Weekend Report

Well, she did it again! Diana has proved herself the mighty hunter once again. For the third year in a row she has brought home a deer within the first two hours of the first day she hit the woods. Thursday was the opening day of the youth hunt and she got a nice sized doe, so we have a freezer full of meat once again for which we are thankful (we hunt for food not sport). The very first year she got a big buck right off the bat, experienced guys called it luck. Last year, when she got a doe the first day they said, "Well, she is really a lucky gal." Ok fellows, it's the third consecutive year. Still calling it luck?

Friday night was homecoming. Mind you, I loathe football. I have absolutely zero interest in the sport whatsoever and cannot explain any aspect of it. The ONLY reason I go is to see Diana march in the band. That part I love and nobody better interrupt the field show. Homecoming is different, I go to be the dutiful band mom and help set up. Then I endure this hideously boring game, watch a bunch of vapid girls (ok, one of them wants to be a pediatrician so I guess they are not all vapid) compete in a popularity contest for a plastic tiara and the band does NOT get to march. AND, I froze my butt off. The upside was the people I sat with. They were an amusing lot. My son, Isaac, actually follows this game, knows what is going on and kept quizzing me. "Mom, do you know what a down is? An incomplete? An interception? Do you know what the flag means? Did you see what that guy just did?" He was so proud of me when I'd actually get one right. If he has anything to do with it I may actually be forced to learn something about this sport and be able to give a better description of it than "unbelievably large boys in spandex and pads crashing around and fighting over an improperly shaped ball." How can I remain completely uninterested with that eager little face looking up at me and trying depserately to inform me?

Saturday, I went to a baby shower. A group of us went in a 15 passenger van to the area where I grew up. I've always liked the drive descending from the Poconos to the rolling farmlands of southeastern Pennsylvania. Two hundred year old stone farmhouses and barns marked with hex signs begin to dot the scenery. Trees thin out a bit and reveal the cornfields. I love how the cornfields change the landscape over the course of a year. Right now the dried stalks stand up like thin and weary sentries soon to be felled. After the first light snow, the short stubs will poke out of the frosty layer until a thicker blanket covers them and makes the fields look like a bumpy white chenille bedspread. Spring means it is time to break up the hard earth and start again so dark, damp soil can make way for little green sprouts that soar to over a man's head. Ok, I confess....I even like the smell of cow manure when they have spread it on the fields. When I was in college, I knew I was almost home when I caught the first whiff of it. I'd inhale deeply every time. Yeah, hunting and cow manure....I must be a complete hick, right?

So.....what makes people call you lucky? Were you a quarterback or a homecoming queen? What interest have you developed as a result of your children's influence? What sights and smells let you know when you are 'home?'