a working holiday

Mark and I both work on the weekends.  He hauling mail from the postal centers, me working for Mrs. H.  Nobody wants to work on Labor Day so I will be there Monday morning.  No big thing.  Mrs. H's age and experiences fill a void in me...I have no mother, and my mother in law is thousands of miles away...Mrs. H lets me know that the road ahead is sometimes hard, but "stay true to yourself and you'll be ok, kid".  Working for her is not hard, sometimes mentally, but I am tolerant, I think being 50 brings a bit of wisdom in itself, life's problems aren't such a big deal anymore.  I have no room to complain about my aches and pains around her, I am still very young.

Some of my stepsons are still going through some major issues right now, some happy, some not so, even tragic, major life altering.  I am sad, but as with looking at my own bumpy past I realize things always work out, our experiences either define us & we grow or fade away into our own cave of depression.  Through divorce, alcoholism, moves and job changes everything works out one way or the other.  For me, I have to know when to step in and when to shut my mouth.  I was very disappointed to find out that I wasn't able to have my grandsons on Friday night as planned.  Things happened, others interfered and I was overlooked, not even notified until I called to see what was going on.  I was angry at first, blew up, vented, then I realized that this as always was the way things were done when there was a crisis with these guys...I looked back at our past and saw this...but things always, always swung back ... back to norm.  

Took a deep breath, called my son, had Liz call her boyfriend and we'll be having our own picnic Monday.

The new school year started fine, my routes are great, nice children and I only made 2 kids cry!

As for my golf story...I was all set to have a couple hour trip which lasted much longer.  The very small team of 6 freshman were bused to a golf outing in a very upscale subdivision.  Even though every male in my family plays golf I have no clue as to how it's played.  When I dropped the boys off at the clubhouse coach told me they'd be done in 4 hours, instead it was 7.  Fortunately for me I love to walk and had money for an ice tea, which I had to pay for at the bar...a bus driver in a bar !!  The neighborhood was lovely, at least 1/2 a million dollar homes set up in rows with garages and alley ways in the back.  They had their own little town square complete with a store, dry cleaner and fire truck!

Mostly I admired the landscaping.  Very lovely, and colorful, with perfectly bright green grass.  Being it was a new development most of trees were young and short.  A sure sign of  new.   Many of the homes had various types of fencing, arbors, patios/porches/decks.  The yards were too small for swimming pools, maybe I missed the clubhouse which contained the 'town' pool.  One family even got adventurous and had 4 large tomato plants growing out back. 

Mostly Hummers, BMW's and higher end cars parked in the driveways.   The streets didn't have normal 4 way stops they had the fancy European circular 5 way stops.  Thankfully with stop signs rather than yields...which are scary for a bus driver as no one wants to be the one to yield! 

I think money most buy whatever it wants as one area even had palm trees growing...from the ground, not in pots...unheard of in Illinois!

It was a nice place to visit, but there is no place like home!  We have trees taller than 10 foot high!    Maybe in 20 years I'll visit again and see how far they've come!

Until then I'll enjoy the rest of my weekend and you do the same!