Disappearing Act

I've been losing my identity bit by tiny bit lately. Well at least Black Betty has. 

At first I laid blame to the prisoners forced to make license plates. But I realized they may have been provided with inferior materials. Because mine is not the only WI plate I've seen peeling away in the wind (and aggressive car washes). 

My concern has been that the APR flew off somewhere. And while I did renew plates for Jim, Carter and me – and ordered replacement stickers – last month, mine never came. Theirs did. I was mainly concerned about getting pulled over without any proof but an email that I am legitimately renewed.

Since nothing arrived in the mail during my long weekend, I just went to the Stevens Point DMV, a mere 8 minutes from work, at lunch yesterday. I thought I was applying for a replacement plate to my "800 topaz" one. 

But BAM! They issued me new plates and new stickers on the spot. My clever son says that must stand for Bad Ass Mom. Damn right!

Then tonight on my way home from work, I was behind this guy. Part of me wanted to run up to him and tell him this can be remedied in less than 45 minutes at the DMV. The other part of me wonder which "shift" was working on these plates behind bars. 

In the end, I guess I don't care. It's just a relief to feel "legal" again!

License to Cry

That final goodbye when you send your kid off to college is pretty tough. The hugs. The tears. For Mom anyway. So why not do it twice in one week and really put my heart through the wringer?

Even though Carter left last week, he couldn't quite fit everything in the Honda Civic that he needed for "the house." Naturally, when Dad volunteers to take it down to Platteville this weekend, he isn't going alone. Mom insists on going with.

So I can say goodbye again!

We didn't have too much to fit in the CRV after all. A dresser of sorts and a few odds and ends. We hit the road at 8:30 a.m. so we wouldn't arrive "too early." As in before noon. We unloaded and got to see the progress on Carter's room and his decorating touch to the rest of the house. I gotta admit, his license plate collection looks pretty cool in a college house! And the pin holes aren't going in OUR wall anymore!

His room is already set up like a cool sound and light show. We don't want to know who's gonna see that besides us parents on tour.

I was especially pleased he made wise use of his time this week and picked up his textbooks already! Looks like junior year will be loads of fun, doesn't it?

We went to lunch and said our goodbyes again. For real this time. When you hand over the tuition check for him to drop off next week, then it's official. So more tears, of course. I tell people it gets easier. And maybe the second year it did. But now, it's like, wow, he's a junior. He'll be done with college before you know it and on his own. And who knows where? Sob, sniff...

To ease the pain of separation, hubby and I made sure our golf clubs fit in the vehicle with Carter's stuff. We figured we'd play 18 holes somewhere on the way home. They had so much rain and flooding down that way this week, though, so we thought it might be better to aim for closer to home. Well, after stopping at two courses that were too busy, we ended up as close to home as we could get!

The Ridges. Five minutes away. Ha.

There's Jim teeing off in the background. No, I'm not smiling. Of course we're not having fun! We were so distraught when we got done golfing, we went out to eat at Sportsmen's Pub & Grill down the road before we could face our empty nest. It was torture. But I think we'll get through it.

We're tired. Our bellies are full. And we still have two more days left of our weekend. We've got this.

License to ... Collect

All thoughts of hoarding and cluttering are top of mind these days with my mother's big Downsize / Please Take This Off My Hands Sale just a week away.

I've learned this collecting disease does NOT skip a generation... as evidenced by one of the walls in Carter's basement Man Cave.

His habit started innocent enough. But I am to blame, I'm sure, because he wouldn't have been at a flea market years ago unless I took him there, right? So he picked out the cool yellow and red flamed smiley face one and then choose a Man Cave and Budweiser one for Daddy. Then, well, it just went into full gear!

He found a few "real" ones a different time at that flea market, then discovered there is an endless supply at the Iola Old Car Show. Of course, the treasured find – gift from his Grandma Hedberg actually – are the old plates up top representing the years my parents were born: 1927 and 1932. There also is a 1949 one, the year they got married, and a Wisconsin 1963 for Jim's year of birth. I don't think he has one for my year, which, for the record, was NOT from a Model T!

He's also received a few as gifts and now has more than half the states.

Our friend Tamara, one of Carter's first "girlfriends," sent him some from Indiana and Montana a few years back after she moved with her husband from Indianapolis to her homeland of Montana. She asked recently if he minded "duplicates." Not at all, I said. No two are exactly the same.

The one he got from her in the mail yesterday – as an early birthday present – is different than his other Big Sky plate. So that's cool. And now he started a new row, which obviously has to be filled at some point. We know that if he goes back to the car show, he could wrap it up in one final purchase. But what's the fun in that?

Besides, if he gets every state and fills the wall, what will he start collecting next? A car for each plate?

Let's not encourage him. Perhaps it's not too late to break the cycle.

Oh ha. That's a good one.