a toad or two

Be nice, Dave clucks at me. I am driving and this lumnuts cuts into my lane making me  lose twenty miles per hour really fast and I respond loudly.  I address his relationship with his mother, his lack of social status and his love of all things country.  I don't apologize for my driving.  I'm a fast woman and a busy woman and I need to get there and back.

God, it's hot. I sweat more as I age and this surprises me as every other body function seems to be drying up. My outdoor exercise regime leaves me red-faced and almost panting, sweat is good, my mantra.  Dave doesn't like spending money on creature comforts and if I didn't say something the air conditioner would remain off or set at eighty-three degrees.  We might as well sit outside, it's cooler.

Last day of school, drat, that went fast.  This summer children will live with me four days weekly. It will take time to acclimate to the invasion. I will attempt to set boundaries and they will evaporate and dissolve and then form again and there will be days when I wonder, when did I lose control of this situation.  I will spend the majority of the summer in the car, transporting children to necessary places.  But we chill in the pool a lot and  perhaps catch a toad or two and in the end it will fill up a space in me.  I walk in my garden, muttering to myself, what must the neighbors think, hoo-ha . . .