Assessment

Oh, hello. I didn't see you there.

The summer comes to an anxious conclusion. The emotions fighting for expression are making it truly difficult to concentrate on any one thing. My dreams have been active, animated and bizarre, struggling for realization. There is too much to do, and I can't get my head around any of it.

I crave two sleepless days to revise one of my scripts. Tonight there will be a rehearsal/reading on another that won't even be performed for six months, but there is no time, we need to figure this out starting now. I need to think of a ten-minute play within the next twenty-four hours.

Work is normal for August, reams of reports due for the end of the fiscal year, and requests due for the next one. A pile of half-completed proposals in my office, days spent staring at the screen, trying to be ar-tic-u-late.

The children have been virtually destroyed by the summer, by Labor Day they will be begging for school. A different camp, a road trip, weeks spent with the grandparents, weddings, plays, games. I miss the Olympics, for two weeks (really? it was for only two weeks?) we came together in front of the TV every night to watch whatever was on. Usually women's beach volleyball. Watching sport is a great family activity. I never knew this.

As I bragged three months ago, I did not lose any toenails during the Cleveland Marathon. I understand this is something that happens, odd though it may seem. But it did appear I had bruised three of them, and I did not know if that meant they "died". Well, one appears to finally have come undone, and will fall off soon. Really? Three months later? Sorry to have to share that with you. I feel like the fly.

Our personal economy is troubling. There is a lot of work to be done on our house. We had a guy over to look at the garage, which has been propped up and held together for years. It is original to the house, and it is done, we need to get a new one. New garage, I have a new (used) car. I sit in our unfinished basement wondering what if? while the boy practices drums. He's pretty good, he's only seven.

The girl will come with me to work today. After a dozen weeks of camps she's finally been hit with one she hates, and we just can't stand to send her there any more. For perhaps the first time in her nine year life, she has entered a situation where she cannot find one person to connect with, not even one. She makes friends so easily, it must be quite a shock. Part of us think we should just tell her to suck it up and go, but she's not a spoiled girl, she does everything we tell her to do, always. She needs a break from the summer. I think we all do.