Saturday, August 18, 2012

Weekend of "firsts"

It's been a weekends of "first's" for Young Lee!  School, Starbucks, Football, and Horses.

That's right....  Friday was the first day of school and as you all know from my last entry I was freaked out and worried the entire day.  Of course the day went well. I asked Young how his day was and he said "Pre calculus is very easy.  Literature (English) and History were difficult to understand what the teacher was saying".  So I assured him that as he speaks more English and is here more that it will become easier.  I also volunteered to help him however I could.  Since I'm good at English and I would be lost just opening a pre calculus book, this may work out well.  If he can handle the math class I know I can assist with the English and History.

When I got home from work on Friday the neighbor kid (as we all lovingly call him), Adam, along with Drew and Young were just returning from Starbucks.  Now Young has made it very clear that he only likes to drink water so imagine my surprise when I saw him sporting a venti frappuchino.  This was his first time to try Starbucks.  I yelled at Drew and Adam for corrupting him and then they explained to me that it is just a chai tea kind of drink and it's ok.   Whatever.  I still yelled at them and I told Young that he didn't have to finish the drink which seemed to make him relieved because it was HUGE.  And  then I bitched at Drew and Adam some more as to why they couldn't have even started him off with a SMALL drink?  Blank stares and shrugging shoulders....

Another "first", we went to the St. Joes/Morro Bay football scrimmage.  Now this wasn't probably the best first football experience since it was only a scrimmage, but it was the first time Young has ever seen the game played except for watching John yell at the Rams while he watches them on TV.  Drew tried to explain who was offense, who was defense, and what each team was trying to do. I think Drew was also having to explain this to Adam who although he graduated from St. Joes and attended football games and grew up in the USA, still needs schooling on football.  Young might actually understand more than Adam. (Sorry Adam, love ya son....)

Saturday morning I was running around like a crazy insane woman since my son had invited like 40 of his closest friends over for a bbq to celebrate his 18th birthday.  So... as usual Stefanie and the kids showed up and I gave Stef and the kids the evil death glare for messing up my newly cleaned house (for like the 10th time) so she took the kids and Young and went to see a friend of hers who has horses.  You guessed it, another "first" for Young.  He has never seen a horse before except on TV.  So anyways, Young was able to pet some horses and he really liked them.   Since my BFF Julie has recently moved to a horse ranch in Atascadero, I can assure Young of many more encounters with horses! Very cool :)


I pulled everything together and we had the BBQ for Drew's 18th birtday.  It was a lot of fun.  Young went outside to eat with the other teenagers but seemed a little uncomfortable since he didn't really know them and he ended up coming in and playing the wii with John for a while and hang with the family. 

I heard a basketball and I noticed Young disappearing out to the driveway to go shoot baskets with Drew and his friends.  He stayed out there for a couple of hours and seemed like he was having a great time.  He also had his very first piece of birthday cake and I assume he really liked it because he ate all of it. 

Drew thought since we are all 18 or older now we should go to the casino at midnight when he officially will be 18.  I really don't think that is an appropriate "first" for Young Lee and not so sure Young's parents would appreciate us taking him there...so I'll take Drew to do that one another day without dragging Young with us.  After all, Young Lee has already been corrupted by Starbucks and junk food, let's not get carried away....

By the way, I was happy when Stefanie turned 18, and it didn't bother me when Jon and Jordan turned 18, but with Drew being the baby and turning 18 I'm just not ready! I feel emotional and I don't like it. Where did my little boy go?

Even though I don't like it at all,   Happy 18th  Birthday DREW!


THOUGHTS:
Imagine being 18 years old and never have seen a horse before except on TV.  As I am learning more and more about Young and his culture, I find myself  appreciating more and more all of what we have here in the USA and all of the opportunities that we have that other people may not have.    When I returned from 2 years of living in the Azores, Portugal in about 1992 I had a new appreciation of the USA and all we have here.  This kind of reminds me of that time...and it's a good thing. This experience is teaching me to be more aware and more thankful for things that I just take advantage of.

Enough deep stuff....   Tomorrow we may go to the beach and see seals and I hear there are whales being spotted every day too. Imagine, if seeing a horse was such an amazing experience, wait till he sees seals and whales!!

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