Ahhh, Track Season

Track practice started for Alyssa at the beginning of March. She’s driven herself to school for two whole weeks now. She thinks she’s hot shit.

She even went through the drive-thru at the Dairy Treat the other day and ordered a vanilla shake…BY HERSELF!

You guys! She’s growing up. She talks to people without my interpretation. She can order food at a restaurant, she can go out with friends, she can buy her own vanilla shake!

The other night, I couldn’t sleep. I tossed and turned for a couple of hours. I finally got up at 2 and paid a bill, took a bath and finally, FINALLY, laid back down to try to sleep at 3:15. My alarm goes off at 6:00. Ugh.

It was very reminiscent of my steroid insomnia from last year. Not fun.

So now that track practice has started, that means the meets are right around the corner.

I hope the weather turns warm before the meets start up. Watching a track meet in cold rain sucks.

But we do it. We parents are hearty souls. We go out there, we bundle up and we cheer our kids on because if they can run and jump and throw in crappy weather, we can damn well show up and watch them.

Alyssa complains a little about track practice. Her shins hurt, the tops of her feet hurt, her shouler hurts and she’s tired of running in the cold.

But she shows up each day, she runs and jumps and keeps trying and I couldn’t be prouder of her.

She’s an inspiration to me. I want to be more like her when I grow up.

Driving

Have I mentioned that Alyssa got her driver’s license in January?

No? How remiss of me. So sorry for that.

She did get it! She failed the first test because, well, the old dude who was testing her didn’t believe her when she told him she was just moving ahead to see if there was traffic coming. He felt she was about to pull into on-coming traffic. Yes.

But a week after the first test, she and the dude became besties and she drove away with her license.

She’s driven herself to school for about two weeks now (yes, it’s March, we had horrible weather in the last half of January and all of February) since track practice started.

She hasn’t yet driving with a passenger other than me and/or Tom with Olivia along for the ride.

Last night it was decided that the girls would spend the day with my mom. Right before bed, Olivia asked who was taking them to Gram’s.

I replied, “Lyssie will.”

Olivia stared at me for a moment and said, “Alone?”

I laughed. “Sure, she’s got her license.”

Olivia looked skeptical. She hasn’t ridden along with Lyss yet. Either Tom or I have always been with them.

I assured her, “It’ll be fine. Gram’s house isn’t too far away.”

“Hmmm,” Liv muttered, definitely thinking we were crazy for trusting Alyssa with Olivia’s precious life.

She did want to know, “But what about Lyssie’s track practice?”

“She’ll drive you guys over in the morning and then leave to go to practice,” I informed her.

“Will I just stay at Gram’s?”

“Yes, I’ll pick you up after I get off work.”

Again, she paused, taking it all in.

“Do you want to stay at Gram’s?” I asked.

“Yes, Gram has good tea,” she declared. “Sometimes, she gives me ice tea and hot tea at the same time. I like it when she does that.”

Well then.