We live right in the very middle of Flagstaff, so with the exception of the time when Clementine was taking horseback riding lessons, every after school activity my kids have ever signed up for has been less than a fifteen minute drive away. This is the complete opposite of how I grew up—we were so far from anything that planning a trip to town was like planning a military campaign: you damn well better have everything you needed for every activity before you went out the door, because the idea of “running back home” for a missing pair of ballet shoes or soccer cleats was laughable. (On the other hand, we never had to drive anywhere at all for riding lessons—out horses lived in the back pasture.)
Because of those childhood experiences, I have never complained too much about driving my kids back and forth to their activities. (You always need to complain a little bit, otherwise they’ll get complacent). That is, I never complained too much until this year. Which is ironic, because this year Clementine has her own car, and drives herself to all of her activities. That means that all of my driving angst falls squarely on Clyde.
On Clyde and his many activities, I should say.
He really doesn’t do that much. There’s boxing, dance, and violin. That’s just three things, right? Well, three categories of things. Because violin encompasses private lessons, group lessons, and fiddle lessons. And dancing involves three separate dance classes and five separate dance rehearsals. All, for the most part, spaced out over the course of the week so that the chances of one happening right next to the other is about 20%.
That means that there is an 80% chance that they don’t happen right next to each other. Oh, they come close. Very close. About thirty minutes close. That’s right, there’s about thirty minutes between them. Which, when you live fifteen minutes away is clearly not enough time to drive home and then back again.
Clearly, that is, to everyone except Clyde.
To Clyde, it is inconceivable that we aren’t willing to drive him home between some of these activities. Even though the one time we tried it we ended up driving back and forth across Cedar Hill four times in one afternoon. It got to the point where I felt like kicking my car every time I walked out to it, and, if my car had been capable of feelings, I’m sure it would have felt like kicking me, too.
The problem is, of course, isn’t that we live too far away from all of Clyde’s activities, but that we live too close. If we lived out in the boonies like we did when I was a kid then we would all have that “military campaign” attitude, and we would all be used to bringing a book (or an iPad, DS, or Kindle) to while away the downtime. But we don’t. We’re spoiled. So spoiled, in fact, that half of my family doesn’t even see the problem with driving home just to use the bathroom. (That would be the male half.)
The obvious solution, of course, would be to just to drop Clyde off for the first activity of the afternoon and only return after the last one has finished, leaving him to occupy the downtimes himself. Obvious, maybe, but also nervous making, as the lack of common sense and foresight that typically goes into a thirteen-year-old boy’s attempts to “occupy himself” are the very reasons we signed Clyde up for so many extracurricular activities in the first place.
Besides, I’m kind of scared to see how he could occupy himself with a pair of dance shoes, boxing gloves, and a violin. I don’t think the world is ready to see that yet. I know I’m sure not.