Well, it's been an eventful couple of days here. Today, Emma moved out - into an apartment in Capitol Villa, which is where I was living (sharing an apartment with my friend Jeff) when Emil and I met.

While Em was moving, Emil and I spent the day in Ann Arbor, futzing with the house down there. We got a whole lot done, which was gratifying: The yard no longer looks abandoned, the sunroom is more inviting, we cleared a lot of stuff out of the garage, we've returned with many items that we've been wanting to have, and - get this - we scored a wooden patio set (table, umbrella, 4 chairs) for free. (Someone was giving it away at the curb.) Woot!, as these young people say . . . To top it off, it was a beautiful day, in that way that spring in Michigan is beautiful: a delicate breeze, blossoms everywhere, varying shades of new green, and a pale blue sky. We took Wally with us, and he had a ball; he alternately took up residence in the sunroom and investigated the yard. He seemed clearly to be in a happy and familiar place.

Ann Arbor was at once wonderfully hip and wonderfully absurd. We stopped at Trader Joe's on the way out of town, where I had two "Ann Arbor Moments" in the space of about ten minutes. First, I overheard a nicely-dressed, fit-looking 30-something man tell the woman who was handing out the blueberry ice cream (yum!) samples that blueberries are in such demand lately because of their antioxidant properties. He said they were up to $2.49 a pound . . . This made me think of blueberry futures. (I wondered if, in fact, there would soon be a cadre of men in some town hall in Maine (Skowhegan, perhaps) who would actually set the price on blueberry futures . . . but I digress.)

And then, while wandering down the cereal aisle, I noticed something called "Hemp Plus Granola." Am I the only one who finds it absurdly funny that hemp products are being marketed so agressively to yuppie Baby Boomers? Just cracks me right up . . . do they want to relive their youth, or what??

We returned to Lansing to discover that Em had moved most of her possessions out already. So we got cleaned up, had dinner, and then headed over to her apartment with some items we'd picked up for her at the "recycle place." She, her boyfriend, and her roommate were all giddy with excitement . . . We discovered that her apartment is laid out exactly as the one Jeff and I had shared (not too much of a surprise, really, but still . . . a bit of a jolt).

This whole apartment thing is such an odd situation that I hardly know how to think about it. It's a fait accompli, so there isn't much I can do but accept it. It's only a summer lease, so that's a good thing; she can't get herself in too far over her head . . . and we are just down the road, so it's not like she's alone in a new place. This is a pretty risk-free endeavor. (Don't ask me why on earth they let her sign a lease. That's just one of the many mysteries in this tale . . . stay tuned on that one.)

This situation also reminds me that I'm completely baffled as to why our children are behaving in the way they are. What do they want out of life, really? Why are they consistently choosing the low road? In my worst moments, I think that they've grown up to be the slackers that we have somehow raised them to be. (Probably everybody else knows how we did that, but it's a mystery to me . . . )

In my better moments, I think that maybe we taught them the art of getting by with "less" - in the sense of, less than those around you have. Perhaps they have learned to "make do," in some sense. (They don't seem to need socks or pajamas or much in the way of clothes at all, for example.) And that maybe we did, in fact, manage to teach them to value what's important. At this point they are not likely to follow paths that will bring them a lot of money; but that doesn't mean they'll be unhappy. We may have raised children who, given the choice between time and money, would, like their parents, choose time. Personally, I've never regretted having made that choice . . . maybe they won't either.

I'm puzzled about why they don't want to go farther from home, since when I was their age, I wanted to get as far away from home as I could. I find it impossible to think that we've somehow clipped their wings or stunted them. I can't figure it out, so I've decided just to take this state of affairs as a gift; I'm more than happy to have them gone-but-close. I don't know how long it'll last, so my goal is to enjoy it while we can . . .

Life is never dull around here, that's for sure.