surprise!

My daughter Katie started a tradition of walking me to my car and waving goodbye when her eldest son was just a baby. Soon this wave goodbye transformed into them shouting, "surprise!" and me acting like I was surprised just as my car was leaving the drive.

Now saying "surprise!" is ingrained and causes William quite a bit of consternation if I slide out before he has a chance to properly see me off.

William loves surprises. Loves the mysteries and delights of life... but all surprises are not met with immediate joy.

The Thesaurus gives these synonyms for surprise: to be caught unawares, off-guard, be unexpected, startle and astonish

Yesterday my boss called me fifteen minutes before my first class was to arrive and told me I would be doing something else during that time. She did not mess up my plans intentionally, but my plans for that day and thus the plans for the week that will follow have been placed on end. Now, rather than knowing exactly what I want to do with the 8th graders next week, and how much time whatever I end up doing will take, I am at a kind of a loss. And a loss with a group of kids that need me to know what I am doing all the time puts me at a disadvantage. This little surprise could have been averted had she talked to me the day before, had we taken the time to look at the schedule and my lesson objectives.

The other day my youngest daughter told me how she longed to do some landscaping in her yard and we walked all around the back talking about what could go here, what could happen there. But now, as I am warming to the subject, she is beginning to cool. I know I need to back off, to let her make all her own decisions, live in all her own struggles... but I was surprised by what felt like a change of heart and left feeling a bit on the side lines, which of course is where I am and where I should be.

And today, I checked my eldest's blog, as I do often and found myself completely surprised by the turn of events. I have known for a couple of days something was afoot, and have really worked at not speculating what might be happening, but really, when I read the blog and viewed the pictures I was completely caught off guard and more than a little confused. She is evidently very happy, and her happiness has always put me at ease. But this is such an unexpected turn of events, that even after reading her e-mail to me, I am still in a bit of shock.

I need a life. I need a life of my own and I need it now. Now this is no surprise... but knowing it, and saying it don't seem to get me any closer to living it.