my personal space
Tonight I had an unexpected phone call. My oldest brother (who is almost 20 years older than me) had a stroke. Through the testing to determine the damage caused by the stroke, they’ve discovered he has brain tumours. If he survives until morning, they will be operating to remove the tumours.
His oldest daughter was about a year and a half younger than me. So, he has always been far more like an uncle than a brother. As far as uncles go, he is one of my favourites.
Unschooling Voices #12 is up. Thanks, Kim.
Everyone in our house has the occasional tendency to start talking out loud midway through a conversation/train of thought going on in their head. Emma is no exception. There are times when she shows how astute she is.
Earlier this week Emma and I were in the office: her at one computer and I at the other. She asked me if we had any money left from selling the green house. I did explain that although we had spent most of it, we didn’t have to pay the bills for the green house anymore. She said nothing in the 5 minutes before or after that. Nor did she give any sign that she heard my explanation. But I’m sure she did. Prior to the sale of the green house she was aware we were running under a tight budget. For the last couple weeks the belt has been loosened a notch or two. Since last weekend we were planning on a shopping trip to Fredericton for this weekend. It may take a few months for her to realize that still having the green house was why we had to run on a tight budget, but I’m sure she will eventually.
Last night while sitting at opposite computers from the last story Emma asked, “Doesn’t war makes them bigger?” with a hint of don’t be silly. Again this came out in the middle of a good spell of silence. I looked over at her screen. She was watching the Schoolhouse Rock DVD. I had to watch the video for about a minute (the volume was low enough I couldn’t catch all the audio) before I figured out what this particular episode was about. It was explaining DEFICIT using a household budget to illustrate spending exceeding income. If we were a household that watched the nightly news, news channels, read the daily papers, etc. then I probably would have expected something like this from her. The truth is that we DON’T buy newspapers, watch news channels or the evening news. I’m still thinking through where she might have garnered the information for this conclusion. Out of the mouths of babes.
Just as a brief follow-up, the money went into our account this afternoon. Since we have never sold via a third party before, we had a few surprises along the way. Everyone involved got their chip off the proceeds. And that’s kind of what happened to me along the way. So, as much as it was home, at this point I’m just glad it’s over. I’m already moving on. If 2008 is the year I’m hoping it to be, then we will make up all those chips by the end of the year in the carrying costs we no longer have to pay.
I will say it was educational. I learned far more about the real estate market via this than I would have learned from any amount of reality realty shows. Next time around (which I expect will be a long way off), we will be better prepared.
This morning I received an email from our lawyer that said he had received a copy of all of the papers necessary to draw up the documents for the sale of the green house. Yesterday we finished signing off agreements on the outstanding conditions for a purchase-sale agreement. I won’t get to much into the details for 2 reasons. First, I know Andrea wants to talk about it. Second, we are both somewhat waiting for the second shoe to fall. So, we are waiting for the money to be in the bank, so to speak, before doing too much talking.
Even though that sounds somewhat tentative, at 51 weeks to go, 2008 is looking like it could be a vast improvement over 2007. And we know already that the year is going to have some challenges and hurdles for us. One of those is our renovation plans. The last few weeks of cold weather have made it clear that the first priorities renovation wise will have to be addressing a handful of high heat loss areas. We won’t be able to get to all of the heat loss areas in one year (there are 38 exterior doors & windows many of which are original). We’ll just start at the worst place and when that’s done move onto the next one. Before we start at that, I plan on taking a month off from that sort of thing to ‘recharge my batteries’.
I have to be honest and say, I’m not going to miss you much. I’ve had worse years. I’ve had better years. There is alot I will remember from you, but not all of them would be called memorable.
I’m looking forward to 2008. While I’m sure it won’t be all smooth sailing, I am expecting it to be more memorable.
I read somewhere several years ago that in the English language of the 19th and earlier that blessed meant ‘happy, and to be envied’. With that in mind, I wish to extend to you my most sincere wish that you are blessed throughout the year 2008.
I know it’s been a long while since I’ve written a homeschooling post. I’ve been keeping busy. Here and there, there have been things that Emma has said or done that I wanted to write about but never seemed to have them in mind when I had time to write.
Since we are now back under the same roof, Emma and I have gotten back to the routine of me reading her a story before tucking her in for the night. One night in the last couple months, I was going through a bit of a cold. I had to stop reading to get a kleenex from Meaghan’s night stand. I handed Emma the book to hold while I did that. She picked up reading where I left off and continued reading until I sat down beside her again.
One night this weekend I asked her if she wanted to read a few pages and she read the first 7 or 8 pages and then handed me the book saying, “You can read now.” Her reading ability has been developing steadily over the last year. Other than help with the odd word here and there, she is self sufficient.
Oddly enough, the main reason I haven’t been talking that much about homeschooling is that we aren’t doing anything out of our normal day to day family routine. We talk about things. If the opportunity comes up we talk about the math related to some subject or other. We share things we’ve learned with each other. In a real sense there isn’t anything to talk about outside of living. And those are the things that I’ve been talking about as of late.
The update on the green house is that it is still on the market. A second open house is scheduled for this weekend. The thing we had not talked about was that the first person who looked at the house did put in an offer on it about 2 weeks the first visit. It took about another week to come to a purchase-sale agreement. Due to extenuating circumstances, there were special consideration(s)/options (depending on which side you were on). A few weeks later we agreed to an extension. That extension was up in the last couple weeks. As it stands now, that deal has fallen through. We are hoping for good news in the next 3 weeks though. But, at this point, it is probably one of the things that is pressing on us most.
Even though I will not be celebrating Thanksgiving this weekend, I will enjoy being home with my family. For the readers in the US, I hope it’s a great weekend for you.
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You Are Socks! |
 Cozy and warm… but easily lost. You make a good puppet. |
… in another small corner of the internet.
Andrea & I tossed the parental coin to decide who would go. Even though I would have liked to have gone, I’m glad she did. I probably would not have got a decent shot. She easily snapped 50 good ones.
Earlier this evening I read this paragraph over Andrea’s shoulder:
Within you there is courage, grace, honour, integrity. These are things that are not advertised but that resound throughout your life with far greater impact than appearance. They do not sell products, they are contradictory to you becoming one, but they are of the utmost importance. They do not mean that you cannot be beautiful, only that without them being beautiful is worthless. – Matthew Good
In the few hours that have passed since I read Matt’s post, the struggle I have had has been not wanting to distract you from what he has said. There is probably not alot that I can say that will improve upon it. He has done an excellent job of contrasting that which is priceless and that which is worthless.
But, I do disagree with him on one small point.
My main purpose in this address is simply to convince you that this desire is one of the great permanent mainsprings of human action. It is one of the factors which go to make up the world as we know it-this whole pell-mell of struggle, competition, confusion, graft, disappointment, and advertisement, and if it is one of the permanent mainsprings then you may be quite sure of this. Unless you take measures to prevent it, this desire is going to be one of the chief motives of your life, from the first day on which you enter your profession until the day when you are too old to care. – C.S. Lewis
Snobbery (under the guise of different names) has been around for generations.
I’m a few years older than Matt. I grew up in the time when the aura of the 60′s was in it’s death throes. I do not believe I was under any less pressure to conform than my children’s peers are. What is obvious is that they are under pressure to conform to something different, somthing more superficial. What’s come to mind while writing this post is what happened to “friends” when I turned down offers to participate (in a variety of things). For example, I lost alot of “friends” by turning down alcohol. It turned out that I wasn’t a friend at all, but someone to drink with. What I’ve always found ridiculous about this was that if I had wanted to blame in on something (Andrea, the wagon, religion, etc.), I could have escaped the dissociation. But simply not wanting to drink was unacceptable.
A young person today is likely suffer the same fate if they are unwilling to be shallow, self-absorbed, manipulative and materialistic (or, at least, maintain the appearance of being so). I did say, though, that it was a small point. One of the reasons I feel that way is that the “60′s ideal” may take 30-40 years to catch up to you. But, I expect that “today’s ideal” of superficiality catchs up far faster than that.
In the last 4 weeks, I’ve slept away from home 14 days. But, the house is finished. It’s ready to go on the market.
I’m due for a rest, I think. In the last 18 months, Andrea and I have not slept in our bed for 7 consecutive nights. I’ve slept away from home for more than 2/3 of those nights. When I think about it, those are pretty brutal statistics.
It’s good to be home. Give me a few days to rest up 
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