Susan Senator

This is a blog post that is merely a news report, nothing pithy, and therefore, nothing to pith anyone off. What is on my mind today is water, but really, deep down, worry about water. We are getting that $#@ sewage pipe replaced — all 30 feet of it — out of our front lawn. The water will be off all day. No little drinkies spilled down the drain, no flushes. Who will be the first to forget?

This job is a result of a video that was taken of the inside of the pipe, that revealed tree root invasion in eleven places, and pipe so broken that it is not meeting up with pipe in three places. How will they do this job, with snow on the ground and the air temp being low thirties, if that? Ned and I are sitting here shrugging and feeling very, very nervous about the job. It is so hard to be a grown-up, sometimes, and look into these things and know all you have to know.

I think I would rather be a kid than this construction-managing, food-shopping, meal-preparing, clothing-washing adult that I now am. As a kid, you don’t have to worry about sewage, except your own. And it provides endless material for jokes, which every one around you gets.

I got so deep into my dance class yesterday (Baby Bellies) that I felt like a kid, too. I was actually disappointed when the first mom showed up. This time, I was so much with them, so in-the-moment, that I felt like one of them, in some ways, or like a neato older sister in others. They were asking to do this or that, and for me to show them. They actually told me how they like to learn, which is to just try doing the stuff as I do it, watching me. So two of them asked to learn a dance routine — can you believe it, that is ambitious stuff! — and so I tried to make one up, using only moves I had taught them. I put on my trusty Misirlou, the George Abdo version, and just felt the music tell me what to do. Knowing the piece so well, I could warn them of tempo changes ahead of time, and of what I would do next. At one point I saw, out of the corner of my eye, four flashes of colored veil: gold, pink, green, and lavender, all swirling at the same time, the same direction. Oh my God, I thought, they are doing it. They are dancing. They get it.