Have you ever watched someone you love set himself up for complete and total failure out of some obfuscated need and you just go with it and try to make it less painful for all? That was this trip to Joshua Tree: set out upon THREE HOURS later than necessary to make it to the park in time to walk around, when B. was already hungry and didn’t want to go to see some stupid cacti and so had to listen to Harry Potter, which she is obsessed with, on E.’s iPod, which meant E. was subjected to my iPod’s contents (the HORROR!), and when it was sprinkling which we all know means instant gridlock in LA. So this is how our trip to Joshua Tree resulted in: a) this blurry photo of said stupid cacti, the closest we got; b) one incredibly painful dinner at some hippie joint where everything was dirty and sprouted so I was incredibly grateful for the local microbrew; and c) one trip to the Joshua Tree Harley Davidson store for E. to buy a consolatory t-shirt.
But I am already laughing about it and am wondering if E. is ready, too. I will tread lightly and see. That’s one thing I have learned in life: you can’t laugh about something until the other person is ready, too. If they’re not? Disaster, it isn’t hard to master.
This is a photo B. took from the backseat on our girls’ day out a couple weekends ago. First we made Valentine’s cards at Pottery Barn Kids for free (cool, except DUDE, heart-shaped cards, those star stickers your teacher puts on your homework and crayons! that’s ALL you’ll pony up, PBK?!) (p.s. B. didn’t even care and I loved watching this sweet little boy come back to make three(!) Valentines (mom, dad, grammy) while his sisters just perused the store). Then we had lunch at Morel’s, where B. was super stoked to discover how huge the portions of Epoisses were (she is 9!). Then we wandered around American Girl Place, had some ice cream, saw a movie and got our nails done. And picked up E. for dinner downtown. Heavenly!
And this is leaning over the Santa Monica pier, when Katie, Christian (Kates’ husband, one year already!) and David came to visit me, and I took them (well, Christian drove, that man loves to take the helm of any Cadillac, rented or no) to see the Pacific at sunset (you only get sunrise on the ocean in Boston). Oh, I miss them so much. There are many friends I have I don’t get to see very often. But there are only a few for whom my heart starts to hurt if I go too long without seeing them. Apparently a Boston trip is in my near future!
The scenery is nice there, too.