodland Park.

Alex got sick on the trip. He contracted pneumonia, and just ... died.

He was three. Just a few months older than Kai.

I don't know how you recover from something like that. I don't know how you can get out of bed, and put your feet on the floor. How you can stand up. How you can breathe.

I told Michelle that I was sorry. That I knew there was nothing anyone could do. That I just wanted her to know that I was thinking about her. And I hugged her for a long time.

I took some fruit, and some fresh pastries from the Farmer's Market. Michelle told me she wanted to go to the market this morning, but just couldn't. I imagine there will be many things that she just can't do for a very long time.

We talked about their move, and what they'll do with the house here. And the list of things that Michelle is doing to get ready to leave. And we both cried.

I didn't know Michelle very well, or her son. I pray that I will never fully understand the kind of pain that she is going through right now.

Back home, the birds are singing and the wind is blowing through the aspens. I am trying, unsuccessfully, to get some work done. And anticipating the stomping on the stairs that will end the silence, so much more peaceful here than it is up the street.

Juggling

"Mom?" Berg asks. "How do you spell computer?"

C..O..M..P..U..

"That's too hard. How do you spell work?"

W..O..R..K

"How do you spell Mom?"

M..O..M

"Thanks."

Two minutes later,  Berg tapes a sign to my office door. It says "Mom" at the top, and "Work" at the bottom. In between is a drawing of a computer, with Berg's attempt at an international "NO" sign drawn over it.

"I made you this sign. Now you don't have to do any more work, Mom."

I try to compartmentalize my day into little pieces of time that can be doled out carefully to everything and everyone:

• Start laundry.
• A snack for one boy.
• A book for the other.
• A gap analysis here.
• Help cut out a paper catfish there.
• Make lunch.
• Do dishes.
• Call client.
• Write quote.
• Update financial spreadsheet.
• Pack for picnic.

Most of the time, I feel like I'm doing everything half-assed. Apparently I'm not the only one.

Music Soothes the Wild Beast

Kai is very good at being a 3-year-old boy. He has moments of such utter wildness that you'd think he was part beast. Maybe Tasmanian devil. Or howler monkey. I only really worry when his dad starts humming Warren Zevon's "Excitable Boy" around him.

Today Kai had none of those moments. With his brother in zoo school and all of Mom's attention, Kai turned back into the sweeter version of himself. He spent 20 minutes singing a song to the Okapi at the Henry Doorly Zoo.

Maybe we'll keep him after all.