September air

I am sitting by my open window enjoying the September air which is rich with rotting leaves and the last deep breaths of the trees before they go back to sleep. The horses are picking through the garden's leavings, having chewed the grass down to a millimeter's length throughout the whole yard. They have fairly strict boundaries and are finally passing beyond them to the slough-y outskirts in the woods around the cleared space. I guess the grass there, cured by now into hay, is not as tasty as the freshly mown stuff (even if it was only mown by them all summer). Our water table is as high as it has ever been, thanks to 6" of rain in the last two weeks. We have a huge new puddle right in front of the barn which is causing difficulties with our planned project of pouring cement in the last third of the barn this fall. The truck will likely sink. We will have to lay down plywood. Even so, once it freezes we will be contending with a skating rink right in our major traffic area. Not good.

This summer was too full, and I am re-evaluating my entire life on the basis of the realities of my energy. Which is apparently finite. I figure that I am in general spending 60% of my energy on my kids. You would think this would go down once school begins, but this September all three got sick and Levi got very sick right away. Plus there were eye appts. for all three with Seth needing two follow-up appts. just to get much needed contacts. Finally he can play sports without his glasses going flying three times per game. Plus helping out with the Parent Advisory Council, field trips, and the annual Walkathon. Not to mention Crutwell's fall supper and bringing in our garden . . . September has been if anything, MORE busy than July and August. And they were full.

So, given that the kids will likely continue to require a significant majority of my time and thought and attention, and that my job also is very labour intensive and emotionally taxing, that does not really leave any time for Dan much less myself. It would be nice to cut back on everything, but financial realities make that highly unrealistic and many other parents have assured me that family life does not get simpler as children mature. Sigh. I would love to read a book that tells women how to do it all and still be serene and calm and reasonably fit. In the meantime, I am really enjoying the fall brilliance today after a week of dark cloudy rainy skies. The trees are the exact shade of yellow-orange that goes best with the fall-crisp blue of the sky. We still have green on the ground thanks to all the rain. So despite the fact that I am doing laundry, dishes, supervising kids' cleaning rooms and practicing piano, hosting two of Levi's friends, and trying to figure out which of the rest of the garden to even try to bring in, I am still enjoying breathing in the day.

Last weekend I was able to work with Jetta two days in a row! Before the rain re-started. That was very nice because I have gone right back to the beginning with her and am working on respect on the ground. She remains too emotionally scattered for my comfort when I am riding her and I have finally realized that she is wired completely differently from Chess. She may eventually come to respect me after I ride her hard for 50 miles but in the meantime I may also get my neck broken with her sudden bolting behaviour. So we are working on attention and sustained attention and her thinking, rather than reacting. I never really had to work to get or keep Chess' attention; she is too focused on avoiding extra work to not pay attention. However Jetta is very unfocused and I think it is just needing to realize that she must discipline herself for longer than 30 seconds. I am not great at setting clear boundaries (obviously) but this is very good for me. If I am clear with her, she is actually great to be around. So it was a very encouraging weekend. I hope to have another starting today, and maybe even extend the time to the next week . . . however I can't really get my hopes up!

Anyway, the boys have come in and it's time to feed everyone again!