Surviving Pomp and Circumstance

I was doing just fine until the Herron High School orchestra started playing Pomp and Circumstance.

Turns out that tune is severely emotional and has been evoking the drama for more than a century, so I'm not crying: you're crying.

Also, my mascara dripped into my eyeballs, so I was fighting on two fronts.

I have two words of advice for moms still to face this rite of passage: waterproof mascara.

Alison's graduation was marked more by laughter than tears, thank goodness.

In preparation, Ali and I cleaned the house. That included waxing the floors, which I haven't done in a while. I have a fun video of her but the technology isn't working for me to share it here. You'll have to go over to Facebook to see that and her walk across the stage to snag her diploma.

Ali enjoyed the smooth surface on Day 1 which included her making a slip-and-slide with a furry throw onto which she threw herself and slid from the hall to the fireplace. I submit it was her extra polishing that made the floor a danger zone, but it seemed to be my name invoked whenever anyone slipped a bit.

"Watch out, Mom greased the floors," is Alison's warning to anyone who steps foot into the living room.

The Captain was not amused whatsoever. "Never again, Cheryl Reed," he said more than once.

There's more risk of slippage to come with her party this weekend. I'm sure Ali will post warning signs. So come at your own risk. But please do come. If you want to check your hair or your make-up, all you have to do is look down. Also, if the rain ever stops, much of the event will be outside where it's safer.

Slippage and the occasional loss of emotional control aside, it has truly been a wonderful week - made infinitely better by the appearance of family from Maine and Indiana and the friends who count fully as family. We're very grateful to those who who celebrated with us for the official night where seats were limited and occurred in the evening of the middle of the work week.

Grandpa is still recovering and had to stay home, but we toasted him and knew he was with us in spirit. Auntie Jen and Uncle James flew in from Maine and I I forced them to pose with the airport Indy sign.

Let's refrain from trying to understand exactly what Jen was trying to convey.  She'd come a long way and had been up since 3 a.m. Personally, I think it was a good effort at a capital "I." I probably love her more than you do, so I won't make scarecrow references...

We had a great, albeit rainy, few days of shopping for dorm room necessities, eating, catching up and trying to stop an explosive-laden passenger train from killing a bunch of people. On paper, we failed in our Escape Room adventure. That was in part because one trick failed to work as designed and also because great detectives, we are not. On the other hand, we didn't kill each other as we scrambled to decode and detect in a timed game that required math.

Because graduation night was so late, we delayed our dinner to Thursday night and walked up to Petite Chou fortified by Dom Perignon in King David Dog cups.

There's more graduation fun to come, of course. Tonight is Rachael's grad party down home. Ali's is next weekend and there are dozens in between. It's also Race Weekend  in Indy, or as the rest of the country defines it: Memorial Day weekend. That means race parties on top of birthday and grad parties and Book Club last night.

I'm going to need all of Memorial Day to recover.