This was my “fortune” I found under my Magic Hat #9 cap tonight.  So fitting.  Magic Hat is the wondrous Burlington, VT beer I fell in love with during my stint at Brown in the summer of 1997.  To be fair, I actually fell in love with Magic Hat before that, but I certainly confirmed my adoration during my lone New England summer spent writing poetry in my hot, un-airconditioned graduate dorm room in Providence.  The little fortune-cookie-esque proverb underneath each Magic Hat cap is literally the cherry on top, particularly if one is pretending to be a poet during a much needed respite from being a grown-up.

Holy wow at how different my life is now, 12 years later.  Those nights of drinking lukewarm Magic Hats pulled from a dorm-room trash can filled with ice (so primitive–and, yes, lovely and retro), listening to Grant Lee Buffalo and the Smiths, and just wallowing in the catharsis were so…[sigh].  I have always told my parents I learned more that summer (and my summer backpacking in Europe) than I did during any of the other years I graciously spent in school.

Now I have three (3?  3!) sons stacked up there on top of my Master’s degree and my law degree.  Good use of money by my unbelievably generous parents, no?  The poet in me pulls me to write; the teacher in me pulls me to raise tiny geniuses; the humanitarian in me pulls me to help others as I’m called; the Epicurean in me makes this all rather difficult to accomplish.

Today was J and T’s last day of school.  I was probably the only mom who was sad about this; that worries me.  In preparation for the summer, I went out a few weeks ago and collected some terrific boyish books about science and chemistry.  I even had several of J and T’s pals over last week for a “Science Playdate” wherein we created Glue-Goo, blew Coke up with Mentos (yes, it does work, and it is impressive), and made Ziploc-“bombs”.  Clearly, I should have saved that playdate gig for a few weeks from now.

That said, I’m off to enjoy the last of my Magic Hat, coupled with a little The Sea and Cake…let it be.