Spring Break 2018 Blog

     Hi folks. I've been away from the keyboard for a bit to make time for Spring Break 2018 although we didn't go anywhere and it's not yet spring in west Texas.
   
     Not that I'm complaining, but spring break these days resembles nothing of spring break(s) a few years ago to many years ago.
     First of all, long gone are the days of cramming a dozen friends into a beat-up sedan, road tripping to the beach and then cramming your sedan of friends plus your buddy's sedan full of friends into a tiny motel room on the beach. Those were great times, but nowadays I'm pretty sure I'd rather go to the dentist.
     Not so long gone are the days of cramming all my kids into our older model mini-van and heading to the beach or sometimes mountains. We had one of those Pontiac mini-vans. The kind with the long snout. It was called an APV, which we figured meant All Plastic Vehicle.
     The kids were five through 12 ish and happy and excited to be getting out of town. We always had a good time and a great many memories, but each trip included pre and post vacation chaos and me almost always paralyzed over how were we going to pay for this planned fun and an almost debilitating fear of losing my children. I can't explain it.

     Now, it's different. Teresa and I are both over our reckless road trip days and our kids have all outgrown the need for vacation chauffeurs. You might say T & I are now in the 'going to grandma's house' category to which I suspect most kids over 13ish say, "oh NO!" Thank goodness our little visitors still think Meme and Booger are worth a visit.

     This year, Teresa's daughter, Ashton Patton, and her young family came our way. There's Ashton, her husband Bobby and the two kids, Carson and Avery. They visit quite a lot considering they live in Arizona and they mostly drive to see us.

     They always amaze me a little. I think it's their consistent mellowness that I find both wonderful and confusing. It's wonderful because when they visit, it's not just about coming to grandma's house. It's also about going to grandpa's house, brother's house, half brother's house, aunt's house, uncle's house. Still, they show up... never rushed... stay, visit, eat, nap, play, eat some more, clean-up and go and come back and go and come back and go and come back.
     It's their calmness that I'd call wonderful. It's that same calmness that I find confusing. Because folks, I'll be honest with you. I'd likely kill someone if I had to do as much traveling, visiting and moving around as the Patton family. But they do it and none of them ever flinch or appear rushed or makes us feel rushed.

     For a little icing on the cake this spring break, we capped everything with a giant birthday party for our one year old granddaughter, Tillie Ann. She's Cody and Kayci's youngest. Mom and Dad threw her a giant festivus here at the ranch. We had kids of all sizes running and playing, laughing and crying. A good time was had by all.

Bill Robertson, I sewn enough oats and paid for enough vacations to enjoy being at grandma's house. I like grandma, a.k.a. Meme.