The past couple days the kids have been kind of, how should I say it...hateful to one another. Though they walk around the perimeter of the hotel, hiking along the blacktop is not the same as taking a relaxing stroll through the mountain park we were staying before our trek back to Atlanta. The pool is closed for maintenance this week and since we've not been out sightseeing for the past few days, they are bored and boredom leads to picking, instigating and finally, the hotel room erupts into a not so pleasant environment. I've had it. Yesterday I awoke with a wonderful plan to drag those children and bored puppy out to a nearby state park where they could run, walk, climb and expend all that pent up energy but when I pulled back the curtain and saw the darkened sky with storm clouds, I knew that plan was not going to materialize. Instead, the boys went to the warehouse and helped unload 300 windows. How's that for using up that pent up energy? By the time they returned several hours later, they were too tired to say mean things. Rather, they chose to commiserate with one another about how hard they had worked for no pay. But the tone of the conversation quickly turned as they decided that building muscles was better than getting a few bucks and can't wait to show off their new 'guns', while wondering how long it will take them to have muscles like their Dad. Keep lifting those windows boys....
My daughter and I went to the thrift store and returned happily two hours later with an armload of new reading material. I wonder how long it will take before I remember that I live in a camper and no longer have room for all my books? Must pass up books. Must pass up books. Must pass up books. Oh well, maybe we'll read them all by the time we head back to the camper on Saturday and I can donate them back to the thrift store. Well, most of them anyway. I did find a couple keepers, out-of-print Landmark books that the boys already began devouring, The Battle of the Bulge and The War in Korea. All I needed was a few good books and all I hear coming from this hotel room is the turning of crisp pages and the puppy chewing on his new bone. AAAAHHHH, blessed silence, well almost....
© 2009 Tonya Prater/Live the Adventure