Outta the nest

My little buddy roommate - let's call her K - moved away today. I'm happy for her, but it's kinda like when my kids went to college. You're happy for them, and it's time. But it's a little sad. She's moving to Clear Lake where her sig other has taken a job. K will telecommute for her present employer.

K graduated from college last spring (2008) and took a job in DM. Her longtime honey still had a year to go in college, so K ended up living in Waukee (houseville-it's a suburb of lots of houses, not much else) with her Auntie Joan, who like me lives separate of her spousal unit each week. K spent most weekends in Ames with her honey, former roommates and friends. But she didn't really have much of a life during the week.

Since she knew this DM gig was most likely a temporary thing, she didn't spend time trying to meet people her age. And the people she works with don't seem to be "friend" material. The person she's closest with there is older than I am!

K's weekday evenings for the past year have consisted of working out, surfing on the computer and watching a little TV. Plus talking to Joan and me when we're around. K was stuck in transition- waiting for a future point when her real life would start.

I'll miss having her around - it's been fun getting to know her better. But I'm excited for her! Now she and her honey can spend some quality time together. They can meet people and join sports leagues. Stuff couples do. Real livin'.

It was hell

I always liked the quote from one of my most valued B. Kliban books that Vicki and I loved in college. Pithy sayings with line drawing cartoons. Words to live by! Things like "Chiggers can be boozers" with a picture of a drunk chigger in a gutter with a bottle (instead of beggars can't be choosers), and "Hey Cuba, eat my Florida". Funny!

One was a picture of a grizzled old guy saying "It was hell recalled former child!" Except it wasn't hell. It was just much different than today's children experience. At book club the other night we discussed the stuff we used to do since there wasn't much on TV and we didn't have all those sophisticated video games etc. Plus there were more kids in our neighborhood, due to larger families.

We spent a great deal of time playing outdoors this time of year. Our house was a newer house on the edge of an older neighborhood - address 202 Crombie Place. It was a great place to grow up! Just down the big hill (bad idea to ride my trike down it that time - crash and burn!) was Fairlawns - a post WWII housing development with small starter homes filled with families.

The amounted to a lotta kids to play with! We did lots of running around. You could usually ride around on your bike and scrounge up something to do. Our next door neighbors, the Reinertsons had kids about the same age as each of us - either 1 year older or younger. We spent a lot of time with that family. Oh how I loved it when the older kids allowed us to join into their games! Freeze tag, Sardines, some ghost game where you said "1 o'clock and the ghosts are out" and so on. Kick the can caused Katherine Reinertson to cut her foot once - poorly chosen coffee can.

Most days were spent at the Country Club pool where we were on the go constantly. Baby pool, big pool, chairs to tip and cover with a towel to make a fort, snack shop, locker room, TV room. We watched Dark Shadows each day. We played Shark and Nibbles. We pretended to take each other's photo while going off the diving board. It was all great fun.

I'm sorry kids today have to be so supervised, and that they can't move about as freely as we did in the good old days. It's much more complicated for them to have a play date. They probably don't often get so busy that they forget to eat like we did. Finally Mom or Dad would track us down and we'd come in for a meal. Bathtime was truly needed after a day of all those activities. We were the lucky ones!