I found this to be a fairly impressive list for an establishment that served blue drinks out of fishbowls. One of the grandma’s (not our family) that joined us with the grads at the bar told us never to drink blue drinks because you will inevitably find yourself face down on the table.
Good rule. Sage wisdom.
I particularly like bullet number 3: No sagged pants or shorts (must cover your underwear/Above your ass)
Classy joint!
Filed under carry a camera, college, signage
I thought it would be a good idea to give fair warning in the title to all my friends who are about to embark on the road trip to graduation.
College graduation? Really? How could that be, she looks too young to have a child that age.
What? She doesn’t look so young? Oh right, she just thinks she does. Because she displays adolescent behavior she still feels like she herself is a college student. AND she is a little nuts with this talking in the third person thing. Ah, cut her some slack, her kid is graduating!
Ok, kiddies, here goes:
Four years? Has it actually been four years since I sat at this very keyboard and banged out the High School graduation post that brought us all to our knees? I suppose so, for as I look down at this keyboard I see that the passage of time has worn away any visible signs of both the ‘i’ and ‘n’ keys. (Odd, I know. There must be some significance to those letters, but it escapes me)
I have spent a lot of time thinking about this next rite of passage for my first born. At the beginning it seemed to not be such a big deal; certainly not compared to the emotions of her High School graduation. Sending a child off into the world felt monumental. It was the first step on the long journey of letting go. A tape loop of the curly-headed little whirling dervish danced in my head as I thought of leaving her halfway across the country.
She was SO ready.
I was so NOT.
For the most part we both did really well with it… until the first time she got sick and I felt just how far Madison, Wisconsin was from home. But she survived. And so did I. With flying colors, actually.
As graduation grows closer, the ‘not such a big deal’ theory is starting to get some holes in it. Who the hell am I kidding? I cry at Applebee’s commercials for G-d sake! I sent a 19-year-old kid off to college and this amazing young woman is coming out on the other end. It was like some crazy science experiment… 2 parts Badger, 1 part personal navigation and a 100 inches of snow a year. Shake well, supply digital equipment, a warm coat, a semester abroad, a shoulder to cry on when needed (aka, bitch too) and wait 4 years to see what it morphs into.
And morph she did! She is one of the few people on this earth that can put me in my place and not piss me off while she is doing it. She makes me laugh till I cry and cry till I laugh. She has my warped sense of humor tempered with a level head and a kind heart that floors me more often than not.
Did I mention she and her 80 lbs. of shoes (20 lbs a year) are moving back home. I suppose getting her back makes it easier than letting her go.
Sort of. But as much as she loves us, and our home, we are not foolish enough to think that this is where she wants to be. And as soon as her next chapter begins she will move out… for good this time.
Ouch. Sort of.
Here’s the thing (which BTW is the phrase she always used as a teenager to preface a difficult discussion… ironic). It is time for Miss Jana to become who she will be. And, like most young people her age there is a part of her that is scared to death. So this is for you my sweet girl:
I have always told you that you can do anything that you set your mind to (except maybe pee standing up… that one is tough). You can. Not everyone knows what they want to be when they grow up – most of my friends still don’t. The most important thing is that you just keep growing up – for the rest of your life. And equally as important, never forget the wonders of being young. Passions will find their way to you. Necessity will rear its looming head and drive you to reach your goals. Life is funny.
When you least expect it, you find yourself just where you should be.
Begin Anywhere.
Filed under college, Jana, Time to Cry Tuesdays
My daughter and her friends have finally hooked into twitter, and I LOVE it.
The other day I saw this tweet:
Since it is hard to read I will translate:
Chetley Has Been Compromised. There is a Situation!
Chetley would be her beloved teddy bear that I have reconstructed more than once in her lifetime. He has also been the target of similar ‘terrorist’ attacks by her campers when she was a counselor. I was a bit concerned when I saw the tweet so sent back a reply asking about his welfare.
This is what came next:
I could not see who was in the picture so I texted her to find out that it is The Situation from Jersey Shore, hence, ‘the situation’ in the first photo.
How can you not love these girls? Speaking of which (cough cough, shameless plug) if you did not get a chance to donate to the UW Dance Marathon that they are participating in, it is not too late. You can do so here.
Filed under college, conversations, humor, twitter
Think about it… you are feeling sort of low, your self-esteem is waning, you just can’t seem to get yourself going so you call…
The Morale Captain!
What a title! And what a perfect job for my daughter, Jana. She is it the ultimate camp counselor, the planner of all activities. She’s the one who gets everyone motivated, flights booked, lists made and out the door. So what better job for her during the University of Wisconsin Dance Marathon than to be the Morale Captain. Her job is to keep individuals energized and motivated to stay on their feet throughout the 15 hour event. And she doesn’t even drink coffee!
As the mom that raised this kid I can tell you sleep was never a high priority for the first few years of her life, so she is well suited for the task.
The Dance Marathon is a student run philanthropy project that funds the American Family Children’s Hospital. If you would like to donate to this fabulous event you can do so here. And who knows, she may even take your call when your feeling down and get you back on your feet again. I know she can always do that for me.
Go Jana go!
This Time to Cry Tuesday has a little something for everyone. If you are a sentimental parent type, it has that poignant touch. If you are someone who could live without the family gushing (cough, cough… Dr. Jimmy) but you are a fan of good music, watch the great video of Warren Zevon and Bruce Springsteen at the top of this post. If you are both (that would be you Uncle Neal) then you will relate on all levels.
This Zevon song has always been a favorite, and although the premise is a little off topic the title is perfect. (oh and I love the line about even the lhasa apso being embarrassed – isn’t that a duplication of terms? I mean are they not the embodiment of embarrassment unto themselves?)
This Tuesday finds my kids back at school and my house a little quieter than I would like. As any parent of a college kid will tell you, they blow back into the house and everything goes back to family hyper drive as soon as they arrive. For most parents, as thrilled as we are to get the family back together, it takes a few days to get used to the…
disorder in the house.
And then we realize how very much we missed it all; the friends, the food, the late nights and even later sleeping habits, the messy rooms and the general lived in feeling the house gets when they are home. The desire to keep the house ‘picked up’ and everything in order soon dissipates for me as soon as I realize that a clean room and an orderly house means only one thing… no one lives there.
So as I walk passed the now recently vacuumed orderly bedrooms of my kids I can think only one thing…
damn i wish there was crap all over the floor in there with the blinds drawn and the countless empty water bottles and equally abundant amount of carmex tubes lying around.
yeh, i pretty much miss the disorder in the house.
Filed under college, dr. jimmy, family, Time to Cry Tuesdays
For those of you who don’t know me, I am somewhat of a social media obsessed 50-something mom that jumps on most trends before her college aged kids because… well because frankly I am way cooler than they are. (says me)
Tonight, as I was wrapping up work around 10:45 because I have no life am trying to take some time off while my kids are home. I did a quick check in on twitter because I am addicted you never know what groundbreaking news or info you will find there.
Right there in the middle of my stream was my sweet adorable daughter, one of the last living breathing souls left in Madison, WI. She has not broken her record for having a final on December 23rd – the LAST day of finals – four years running! This is what she had to say.
This cracked me up as we are the family of the HEAVY tag when we fly. So shoot us, we like to have options.
I thought I would ease her mind and tweeted back:
For those unfamiliar with twitter, the # is called a hashtag. You use a hashtag at the end of a tweet to designate a topic. When a lot of people tweet with the same topic, that topic ‘trends’ or becomes the most popular thing people are talking about on twitter. At this moment the top trending topic is #howtopissyourgirloff. So I am thinking that it is not far-fetched to think that one of my hashtags could catch on.
Ok, maybe not #schmanboy.
Filed under absurdities, college, conversations, family, humor, Jana, moms, twitter, vacation, wisconsin
Home. It’s more than just a house. Sometimes it is not even the ‘right’ house. Certainly not the dream house. But definitely home. With its drafty windows, ancient kitchen and not enough space… I still take comfort within these walls.
This is the place where the kids came home from the hospital and now come home from college. Where I walked the floors with them as teething, croupy, bronchitis babies and walked the floors again alone waiting to hear that garage door open when they started to drive.
And now this house – that has been so quiet these past months – is starting to come back alive with laundry and the smell of bacon. One kid home, first with a stomach virus and then a with her boyfriend. (21-year-olds get better quickly). And the other kid will be home before Tuesday comes to a close.
Not only have my children been gone, but their friends have been missed almost as much. I cannot wait for the door to open to those man-boys who love yodels and hug me till I almost fall over. Who initial the fruit and leave notes in the cup cakes and whose humor keeps me laughing all night long. I long for a foyer full of big sneakers and the shouting of video games in the basement. I can’t wait to have a late night kitchen full of young women who want to bake and hear all the plans of the lives they will soon enter when they graduate. I am thrilled to line this house with air mattresses and make breakfast for the masses.
There is now life in rooms that since the summer laid silent. And if these walls could talk they would tell the tales of a family that has grown up here. The years seem to echo in these walls, and as I walk through them things catch my eye that make me smile. For instance, the photo above brings me back 20 years. That would be a drip of Baby Tylenol on the wall in my daughter’s room. We have painted it twice since then, but it would appear that Tylenol trumps Benjamin Moore and it keeps bleeding through. It is a reminder of the strong will she had as a baby that serves her so well as a young woman.
If these walls could talk they would tell you that maybe this family never got to upgrade their house, but they have certainly built themselves a warm, solid place filled with love that they can always call home.
To my beautiful kids: don’t believe what they say…. You can ALWAYS go home again.
Happy Thanksgiving all. May you and your families feel at home no matter where you may be. And may your turkey not be pink when you carve it.
It is a bittersweet fact that as your kids grow, the time you spend as a family shrinks. If you have done your job well, their lives are full. If you are lucky, yours are as well.
We are four people with very full lives. Not one of us is the type to be idle or feel lonely. We have a great extended family, many friends and rich lives. We work hard and play hard.
Blah. Blah. Blah. Ok, so that is all academic. And though it is true on some level, after 21 years of being a family unit, you crave that time when you can be together. And you learn to appreciate the moments for what they are… fleeting and precious.
This weekend we visited our kids at college. If you don’t follow this blog regularly, my kids are away at school together as a freshman and a senior.
They love it. I love it more.
Parent’s weekend = fly. drive. eat. reverse. repeat.
But for twenty precious minutes, just the four of us sat on the couch in my daughter’s apartment and were simply US.
In all caps.
Nothing special was said. (oh except when my son told us about his human sexuality class and said he now knows more about the vagina than he ever cared to know – now that is something you rarely hear from a 18-year-old boy) There were no real heavy parenting moments. We just WERE. (again in caps)
And to me, there is nothing better on this earth than a little time with just us four…
even if it was only for twenty.
Filed under college, danny, family, gary, Jana, relationships, Time to Cry Tuesdays
Ah, Big 10 football and a rainy morning in Madison, Wisconsin. The late morning kick-off is no reason not to pre-game when you are in college. And for the young woman on the left, the mid-40 degree weather and drizzling chill was no reason to wear sleeves either.
This apartment was a half a block from Randall Stadium and there were no shortages of cheers from the crowd as they passed them by. You have to love the spirit of college football; and the complete joy they get from being fans.
This was the last home game my daughter, the senior, will attend as a student and marked the end of the first season for my son, the freshman. With a final score of 83 to 20 this home season went out with a bang. (this is not the official last home game which takes place Thanksgiving weekend, but it is the last one for my kids). UW set a school record and tied a Big Ten record for points scored and scored more points than any other FBS team this season.
I must apologize to you all for not getting the best shot of the day, which was the two guys walking down the street in the freezing cold rain in nothing but sneakers and badger g-strings.
I know, I am slipping up, sorry.
Filed under carry a camera, college, current events, danny, family, humor, Jana, sports, travel
photo: Jana Levinson
For those who do not know, I have two Badgers. That would be a freshman and a senior at the University of Wisconsin, Madison. And these two bleed red. Well, ok, we all bleed red but they bleed Badger red. Go red. Camp Randall sea of red on game day red.
And if you follow college football, then you would know that this past Saturday night the #11 Badgers beat #1 Ohio State in the game of the decade. As my daughter described it, the place was electric from the moment of kick off. As well it should have been since they scored in the first 12 seconds of the game. The level of intensity never let up. As you can see, they rushed the field at the end of the game; something she had never seen in her 4 years there. Her friend who was visiting said this was up with the top 5 days of her life and she was not even a student there!
But this is not about football. Well it is, but not really. This is about belonging. About a sense of place and feeling a part of something that is way bigger than you could explain, yet it feels like it is simply a part of who you are. My kids are lucky to have had this at camp. And now in college they have what feels like camp on steroids.
81,194 people jammed into that stadium, all chanting, cheering and praying together for that win. For their team. Their school. Their culture. Damn, it does not get better than that.
We go through that crazy college app process praying that our kids will find a place to ‘be happy’. A place they feel they belong. A place to grow that will shape their lives, not just in the classroom, but out as well.
I am a firm believer that much of what they learn there is not academic. The community of Madison has been as strong a teacher for my daughter as her professors have been. I can only hope for the same for my son.
Everyone gets hung up on the career prep in college. Sure we want them to get jobs and be fulfilled and self sufficient. But maybe part of what makes them ready to go out into the world is to know WHO they are, not necessarily WHAT they want to be.
And that, my friends, is something to think about.
Filed under college, danny, family, Jana, Time to Cry Tuesdays
i could cry but i don't have time 