Showing posts with label Memories. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Memories. Show all posts

Monday, March 28, 2011

Sweet Dreams are Made of This

Just a few minutes ago my ears perked up as I listened to Jordan singing that Annie Lennox song as it was on the radio.  She didn't see me looking at her--she was too busy drawing pictures at the kitchen table.  I watched her for a few seconds and smiled.  I had a strangely nostalgic sense of myself back in 1984 singing "Sweet dreams are made of this, who am I to disagree?..."  Although I was surely singing "sweet dreams are made of THESE" not "this" because that lyric sounds like "these" to me.  Not the point.  I was seven in 1984. Jordan is seven right now.   I am so struck by the idea that this song pulled me backward and forward at the same time.  All these life-comes-full-circle kinds of thoughts come swirling. 

Like when Jordan says she wants to be a singer or an actress when she grows up. I said the same thing.

Like when the girls play with their Barbies and turn it into drama central by pretending cat fights, domestic turmoil, gossip mill, fashion show craziness. My husband thinks they are nutty. But my sisters and I played the same way with  Barbie, her clones, and her frenemies.

Like when I showed the girls how we would make little "dolls" out of rose of sharon buds and flowers in the Summertime. And they would try to make them too.

Like when they came running to me with a bottle of "potion" they made out of water, soap bubbles, and flower petals. One of our favorite ways to spend an afternoon imagining.

Like when I soap up Livi's hair in the bath and slick it straight up like a unicorn horn--the way that my mom used to do for us.

Thanks to a barbie guitar and a "Girls just wanna have fun" cover by Miley Cyrus my girls can sing at the top of their lungs: "The phone rings... in the middle of the night..." the way that we would.

The past and present magically mingle.  Sometimes the girls will share an idea or say something that I distinctly remember having or thinking in my youth.

I never thought I'd want to relive the 1980's.  I imagined neon pink hair, leggings, jelly bracelets, and stone washed denim making a comeback, and I would shudder--I didn't realize that my 1980's childhood might revisit.  I have four little time machines that take me back there quite often and Sweet Dreams ARE made of this.

Saturday, August 21, 2010

Feeling hot. Hot. HOT!

*pant*  Our AC went out right before vacation. We had it charged and headed to Myrtle Beach. Jim turned the unit off while we were away. Came home to a hot, stuffy house. Turned on the AC. It wasn't working again. Tech came out, and filled it up again...3 days later we were warm again. Obviously we have a bad leak somewhere. We need a new unit.

Luckily (maybe), we have a home warranty since our home is on the market and we are able to get it fixed and just pay a reasonable deductable.   BUT there is so much red-tape and runaround that as I sit here sweating like a pig, I wonder if it is worth it.

Jim went and got fans. They are basically just blowing around the warm air, but I found that if I aim the fan directly at me and spray myself with a water bottle it gives me just enough time to fall asleep before the water evaporates! The AC probably won't be fixed/replaced until the end of next week. 

How spoiled are we though? I'm not sure if we will make it. Jim was pricing window units yesterday which I am trying to prevent him from wasting our money on...I mean we can make it a week! I made it my entire childhood without whole house air conditioning. Of course, this is the 9th hottest summer in the history of our city...OF COURSE!

I tried to convince him to put up a tent and sleep outside, but we don't have a tent big enough for our family, and our yard probably isn't big enough for a tent that's big enough for our family! It would be fun though. I remember doing that when I was a kid. My parents had a HUGE tent that they would set up in the beginning of the summer to air out and check for leaks (we camped a lot when I was young) and we would sleep out there (and play in it all day).  Instead of my kids having that memory, they'll say 20 years from now, remember when the AC went out and we slept in our underwear in front of the fan, and mom sprayed herself with a water bottle and was really cranky for a whole week?  Good times.

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