What a long, strange trip it's been.

 Well, it's August now. I feel like I went straight from June to August, since July was spent driving across the country and relaxing at the beach. We got home late last week, and promptly threw an epic backyard party for our friends who were staying in our house, visiting from New Zealand. Now they are gone, too, and I spent the day washing sheets and towels and re-making beds and trying to avoid going outside, as it's 108 degrees. Record-breaking heat, the news says, and I don't doubt it, since it feels like you're standing under a hair dryer.

As much as I loved being at the beach, it's not always roses in a city the size of San Diego. I forget sometimes how insulated we are in the suburbs of the Midwest. Last week, as I was walking out of the nail salon admiring my freshly painted toes and sipping on the last of my Chai Tea Latte, I passed a homeless man eating from old California Pizza Kitchen boxes that he had pulled out of the trash right in front of the restaurant. The box and the pizza was crawling with ants, he was eating it anyway. He didn't seem to notice. My heart broke.

Perspective can be a bitch, sometimes. But I have it.

I am glad vacation is over, and happy to be home, despite the heat. It's been a good summer. I am refreshed enough, I have drank plenty of wine with old friends, I have done as much yoga as I could fit into my schedule (and that my stupid bum knees and shoulder will allow.) Since my return I have spent some quality time hanging out with my grandma, in what appears to be her last summer with us. I both wish for that and loathe the thought of it, drifting between not wanting to see her go and not wanting her to suffer.

I do wish that I were there again in San Diego, for BlogHer. I originally tried to make it work, when San Diego was announced as the city hosting the conference, to fanagle my vacation so that I would just stay for the conference. But in the end I couldn't justify the extra week, and I wouldn't have gotten to see my lovely friends from New Zealand. Another time.

Besides, now that I'm home and the house is quiet, I'm realizing that school starts a mere two weeks from today. I need to get organized. I need to start planning out my classroom and my lesson plans, I need to make sure the boys have shoes that fit and clothes that aren't torn or stained. And I need to make other plans, too, and here is where the other shoe drops.

My husband recently started a new job, back in California. North this time, in Silicon Valley. Right now, he is commuting, flyying out on Monday mornings and returning late Friday nights. We don't know yet if we are going to move out there or not, for now we are just playing it cool, making sure that the opportunity is what we think we signed up for, seeing how it goes. But it's likely that sometime in 2012, we will move back to California. The bottom line is that I'm functioning as a single mom with a full time job right now, or at least, when school starts in two weeks. I've never had this kind of day to day, hour to hour inflexibility in a job before. Thank God for my mother, who has become just as familiar with the Orthodontist's office as I am.

I'm excited and ready for the adventure, but I am also apprehensive and disappointed, now that I have this new teaching job I've wanted for so long. I worry about the boys, they are getting to an age where it's harder to start over and make new friends. They are just as excited and also apprehensive as I am, so far. But they miss daddy. We need to be a family.

So that's our big news. It's going to be an interesting year.