Weekend: Being Boring

The kids’ Saturday activities are wrapping up; the four year old had his last soccer session and the nine year old has one more session of dance next week. There is still Mandarin Class for the four year old and swim clinic for the nine year old on Sunday, but we’re keeping Saturday pretty open for December so that we feel like we will have the capacity to partake in some holiday festivities as they come up. The Botanical Garden’s annual holiday train is outside this year, and I’m looking forward to a trip down to the Mall to see that. And I definitely want to take in one of the light displays in the area. And there is a Christmas Tree, and putting up the Christmas lights….

I’m not sure what possessed us, but on Saturday, we decided to take a trip to the Pringel Family Creamery, about an hour away. It seemed like a reasonable Saturday afternoon family adventure. We had gone there on the ice cream tour last summer and really liked the pimento cheese. They also have an Everything Bagel Cheese spread that is really good too. In the summer, there were lots of cows out and you could sit outside, eating your ice cream while watching the cows waddle through the pasture. It being November, there were only a few cows and it was too cold to eat ice cream outside. But I did enjoy my cherry chocolate chunk ice cream inside and that was nice.

Afterwards we found a little trail and went on, what I called a “tromp through the woods.” As it was already getting dark – the sun is setting by 5pm these days – we only went for about half an hour, but it was a nice little path and it was nice to stretch our legs among trees and streams and logs.

Sunday, I took the four year old to Mandarin class. I had to bring the baby with me, so I didn’t get my run in, but I did take the baby on a walk and we saw a family of deer. That was pretty cool. I know deer are kind of regarded as a nuisance around here, but it still makes me breathless to see one.

One of the websites in my Feedly is A Poem A Day, and the other day, Wendy Cope’s poem Being Boring dropped into my feed. The last lines of the poem are:

Someone to stay home with was all my desire
And, now that I’ve found a safe mooring,
I’ve just one ambition in life: I aspire
To go on and on being boring.

I was thinking of this poem the other day, when my self-employed friend who is trying to navigate the world of online dating asked me, “What is it like to have a both a job and a life partner that you like? It’s like you have it all.”

Well, first of all, I only have a job that I really like off and on, which I think helps me feel really appreciate it. And I have a great husband, but we still squabble over socks (mine) left on the floor. And then I thought… I never really think that I “have it all”. Or if I do really have it all, this isn’t what I thought it would be like. All this mundane day to day. The diapers and bills and constant cleaning and tears and bedtimes and carpool and evenings exhausted zoned out in front of the tv. It is certainly a lucky and privileged kind of mundane life, but it is definitely not exciting. There are no European vacations (even pre-COVID) or fancy cars and I wear ratty sweatpants more than I care to admit. (Actually, not really. I am happy to admit that I live in sweatpants and leggings these days).

I mean a trip for Pimento cheese and cherry chocolate ice cream… that sounds like enough of an adventure for me some days.

Maybe the answer to my friend’s question is that having it all is actually pretty boring. And that’s a good thing. It’s that “Safe mooring” that Cope writes about.