Summer has been flying by. With me working from home 100% of the time, and the kids just old enough to entertain themselves, I decided to forgo camps and childcare and have an unstructured summer.

I’m surrounded by two sets of parents it seems. Those that give me the stink eye for letting my kids have the lazy unstructured summer they’ve been enjoying. “Kids need structure!” I am told. The other type offer sympathetic smiles, assuming I can’t afford camp. (The truth is I can’t, but in the past when I couldn’t afford it, I still managed to send them somewhere. There’s always the Y, or Parks and Rec.) This year I had no desire for it, and neither did the kids.

I used to tell people that I don’t own a laptop because I never leave my office. Well, I finally realized I never leave my office because I don’t own a laptop. So I finally bought one.

No longer employed with the dysfunctional agency, We’ve been enjoying time off and vacations, day trips and hooky days. It’s wonderful! We meandered down to the Gulf Coast early in the summer, and meandered back when we felt ready to leave. No particular schedule or deadline to be back. Our favorite Friday night activity of staying up late watching movies and sleeping in the next day has become a near daily activity that wouldn’t be possible if the kids were in camp. I feel like I am in the honeymoon stage of parenting at this point in my life. Master and commander! No pesky co-pilate (who really thinks he’s the pilate) to question me on how the kids spend their days, and how I spend my evenings—irritated by the constant presence of his own offspring and making everyone miserable as a result.

Don’t get me wrong, there have been plenty of days when the kids have driven me crazy. Sometimes I miss the silent work atmosphere I have during school days. But waking the kids up pre dawn to be drill-sergeant, playing chauffeur, monitoring homework, schedules and bed times—it’s all so exhausting! And relentlessly regimented. By contrast, summer is so liberating! So much more so now that I am single and I can do it my way. In the blink of an eye the kids will be grown and I will be alone. It’s days like these I will miss the most.

That’s all. No rants of any sort. No “buts” to counter the pleasantness of my current life. Just taking time to notice the wonderfulness of it all.

I have been struggling with my faith all my life. But on days like these, there is clearly someone… something, somewhere, that I need to be grateful to. And I am.