This week, I learned that my former high school boyfriend is a grandfather (in a slightly roundabout way) at 38.

I learned that my last boyfriend from PA is now married with a child.

And I learned that if you give a man enough time to show his true colors and he will do just that.

For those of you married folks who are perhaps thinking that the idea of going out to dinner, having an intruguing conversation that doesn’t revolve around your kids or the grocery list sounds like a great perk to being single, let me just suggest that you think again. You might indeed get something good to eat, I’ll grant you that. But you will have to deal with your date drinking at least three beers (he was already drinking when you arrived, so it’s hard to know the total) and smoking two cigarettes while you eat. You will have to cope with a man dropping the “f” word amongst others making you wonder what he says when he’s around people he’s not trying to impress (or wonder if he is just not trying to impress you?) When you tell a funny antecdote about the bath you took earlier, he will say, and I quote “What is it with you girls and baths? Is that where you go to touch yourselves? Is it? It is, isn’t it?” and delight himself thinking the look of disgust and shock on your face is some indication that he’s actually stumbled upon some secret female truth.

On the bright side, it cost me less than $25 to find out this date was not a match for me and I had a delicous meal included in that bundled price, too. The continued efforts of the ex-boyfriend to try to prove in some manner that he is in fact a great catch for me have only worked against him, proving instead my point that we were not a good match from the start (and perhaps a much worse match than I even realized at that time.) I have realized why I never regretted breaking things off with my high school boyfriend and even though it was terribly frustrating at the time that my last boyfriend couldn’t commit, I am glad to hear how happy he is and how blessed his life has become.

I didn’t go looking for this last date, it sort of found me all on its own. As I type this, my sister is trying to figure out a way to glean critical relationship status off a man she knows and thinks is a great catch for me. I’ll admit, my enthusiasm at the prospect is greatly lacking. Not because he’s not a great guy (I wouldn’t even begin to know) but because this process is so exhausting. Maybe all of this is God’s way of reminding me how amazing my life is without anyone having to add to it. I don’t know for certain. All I do know is this morning, I am quite happy to be single.

I am IM’ing with my brother.

Checking a message on Facebook from my sister.

Reading an email from a friend.

Getting a text from a friend.

Talking to my dad on the phone.

While Flash stands next to me asking if I’ve seen his flash drive.

I CAN’T KEEP UP!!!!

I had a few minutes today with little to do so I went across the hall to watch one of my favorite teachers teach her math lesson. I love these little moments. They allow me to sit and soak in the skills of veteran teachers and to hopefully glean some bits of wisdom and method I might use eventually in my own classroom.

Today, she was teaching a lesson on subtracting two digit numbers. Specifically, she was teaching them how to regroup, or “borrow” as we learned it. She put a problem on the board: (it won’t let me line the numbers up correctly, but you get the idea)

` 52
– 47
_____

And was talking the class through the problem using metaphors and cues to help them visualize the problem. She had already walked them through a few problems, showing them how to borrow from the tens column if the ones number wasn’t large enough to subtract from. Now she was giving the class an opportunity to show her they had absorbed her lesson by telling it back to her.

“If I have 2 gum drops. Can I give Robby 7 of them?”

“No!” came the mostly unanimous answer from her class of second graders.

“You’re right. I can’t take away 7 from 2. I’m going to need to borrow,” she said, pointing to the problem on the board. “Now, who can tell me, where am I going to borrow from? Sam?”

Sam looked up at his teacher confidently and replied, “Definitely from someone you know!”

Where you realize Mr. Can’t Commit really can. Just not to you, apparently.

I have been attending the church TB introduced us to since August. Other than a couple Sundays when we visited other churches, and a couple when I was travelling to take or fetch Flash from OH, I have been there every Sunday.

Last week, in adult Sunday School class, I was one of the first to arrive and I sat and talked with D for awhile about his new job and their relocation efforts. Another regular attender arrived, with her baby in her arms and stopped in the middle of the room. She looked at me and then looked at D and promptly said, “D? Will you mind holding the baby for minute?” D, despite being a father, had that puzzled look on his face that said, “Me? You want ME to hold your baby?” Always eager for a little baby time, I jumped in and offered to hold her.

The woman turned to me and declared, “But I don’t know you.”

And then she held the baby out to D, who took her and sat for the few minutes the woman was gone entertaining the baby on his lap. He looked at me once with an apologetic look, but I waved it off like it was no big deal. I know mom’s can be particular about who holds their baby and all even if I was sitting in a Sunday School classroom.

A few more people had joined the class by the time the woman returned, only a few short minutes later. She thanked D for holding her and sat down across the room where she usually sits. It was then that she addressed me. “I’m J,” she said.

I’ve known this since one of the first days I attended that church. I had been introduced to her then and had spoken with her briefly. I had even been present during a couple conversations TB had had with this woman. And, if that had not been enough, I have been in this particular class for most of the past few months. so I said, “I know” in the most polite way I could under these circumstances. And then I added, “I’m Amy” with a knowing nudge to try to suggest everyone else in the room already knows that I wasn’t sure why she didn’t.

To which she replied, “Give me a couple of weeks and I’ll know you much better!”

I had to stifle a chuckle as I noticed D’s wife looking at J with a puzzled look. It’s not even that I sit in class silently pressed up against a wall unnoticeable. I participate. I ask questions. I talk wtih people around me. I wanted to somehow explain, but I just left it alone and we moved on. I wasn’t going to make a fuss over it.

But this morning I did get a little follow-up chuckle when J approached the nursery window to hand over one of her small children. Imagine her surprise when she realized I was the one in charge of the nursery today!

I promise you, I didn’t say a word. The look on her face said it all.

I would blog, really, except that someone didn’t do any studying since break started and now with four days left we have an essay, a short story, an SAT to cram for (three weeks and counting) and a few thank you notes that are important to his mother that he get out soon.

My sugar-plum dreams of ice skating and playing our new games and watching movies together have gone right out the proverbial window.

Instead, it looks like my last few vacation days will be filled with Geometry, Algebra and Desperately Trying Not to Strangle a Twelve Year Old.

Wish me luck.

The dog, one of the cats (the only one who emerges from my bedroom) and I are all sitting in the same three foot square of space in my living room. Why? Because the sun, after days of hiding, is peeking out from the clouds and casting it’s bright rays upon our floor.

And we are all soaking it up.

To boot, unseasonably warm temperatures and rain yesterday unearthed the green lawns once again. A bit of blue in the sky, a touch of green on the earth and rays of golden sunshine through my windows.

It is a very good day, indeed.