The weekend

It’s a dark early morning, and I’m on the train to a cab to a plane to a cab to Auckland where I have another ToPs focus group day. There’s no difficulty about reading on the train today because it’s too dark to see the sea or the harbour or the swans, to see whether the water is glossy or rough, whether the tide is in or out. Past Porirua now, and the train has filled up here with sleepy commuters reading newspapers and magazines and governmental briefing reports.

It was a good weekend, although in retrospect it feels shockingly short. Saturday is soccer day. We headed to the field in the spectacular sunshine, and sat on the sidelines discussing the coaching and the playing and talking with the other parents about how ours is the most beautiful field in the entire universe (an opinion M and I have had for more than a year now and one which we’re pleased even natives share). Aidan played well and then, after his game, ran up to the field to hone his monkey bar skills. Naomi—this year playing on a co-ed team for the first time—got a lovely goal. I was captivated by the difference between this experience and the kids’ soccer in the US, and was remembering last March-May when I missed almost every game because I was too busy attend. Even though I have been travelling, somehow I haven’t missed any games.

We moved furniture back to B&D’s and discovered, to our chagrin, that the garage was still full of stuff—now all of it sadly ours. So we reorganised and threw things away and piled the stuff in the middle of the garage so the “sparky” (the electrician) could come and give us new outlets. Aidan practised his bike riding (a two wheeler with no training wheels) on the beach and Perry tried to get us to throw balls or sticks--or anything--for him to chase. He's not allowed to run until Thursday because of an operation he had to remove a cyst from his back. Finally, after the grey but lovely Sunday afternoon, we celebrated Rob’s birthday with cake and really good Indian food and stories about a friendship that spans almost 20 years.

Today I was off to Auckland—a surprisingly lovely city (which maybe I’ll talk more about tomorrow)—and home again. And when I got home from a day in another city, the sparky and D (the contractor, or “chippy”) were still here, plastering in the garage and putting in outlets. They just left, at nearly 10pm, after having a piece of Rob’s birthday cake. This is a fantastic country.

(The pictures tonight are a mishmash--Two are from last weekend when we went to Pukerua Bay (the picture of me holding a cool starfish) and Te Papa (the kids on the rocks). Two are from this weekend: the garage with its new doors and still WAY too much stuff, and Rob, celebrating his first birthday in this new land.)