bread and roses

The weather finally cleared and so did my conscience about visiting my dad. I think Chris will take the kids sometime this fall. It's a little scary to be away from Kalian, but I think it will be good overall.

Had a great "adult" - note, not grown-up, meeting with Mk about our course selection over chai this morning. It felt so great to have someone to talk about the angst over something I never realized would be such a big deal. I wonder if a lot of mid-careers are in the same boat - we may have a general idea of what we want to study but, for me, at least, I came here to get some renewed energy for my work, get a degree, figure out what i want to do, etc. and the actual classes seemed like a small part of it all. But after having such fun this summer taking classes and wanting to fit in all of my specific goals of topic and method (of news media analysis) - I feel overwhelmed. I also want to follow the advice of the much appreciated article on the mid-career site called "My mom is an mpa" - that moms might want to limit the amount of classes that require group work because parents tend to be much more disciplined with time and kidless students tend to wait til the last minute.

So then I took the kids to that fun morning at the park. We had lunch and then threw the kids in the car and headed up to Lawrence for their commemorative Bread and Roses Strike Labor Day event. Highlights included:
-Great song by Anne Sweeney about being an activist mother - kids who slowly realize their friends don't play "bulk mail" or when their car broke down and someone picked them up and kindly drove them to a gas station, but the kids said they couldn't go to Exxon because they are boycotting it. All of this made me feel even more determined to get back into activism. One step at a time, I suppose.
-Not a lof of younger folks - not sure if this was a commentary on the town of Lawrence or on the movement - probably both.
-Of all of the food at the festival - no meatless options - literally except french fries and funnel cakes (and fried oreos, snickers, etc.). We opted for french fries for dinner. Ok, ok, we're not in the bay area anymore.
-Liam rode on a pony!
-We took a great tour around the city in a trolley car (borrowed for the day from Salem) to learn about the history of the town and the strike - fascinating, though it was a challenge keeping Kalian happy for an hour
-Heard a great band - the mammals that Liam rocked out to.
-Mk and his family showed up after I mentioned it to him. Maybe I still can organize....