Entry 698: Weather Insanity

We've had some bonkers weather the past few weeks -- probably the craziest I've ever experienced. As I mentioned in my last post, it was bitter cold a week ago, as we were in the aftermath of a couple of snowstorms that dumped almost a foot of powder on us. Then, this week it was unseasonably warm. Within six days, we went from a high in the mid-20s to a high in the low 70s. I've never been somewhere that snapped between temperatures that extreme that quickly. You could see the snow melting in real-time. It was like watching one of those nature documentaries where they film a wintry area for several months, and then speed up the tape so that the ice thaws and the flowers bloom in a few seconds, only nothing was sped up. I'm sure it's a sign of impending climate doom that we had June temperatures in January, but it was nice to go running outside--in shorts and a tee, no less.*

*The gym in my sister in-law's apartment complex, which she gave me a key to, has gotten weirdly crowded of late. For the first time ever, both of the operational treadmills were occupied when I got there, so I had to do the elliptical machine, which feels like a fake workout to me compared to the treadmill. Actually, it's not that weird. It was probably crowded because of the bad weather.

In other news, S is out of the country again for work, so I have the boys to myself. They've totally flipped on me, so that now Lil' S2 is the easy one and Lil' S1 is the difficult one. Well, Lil' S2 is still a bigger headache we he's home, but that's the beauty of it: He hangs out with his pals so much that he's either not here or he's here with a friend and they are occupying each other. Last night he had a sleepover at his little buddy's up the street, so I didn't have to deal with him at all at night, and then during the day, I took him to the park to play football with some other kids, which I don't mind, because I will either play with them, which is fun, or I'll just walk around and listen to my podcasts, get some steps in, and maybe even do some calisthenics.

But with Lil' S1, it's different because he's so loath to leave the house. I'm mean, he will if he has an activity, and he does do a decent amount of activities--he went to coding class yesterday, for instance--but he when he's home, he's just home. He doesn't seem to want to go anywhere or do anything, even with his friends.

I'm not sure why this is. There are two possible reasons I can see, either of which could be worrisome or could just be part of growing up today. The first is that he's not actually that close with his friends -- not in a bad way, just in a normal changing-of-relationship way. You know how you have people in your life that you like and you're fine hanging out with when circumstances put you in the same place, but you would never actually contact them to do something? Of course, you do -- this is probably the majority of adult friendships. Maybe that's how Lil' S1 is with his friends. They are friends mainly because they've been friends, but now things are changing, and it's not enough that they are all the same age and their parents get along, like it was when they were littler. It would make a lot of sense if this was the case. That's how friendships work. I didn't really find my ride-or-die BFFs until I was a few years older than Lil' S1 is now. So, maybe he'll make some new friends that he will take more initiative to hang out with when he gets a bit older. We will see.

The other possible reason is that he just likes being by himself. He has solitary interests and wants to pursue them in his spare time. This in and of itself is not necessarily a problem, but it has me concerned because I'm worried he's already getting sucked into the virtual vortex of inevitable despair. It's one thing if you just like doing things by yourself in your spare time, and it's part of an otherwise balanced and happy life. It's quite another if you are addicted to your devices and crave their ersatz company over real-life relationships. That, to me, seems like an almost guaranteed path to unhappiness and dissatisfaction.

It is hard, though. I understand because I have to fight the same urges. We all do. That's how society is structured now. Everything is too easy, and that makes it hard. It's so easy to live a lazy device-life and not have to bother with the annoyances that are other people. But it's making us all miserable. That's the thing about it. The verdict is in when it comes to this type of super online, device-oriented, shut-in, lifestyle: It's bad for us, and we don't even really like it, but we do it anyway. Most adults, with fully-formed prefrontal cortices, struggle to fight back against this. What chance do children have left to their own, um, devices?

So, when S gets back, we're going to have to seriously lay down the law with device usage. We've said this to each other before, but now we actually have to follow through with it. It's only going to get worse as he gets older and discovers how easy it is to see naked people on the internet (if he hasn't already). Can't wait for that to come down the pipeline. That will be fun to navigate. *Sigh.*

Until next time...

Note: I edited this entry because I thought my first version was too personal concerning Lil' S1. Not many people actually read this blog, and it's anonymous(ish), but still, my kids don't give me permission to write about them and don't even really know. So, their privacy is something I have to be mindful of going forward.