A Texas Rainy Sunday

When my husband goes fishing, he usually is gone past mid-night and sleeps until noon the next day. So when our four year old woke up at 8 am and wanted to go to the park, I jumped on it right away. I grabbed my toothbrush, poured myself a cup of Starbucks Veranda blonde roast and threw on some typical mom wear.

Let's face it, I don't exactly look great in skin tight yoga pants so I settled for my favorite Under Armor shorts and big Tee. I can't say putting on 50 pounds in a year has exactly improved my image, but my mom duties continue on regardless of the extra poundage. Of course, I am thinking of buying a gym bag, some yoga pants and joining the gym 1.5 miles down the road. Being in Texas means competing to be the best mom, most fit, most rich and driving the biggest SUV. I mean, I didn't watch "Big Rich Texas" while I lived in Tennessee for nothing, right? Oh yes, and good hair and make-up.  I am a blonde--not exactly natural- (except for a few months last year when I had my mid-thirties crisis and went to Walgreens to buy a box of red dye and emerged 2 hours later bright red headed). I suppose having a son who plays football may win me some cool points but other than that, nope, I don't fit in even with the blonde, especially with my Giants T-shirt and my weird dry voice that came from years of anti-socialization in the woods of upstate NY. I attempted to be peppy and bouncy and all excited once but it didn't stick...My sarcastic, slow tone came out sooner than later and people just looked at me---or rather, stared.

But enough about that, I was out the door in 15 minutes to take my 4 year old to the park. The small Texas town of Harker Heights has a community park about 2 miles down the road, past two gyms and two tanning salons (ok, I took the hint). Little man took off running and happily played on the monkey bars and slides. He collected a few stones for his pockets, and threw some at the big tree as well. After a few minutes he announced he was hungry so we took off to Shipley's Donuts to get him "one with the sprinkles". It's amazing how quaint and cute the Texas shoppes are.

With my sweet boy munching on his donut, we arrived at this small Texas Garden Center. And soon I was browsing through rows of Texas hardy
plants, palm trees and Pecan trees and cactuses. My 4 year old did less browsing and more touching everything and running.

Guess what, the girl who worked there was blonde with a nice little tan and a cute Texas drawl. I thought to myself, this can't be happening! She was pretty though. I mean, if I were a guy, any guy, I would totally date her or at least ask her out for brunch or whatever meal they are doing these days.

At the playground

Avoiding eye contact, I hid among the hanging plants and noticed in a remote corner some aromatic herb plants perfect for my little Texas herb garden. $8 later, I hauled the small box of herb plants back to our house.

And then it rained. I guess it was a good thing that it rained. I planted my herbs and pulled weeds and the rain just started to pour down while my 4 year old danced in it. Then suddenly it was 72 degrees and we were all shivering. The Texas heat had stormed off and left us in a chilly cold rain.

My first Texas peppermint plant

My first Texas lemon balm plant