Finally, the God awful heat wave broke, and we spent all day outside. The grass desperately needed to be cut. Tony went out there to do it, and I swear that man, I know it's not his fault, but he just won't DO it, and by "it" I mean anything. He goes out there, smokes a few cigarettes, drinks a beer. Pulls the lawnmower out of the shed. Smokes a few more, takes a few more sips, puts the gas in. It goes on like this all day. Although I realize that out in the sun, it's hot and that he needs to take the OCCASIONAL break, but he gets down right ridiculous. Also, he then bitches about how long it takes him.

I went out there to chat with him as he had done half the backyard and was on another "break" You'd think we lived on a farm or something. I fired up the lawnmower to see if I could do it. Well I could. Then I decided to push it to see if it was hard, and it wasn't. So, I went inside, put my shoes and a hat on, and I did the rest of the backyard, while he weedwhacked, because the weedwhacker is NOT my friend. I hate that thing. So I pushed the lawnmower, lost in a zen like trance, watching the grass in front of me turn into crisp clean lines behind me. The plus to this, other than the zen, was that since I was working, it meant Tony would work. He wouldn't let me do the front yard though. I think he didn't want people to think he was some bum that made his wife cut the grass, and heaven forbid if my DAD were to drive by. My dad was pretty easy going with letting us do manual labor if it meant he didn't have to, but one thing he would NEVER let us do, was cut the grass. He said that a woman shouldn't HAVE to EVER cut the grass if a man is around. What's funny, is that the one thing he never MADE me do, I liked!

Tony ended up schnockered by the evening. Insisting that he grill up some chicken and sausage for us becuase I think he just wanted to burn somehting, and burn he did. He had rendered both chicken and sausage practically inedible. Me and the kids had cereal for dinner. He took a short nap to sleep it off before he had to get to his homework, which meant he was up until 3 am, unable to sleep, since he napped at 8.

I love watching the kids play outside. Jonny just running around like he's crazy, Aislinn, more subdued in her play spent hours playing with a stick she said was her baby dinosaur. THIS is why we don't have toys here at our house. Why bother when your kids would rather play with STICKS right? Not a problem here except when other kids are around, and other kids? They don't think sticks are fun. When other kids are around we get a lot of "You don't have a lot of toys here" Yeah, you're right we don't. We're lucky that way. We used to spend a small fortune on Aislinn, getting her toys and boy howdy did she have toys. But, watching her choose a McDonalds Happy Meal toy over the mini Toy R Us she had in her room, convinced me that hey, you know what? Fuck it. She likes sticks, and Nintendo. Yay for my wallet.

So, now I'm sitting outside, feeling the cool breeze waft over my deck, sitting in the last patch of shade that the morning will allow before the sun moves and covers our deck with blazing sunlight. That's when I'll go inside and get started on my day. For right now though, I'm relishing the shade and life. With the heat wave went my sadness, my crabbiness, my depression. It's almost September, and I can feel myself feeling better. Righting myself mentally and emotionally. I realize with each summer, I will feel that depression even on meds. I'll want to only curl up, and not deal with life in general. I accept that now. Considering before what a mess I was all year round, with summer being the WORST, having eight long months to feel good is a blessing.