Yesterday

Act 1
One day out of daylight savings time, a 5:30 AM run feels like a 4:30 AM run. On the other hand, I remember running on that morning we were supposed to have wind chill temperatures down to 35 below, and it's been almost too warm for my wool hat the last few days. Owen got up around 7:00 and was delightfully smiley, and James slept in past when I left as I went to Buffalo for the last time for four days. With a full Philharmonic week and two recording sessions, I'd been to Buffalo every day since Tuesday, and twice on Saturday. Buffalo used to be just over an hour from our place on Washington Street, but now to get there for a 10 AM rehearsal I need to weave my way down to the highway through side streets and stop signs, bypassing 590, and it can take up to an hour and a half.

Act 2
Recording session. I'll let you know if this one goes up for any awards, but I wouldn't expect it. Still, a recording session with that group is probably the biggest single payday I get all year. The experience is quite different than the regular rhythm of a rehearsal or concert. Everyone is on stage in the empty all, dressed down in comfortable clothes with the stage exits sealed shut with blockades of curtains. We blast through passages over and over again, waiting for a disembodied voice with a British accent to gargle over a loudspeaker something about intonation in the celli or adjustments to the percussion microphone. Then there will be a union-mandated 20 minute break while everyone gulps down sandwiches and chips in the break room, a buzzer sounds, and the orchestra is set again to play the same passage over and over, looking for a good take.

Act 3
Back home, free until the following afternoon. It's a glorious 40 degrees out, and I am taking Owen outside, for the first time in his life, for the purpose of being outside. Not just a quick dash to the car, not a hurried rush into a warm building, but (thoroughly bundled and hatted and wrapped in a baby carrier) out into the bright sunny world to look around. The snow is melting, James is gleefully padding up and down the driveway on a tricycle, and Owen mostly squinted and wrinkled his nose. We saw dogs, we made a pathetically small snowman from melting slush, and we walked over to the playground across the street. It felt like Spring was breaking in.

Act 4
I mentioned to J that my car was looking awfully dirty from all that highway time as we ate dinner. James didn't want to eat his tortellini. We bribed him into finishing the tortellini with the promise of a car wash and a trip to Wegmans. We all drive down to our old neighborhood at Clover and Monroe, reveling in the still bright evening. We went through the car wash line and a familiar looking attendant spotted James sitting on J's lap in the front seat and exclaimed to his co-workers, "Hey it's the kid that used to watch us through the window!" We were upgraded to the nicest wash for no extra charge. James was transfixed by the wash and immediately asked to do it again. Even though he'd been chatting excitedly about riding in a steering wheel cart at Wegmans the whole evening, he wanted to be held when we got there. He was cranky and said he was tired. He wanted to go home. We cajoled him inside, and he asked to go home again. He wanted me to hold him, he wanted Mommy to hold him. We began to load up the cart with produce. He started flailing out of J's arms, and I scolded him. He threw up half-digested tortellini in front of the bananas all over himself and J.

Act 5
I guarded the banana stand until the clean up crew could arrive, then hurried through the store to get the rest of our list while J wiped off herself and James in the bathroom. After a painfully long wait at the checkout line (an older cashier needed to dote on Owen, who was more than obliged to receive some of the attention usually shared with his brother) we drove home. James was quiet and tired, but didn't look to be sick anymore. He had a pedialyte popsicle when we got back, and I put him in the tub and read him a story. By the time he was in bed (with a bucket beside) it was almost 9:00. I still had to practice, and his clothes needed to be scrubbed out before they could be washed. And Owen's clothes from a diaper explosion the previous week were still waiting to be scrubbed out. I listened to Mahler 4 as I soaped and brushed and worked at the little shirts under the hot water.

Epilogue
Red wine