Perfect Storm

At the end of July we hosted a party for my daughter who had graduated from high school back in May. It was a HOT and HUMID July afternoon, pretty par for the course for summer in the Midwest. I had decided that I was going to cater it all and not worry about a thing. It has been a stressful year and even harder summer, with lots going on in our family and little time to worry about the details of a backyard event. However, I did want to pull off a great party for my daughter who has worked so hard to get where she is and deserved a day of attention and celebration.

Lucky for me, Ted worked nonstop to get the yard ready. If you know us, you know we have a large backyard with a decent sized ~~swamp~~ wetland taking up a corner of it. There are random groundhog/skunk/raccoon holes all over it. Add a swing set, multiple trees, and a huge slope leading from the street level to the lower-level walkout basement, and he had a lot of work to do. Also lucky for me, I have a sister who came into town a day early to help with the indoor work. (Not lucky for me: A dog that has had extensive gastrointestinal issues which results in steaming cow pies in our yard and frequent sulfurous gas emissions.)

The day of the party we were in pretty good shape. That morning, we woke up at 8am to get the final decorations on the tent before the party started at 2pm. It was a steamy and hot already. (For the record, I am terrible in the heat. I sweat like a sumo wrestler in a sauna.) Franny, my sister Melissa, and I began by carefully moving the rented tables and chairs onto level ground to avoid the large divots in the yard. We gently placed the royal blue fancy tablecloths on the tables and made sure they hung evenly all around. Ted and his brother had strung outdoor lights throughout the tent. Franny assembled around 20 lanterns of different sizes and hung them evenly and symmetrically from one corner of the tent to another. Melissa spent a lot of time stringing together a banner of paper triangles to hang as bunting around the perimeter of the tent. We all worked hard as the time slipped by until around 12:30pm, when we felt we were done. We were drenched in sweat and disgusting.

We had about 45 minutes to get ready before the food arrived. Ted ran to the store to get ice and Franny ran to Target to get a last-minute item. Melissa and I went upstairs to shower. I even had time to sit on my bed after the shower and take a short break before the work began again.

Now, I realize this a long, boring build-up to my story. But you need to know the extent of the work that was done before disaster hit. And it hit fast and furiously. At 12:45pm, around an hour and 15 minutes before the guests would arrive, and after four hours of prep, Ted arrived home from getting ice to see a truck in our driveway and the tent guys packing up our tables and chairs.

Apparently, the owner “Steve” (I’m going to protect the poor guy and not use his real name), got his dates wrong. He thought pick-up was the day of my party, not the next day. The tent was halfway disassembled. The lights had been cut down and were tossed aside. The flags Melissa had so carefully strung and hung were ripped off the tent and lying crumpled on the ground. The tablecloths were in a pile in the dirt. (I really wish I had taken a picture to show you the extent of the damage, but the fury that overtook me prevented me from being calm enough to take a photo).

All I can say was I thought I was in a dream.

I don’t know how to explain what came over me, but I ran down to the yard yelling like I was possessed. It’s possible that the stress of 2026 funneled into my brain, personality, and mouth all at once and was released on that poor guy. I won’t repeat what I said, but it ended with Steve (a big, tall, burly man) sitting on a chair re-stringing those delicate flags with his beefy hands.

Side Note: I don’t know how a person could look at a tent that was strung with lights and banners and flags and lanterns and see tables covered in pristine clean tablecloths and maybe if you looked around notice that there wasn’t really any garbage laying around and not be able to deduct that maybe A PARTY HAD NOT HAPPENED YET. Why he didn’t stop short and think, “Hmm..maybe I should double check my dates,” or “Hmm..maybe I should knock on the door and ask them if they want their lights or lanterns or tablecloths before I rip them off this tent and throw them all on the ground,” I just don’t know.

We had a little over one hour to get the place set up again. Except this time, we had two very frightened tent workers helping us. I can’t comment on anything during his part of the day because I actually walked away and let the rest of my family handle it. What I can comment on with confidence, is that none of us ever really recovered from the heat. The next hour was such a rush that I started sweating again and never stopped. I did not wear what I was planning on wearing. I did not wear my hair down the way I was planning. (In fact, in the pictures from the party my hair is a disaster. Why did no one tell me?) My makeup ran off one hour in.

But in the end, it made a good story for everyone who walked through the door. “Did you hear what happened with the tent?” We all had a good laugh as it was fixed before the guests showed up and it looked nice enough that no one noticed. And as with every “I can’t believe this happened” incident with me (and they seem to happen often), mid-way through I was thinking, “This might make a good blog.” But was there enough material? Well, I shouldn’t have worried about that, because what happened the next day left me with no question.

Monday was a dark and overcast morning. It was obvious from the skies and the forecast a storm was coming. I wondered when the tent guys would come to pick up their things and was surprised they hadn’t arrived early in the day. I decided to go outside and make sure all the tables and chairs were completely underneath the tent. I was hoping to get some kind of refund for the trouble the day before, and the last thing I needed was the owner saying his tables were water-damaged and we could call it even.

At around 11:30am it started getting really dark. If you live locally, you will know that in some areas it was dark as night outside that day. Suddenly, the alerts went off loudly in unison on all the phones in our house. Tornado warning. Now, I will admit that I am lazy about tornado warnings. I don’t always take them seriously and go into the basement like I am supposed to. But this time was different. It was very windy and by now black as night. My friend Maggie was visiting, and she and Franny and I went into the basement with the dog and took shelter.

Now, mind you, I have a walk-out basement. So, even though we are “taking shelter,” there are two glass windows and a glass door that lead to the very wooded yard, so I am not sure how safe it actually is. But there we were. It was loud and windy and rain was pelting down and by the now the power was out and it was VERY dark. It was a little bit scary, and at one point I even thought I heard voices, but in a dreamy sort of way, like if you were in a horror movie and strangers show up at your door during a storm looking for shelter while running from aliens.

Except this horror movie was real life and the tent guys were outside my house. it was real life and suddenly Franny yelled, “The tent guys are outside!!”

Yes readers, the oh-so-bright tent gentlemen were back. Taking down my tent in the middle of a tornado.

I went to the door and opened it. Three grown men were wet and shivering on my back patio like stray dogs.

“THERE IS A TORNADO OUTSIDE. GET INSIDE” I ordered them. I was dumbfounded. I am sure I looked like a disappointed and confused mother. What on earth where they doing there? None of them moved. “Oh we’re okay, we’re just going to —” Steve started to say. “GET IN THE HOUSE NOW! WHAT IS WRONG WITH YOU?” I interrupted.

Suddenly Steve looked to his right, “TREE FALLING!” he shrieked, and the next thing you know, he and his lackeys were running into my house while a tree crashed about 10 feet from where he was standing.

I was done with this mayhem. I started barking out orders. “Come in the living room. Don’t touch anything, you are wet and dirty. Don’t sit on my couch. Who is in charge?”

Turns out Steve was the owner. He went on to explain that according to the radar they checked, the storm had passed, so they decided to head to my house to collect the tent and tables. I mean, you don’t need radar to see that it is pitch black outside and windy and rainy and that a tree just fell down next to you. But anyway, there they stood in my basement for about a half hour until they felt it was safe to pack up and leave.

Epilogue: A few days later, the weather report showed c that an actual tornado had touched down in our area. In fact, according to the map, the path of the tornado literally passed through my property. I have to believe it touched down the minute I had opened the door and the tree fell. This is because it matches the time stamp of when I snapped a pic of the Steve and his crew in my basement. (Yes, I took a picture of them. I was already concocting the blog in my head as it was happening.) Unfortunately (or fortunately for them), the power went off as soon as I clicked so the picture is dark, which might be good because I don’t want them to sue me.

I know you are all going to want to know what the rental company was so you can avoid them, but I have used them twice now and I’m not going to ruin a guy’s business because of one mistake. He rectified it immediately and gave me a partial refund and was very apologetic.

Then again, when Ted said, “I’m sure you must feel horrible. This probably never happens to you,” Steve look at him and answered, “Eh, about once a year actually.”

I can’t make this stuff up.

**The path of the tornado,. X marks my house**

Uncategorized

How many days?

Is it possible to wake up cold and sweating at the same time? Even when you are not going through menopause? Well, that is how I was greeted Monday morning. I slept horribly, and not only because one of the campers woke me up at 2:30am to go to the bathroom. (This happened three out of the six nights I was there by the way.) I asked myself if it was child abuse to limit water in the sweltering heat. (No, I did not limit her water. Yes, I considered telling her that bears come out around 2am looking for tasty children.)

The day started with morning activities. These included Orthodox Life, arts and crafts, and swimming lessons. I had made an under-the-table agreement with my co-counselor that if she led all of the water activities, I would take cabin duty every night. What do I care about going to bed early? Let the youngsters have their fun and stay up late, as long as I didn’t have to get into mucky lake water. Unfortunately, when I ran this past the Water Safety Instructor, he had other ideas. With so many campers, they needed both of us to assist.

As we approached the water on day one, I looked over to see the Media Director. (Dammit, was that kid everywhere?) If you are familiar with my blog, you know that I have very little vanity. You have seen the terrible pictures of myself I have posted in the past. But this was going too far. I walked over to the poor kid, looked him directly in the eye and said, “There better not be one picture of me on the camp website in my swimsuit.”

“I got you,” he said, and nodded slowly. Honestly, I don’t care if I scared him or not.

Swim lessons were a disaster with various 8-year-olds crying and clinging to me and not wanting to go under water and thinking they were drowning. After about 15 minutes I was told I could take the criers to the shore and we were done. I happily got out of the water to dry off. Except…I could feel an itch on my leg. I looked down to see something black with a little blood on the back of my calf.

LEECH!!

Oh my gosh, could this camp hell get any worse? The only positive was that this was the moment I realized that I was going to turn this whole experience into a blog and so I better start taking notes on this nightmare.

Turns out the lake had leeches. The directors had taken steps to clear the lake by hiring “Raw Meat Robby,” a local who apparently did this for a living. He was a native of northern Michigan who showed up in his pickup truck, dog in the back, and dropped a bunch of raw meat in traps into the lake to catch the leeches. Yes, this really did happen. No, I don’t think he caught any. Yes, I still eat meat.

After swim lessons one of my little ones who had never been to camp before looked at me and said, “How many days?”

“How many days?” I repeated to her, confused. “Until what?”

“Until I go home.”

“Oh. Five,” I said. And then under my breath, “Same, girl. Same.”

Finally, we reached the end of the day. Just when I thought my responsibilities were over, I learned that a handful of the girls had never showered on their own before. Trying to manage ten girls to move quickly is hard enough; trying to do it with only five showers to work with and half of the girls not knowing what to do is unreasonable.

“Does everyone have a towel? Do you have clean underwear? Get the sand out of your hair! Wear shower shoes! Yes, you have to take a shower every day here! Listen, if you don’t let me comb your hair out I will NOT be around when your mom comes to pick you up!”

And that was just while we were in the cabin getting ready to walk to the bathroom. Then there was the shouting of instructions from outside the shower stall:

“Now shampoo?” one would yell.

“Yes, now shampoo!” I said as I undid the cap and squeezed it out on a hand that sprang out of the shower stall.

“Now conditioner?”

“Yes, now conditioner,” I said as I undid that cap and squeezed that out on another hand.

Finally, I got them all showered and fell into bed.

The next afternoon Franny came running up to me a little worried.

“Mom,” she said, “you’re going to have to do the Camper Save today.”

“Ok, ” I said,” what’s that?”

“It’s when they have a drill where they pretend a camper is missing and you have to go find them.”

“Ok,” I said again, not understanding her concern.

“Mom, you have to run really fast! Around the camp! There is a time limit!” I was insulted. How feeble did she think I was? Yes, it had been a few years since I worked out or run as a form of exercise, but it wasn’t like I couldn’t participate in a simple drill. Besides, this wasn’t a life or death situation. A camper wasn’t really lost. Quite frankly, I could barely get those girls to stop asking questions or give me some personal space, fat chance one was going to be away from me long enough to get lost.

Five minutes later my niece Melina approached me, looking very stressed. “Thea Sal,” (this is what she calls me), “you have to do the camper save today! You have to get out of it! Tell them you can’t do it!”

“Why?” I said, not quite getting why everyone was so freaked out.

“Because, you’re OLD!!”

It was actually very sweet of them to be concerned. I mean, if I was in their place at their age and one of my aunts had to run around a camp, I would have been concerned as well. On the flip side, I also would have wanted to watch it as I don’t think I ever saw any of them run before. Moms in the 80s didn’t really run for sport so it would have been entertaining.

When it was time, I headed down to the beach where the drill was supposed to begin. We were supposed to go in pairs to check various parts of the camp for the “missing camper,” which was actually a milk jug filled with sand. Initially, I was assigned to search the field, which was the farthest you could get from the beach. I would have had to run up an inclined path made of rocks, through the whole camp, past the driveway, and to the field. Suddenly my bravado went out the window. I looked at the kid in charge and said, “I’m 56. I am not running to the field.”

Honestly, as I recount these memories and my interactions with these poor young staff members, I am lucky I didn’t get written up for bullying.

I was instead assigned the lodge and some surrounding buildings. The timer went off and we all ran. I could go into the whole mess of how I searched my buildings and didn’t find Lost Camper, yadda yadda yadda, but the short version is…I forgot to check a building and Lost Camper died on my watch. Ironically, he was in the Infirmary. I argued that in real life a nurse should have been there to help him. But it was still a fail on my part.

By Saturday I was more than ready to go home. It was a hard week, but MDSC is still as magical as it ever was. I can still see that. But if I ever decide to go back, I will have it in writing that I will be working in the kitchen. And I definitely will NOT get into the lake.

adolescence, college, Family, Motherhood

The Hardest Goodbye

For a year I have been counting down the days until my oldest goes to college. And not in the way you might think. This is the last summer we have before he turns 18. The last Christmas we will have while he is still living at home. The last family vacation while he is mine. I try to joke about it, “This is the last Friday in a July that you’ll be living under my roof before you graduate!”

But I’m only half joking. I am not ready for this stage of his life to be over. And what I really mean by that is that I am not ready for this stage of MY life to be over.

He is my firstborn. I have spent more time with this human than probably any other person on Earth. He is my heart and soul and life and happiness and anxiety and worry and pride and annoyance and frustration and everything in between. And his leaving is not just a rite of passage for him, but for me as well.

To all the young moms out there: Remember when you cried on your child’s first day of kindergarten? You ain’t seen nothing yet.

I wonder, were my parents this emotional when I left for school? I have no memories of them even dropping me off, although I’m sure they did. I have ZERO memories of my mom crying or even visiting me at school. I am quite sure she drove home and didn’t think twice about whether or not I was scared or sad or going to make friends or be lonely. I know FOR SURE she did not add Life 360 to her phone or order the blue bags from IKEA or get overwhelmed and panicked from following multiple parent groups on Facebook. In fact, I’m pretty sure the only time she called to check in on me freshman year was to ask me why I got a D in Statistics.

I’m not just saying goodbye to him. I’m saying goodbye to a season of my life I won’t ever get to experience again. And I have tried to savor all the days lately, even the bad ones, because at least he was still MINE. But still, this day came faster than I wanted it to.

And right now, I can barely breathe.

Raising my kids has been a joy. Yes, it’s hard. Yes, it can be unrewarding and thankless at times. But spending time with them has been an 18-year journey (so far) that has fulfilled me in ways that I didn’t know existed before I had kids. It took many years to mentally adjust to being a “stay-at-home” mom. Accepting parenting as my job, and not being embarrassed or resentful or feeling like I wasn’t using my degree was difficult. But now that I am nearing the end of this stage, I can’t believe how I am going to miss it. My house has been full of fun and noise and laughter and teenagers, along with dirty dishes and stinky soccer cleats and backpacks on the floor that for some reason just can’t make it the extra four inches into their cubbies.

I am going to miss having a house full of high school boys making noise in my basement. I am going to miss the shouting coming from his bedroom while he’s playing video games. I am going to miss someone as competitive as I am when we play board games during dinner. I am even going to miss charges showing up on my Target app and Starbucks app for Doritos and Iced Mochas. And just who is going to be there to explain to me what’s happening in all the Marvel movies when we go to the theater?

I barely remember the hard days. I mean, there are STILL hard days, but I’m sure someday I will forget these too. I just know that lately, I have ached for a do-over. Not to change anything, although I’m sure I would if given a chance. (Don’t get mad so quickly, don’t argue with them all the time, let things go more often). But I want a do-over just so I can experience it again. I want to relive the days when we would go to the library and the toy store and end our day getting ice cream. I want to go back to the days when he was attached to me and wanted to play trains all day. I want more zoo visits and mom-and-tot classes at the park district. The days when my whole life was him and his whole life was me. Why does it feel like I wasn’t paying enough attention all those years?

Today my firstborn goes to college. And he is ready in every way.

I’m just not sure I am.

Never a Dulles Moment

Finding the absurd in the ordinary

Tag Archives: parenting

Perfect Storm

How many days?

The Hardest Goodbye