Little loud one has not been such this weekend.  She had a fever for 2 days and pretty much just laid on the couch, snuggling with ninjamicrokitten, drinking ginger ale, and watching nonstop tv.  This morning dawned with the fever gone and my needing an end to the quietness.  Because really, this kid needs to be noisy.  She’s not herself unless she’s breaking eardrums and so on.  A quiet little loud one is a crime against nature.

I had a plan.  I figured a guarantee to get some volume outta this kid would be to tell her to clean her room or practice her drum.  I left the house to do my duty to all humanity with the plan in place.  I would walk in the door and make that demand and let the ruckus begin.  Apparently the spouse and I were on the same page, because when I returned home (from doing my duty to all humanity), the ruckus was in full swing.  There’s the little loud one singing the “I want to go outside to play and there’s no way I’m practicing my drum” song.  And I do mean singing.  The words are very clever.  They are:  I want to go outside to play. and. There’s no way I’m practicing my drum.  Sometimes separate, sometimes together.  It’s good music.  The other symphony in the ruckus was the lament of the fever stealing her weekend.  We all know that the last thing she wanted to do this weekend was lay around watching tv.

A couple summers ago, little loud one did some summer camps. The director got a twitch every morning when she walked in.  This child has no inside voice.  Sometime at the end of that summer, we saw him outside at some kind of festival.  He greeted little loud one like he was happy to see her.  She was very quiet in her response.  He was dumbfounded, really, until we called it her “outside voice.”  We got a lot of mileage out of telling her to use her “outside voice” when we wanted her to talk more quietly.  When she’s being particularly loud, I’ll ask her if she needs a megaphone.  Of course she doesn’t.  It doesn’t help with the volume, but it does help me laugh about it.  We often laugh about her “going to 11″ ala Spinal Tap.  Because she does.  Go to 11.

It has now been an hour.  The ruckus has changed form.  She spent a solid 30 minutes writing the perfect plan for the afternoon, which includes the 30 minutes of drum practice, so I’m ok with it. It also includes watching a movie, because apparently there wasn’t quite enough screen time yesterday. Still no actual practicing, but I’m ok with that too. And playing the ukelele, because no day is complete without that.  It’s all good.  Because there’s a plan and it’s not a quiet one.

“Hey Mom, you wanna hear a nerd song?”

I live for it. (and she recognized the sarcasm and it neither offended her nor stopped her.)

And then I had to watch this thriller, because we are well-balanced.

The others haven’t been discarvard.

She takes after her father. 

Oh, and I hear her social plans for the afternoon include dressing up as a Victorian woman and reenacting some Jack the Ripper scenes.

I just got home from one of my favorite early November events at the local high school.  At the end of marching band season, the band does an indoor concert of all their half-time music and stand cheers from the football games.  I try not to miss this concert, because our music program is totally awesome, the football games are fun, and the concert is a great time.

I had an extra reason for going to and enjoying the show.  My kid, the freshman, was there!  You have no idea how huge this is.  She’s been reluctantly playing the clarinet since 4th grade.  I’ve been nagging every step of the way.  I mean every step.  She wanted to quit every week in the first year.  Then she realized that quitting in the middle of the year wasn’t going to happen, so she just didn’t practice as she should and then whined at the end of every year that she didn’t want to do another year.  A couple of those middle school years she didn’t speak to me much, because I was just darn stubborn on this one.  I’m a pretty powder puff mom, so this is big.

Why was I so obsessed about her doing band?  Because I knew, almost without a second of doubt, that this kid would LOVE marching band.  I know I did.  Practices, band camp, football games, bus trips, competitions, fugly wool uniforms, spats, cold nights, memorizing music, not watching the football games, trips to Kennywood, singing ridiculous songs, hanging out.  Marching band was the best way to have fun in a totally geeky way and be part of a group in a time of life when being a part of something was so necessary.   I wanted this for my kid- who doesn’t always belong to a group and seriously doesn’t make her own plans yet (and I’m so done making playgroup plans.)

This girl o’ mine is stubborn, I’ll give her that.  She sort of agreed to give marching band a try. I think I might have said words like “give it a year and if you don’t like it….”  The first day of band camp, she was nervous.  Maybe a little excited?  When I pulled into the school parking lot to pick her up at the end of practice, I could immediately tell two things:  she’d had a good time and she didn’t want to tell me that.  I bided my time.  Well, the silly girl couldn’t even make it the whole way home (a 5 minute drive) without spilling the following words, “mommy, you were right!”  Heck, yea, I was right.  And it’s been a blast the whole season.  She’s loved the practices, the parades, the games, the activities, the concert.  She adores the kids who are in her little group.  She’s had social plans on more days than I can keep track.  And she’s happy and enjoying high school.  Who can beat that?

What were those words again?  “Mommy, you were right.”  Those are some beautiful words.

I was going to post a link, but you don’t wanna see it anyway, do you?  Let me just say that the Earth, Wind and Fire show was totally awesome and it’s astounding how well a bunch of high school kids can play Stars and Stripes Forever (best march ever written, imho).

And we’re at year number 2 with nagging the second kiddo.  She’ll start marching band the year after her sister graduates. 

I have a love/hate relationship with driving.

My first experience with driving was when my dad was teaching my older brother how to drive.  We went to the parking lot of our church in our enormous station wagon with the genuine fake wood panel doors.  I was in the back seat- I have no idea why.  Well, my dad must have been bored with teaching the real learning permit person or some such, or maybe I was complaining, or maybe I was just such an awesome kid,  In any case my dad told me to give it a try.  I sat down in the big front seat at the steering wheel, my 14 year old self a little cocky about Dad letting ME drive.  I hit the gas- I must have- because the next thing I know I’m SLAMMING the brakes.  I slammed the brakes so hard the big old bench back seat slammed into the big old front seat.  I broke the car!  Needless to say, it was a long time after my 16th birthday before I finally learned to drive.  I have no idea if that was all my choice or not.

When I did finally get my license, my parents were way stingy with the keys.  I didn’t get to drive to school like I thought I should be able to.  I didn’t get to go cruising with my friends like I thought I should be able to.  I was allowed to drive to the library.  And sometimes I actually did, I was that kind of geek.  But I always took a little extra time with getting to/from the library.  I had a few places I liked to drive.  There was a string bean boy I had a crush on who lived in a neighborhood on my way.  Yea, I liked to drive by his house.  He lived on a no outlety kind of street, so really no purpose for being on that street… at all.  So, the one time that I drove by his house that he was actually OUTSIDE and SAW ME, I about keeled over.  I think he might have waved.  I hope that my stalking days were over, can’t quite remember.  I do know that he declined, politely but firmly, my invitation to the Sadie Hawkins dance. 

Right near his house was this totally awesome hill.  When I hit it at just the right speed, the car would fly.  I mean it- tires left the pavement.  I loved that feeling- still do!  Well, one day I’m driving my dad’s little Chevy Citation with a boxed up washing machine in the back (yea, don’t ask), not thinking so much about what that box was going to do when the car went airborn.  I’m pretty sure there was damage.  I’m pretty sure I got in trouble.  There was probably some grounding. (I was always grounded.)

I have car issues. I get lost.  Sometimes on purpose.  I’ve run out of gas more than a few times, but not recently.  I have a history of hitting parked cars, but again, not recently.  I have trouble parallel parking.  I got a ticket this summer for parking too far away from the curb, because the parking police don’t have quite enough to do in this town.

I love long car trips, solo.  I made quite a few voyages when I was just me- I thought nothing of a 14 hour drive.  Especially if there’s a friend at the other end.  I’ve been to North Carolina a few times.  (don’t be scared, I don’t have 14 hours of free time anymore) Someday I hope to drive all the way to California.  That just sounds about perfect.  And I’d almost want to start at the beach on this coast.  Just because.

My most recent driving experience was just a few minutes ago, picking up the spawn from band rehearsal.  I watched her terrify a boy to the point that he fell to the ground (ah, she takes after her mother.)  While I had this song cranked.  As soon as she got in the car, she tried to turn it down.  I won.