Hello again...

Good God...it's been months.  I've been busy writing elsewhere (on my computer) but my blog is beginning to feel alarmingly neglected. 
The current status in our house is that we have a nearly-eight year old raging with hormones who needs to be exercised like a whippet if we are to get any peace. The said exercise makes the five year old extremely morose and he starts whining about milkshakes and smoothies as soon as his heart rate quickens. I think he equates the beat in his chest with fear-pumping adrenaline when he meets an unknown dog which, in this town, is about 3 times a minute. The three year old, amazingly, just keeps going. He takes tactics from both his brothers and uses them when needed; raging and moaning in turn. By the time they fall into bed they are all kisses and tickles and I wonder how the day can have been quite so exhausting. 
The other night the five year old woke me from my sleep wailing.
I don't want there to be a war! he cried.
Had he heard about Putin in the Crimea? About Assad and Syria? I wanted to agree with him.
Do we have to sign up? I hugged him.
Was he thinking of soccer? We have signed up for that.
No I said. You don't sign up for war. You don't have to fight. There is no war.
Will Dad be back for the war? (My husband was away.)
There is no war. 
But you said! he accuses me. You said on the phone there was fighting.
My love, I think I was talking about you and your brothers. (That might have been the day the sibling rivalry got so much that I wanted to text 'help' to someone but couldn't think who to send it to. I ended up calling my mother to commiserate about my parenting skills.)
There is no fighting.
I don't want to die! he wails as I lie him back down in his bed and stroke his hair.
I don't want to die!
In the morning we oversleep because it took us so long to get back to sleep after the war stuff. We eat breakfast in the car and I have to stop the school run twice because the five year old says he's going to be sick.  Haste is not his forte.
Yesterday I had an entire afternoon to myself. Well, an afternoon that started at 3.30pm but it ended well past 8pm. The quiet! It intensified at teatime when there should have been bickering and shoving as hands were washed, the menu was assessed for vegetable content and favoritism was determined by the distribution of particular plates and cutlery. Instead there was the imperceptible sound of the kettle boiling as I made myself a cup of tea. The boys were at the beach and stayed there eating hotdogs well beyond their bedtime. I was at my computer as the dark crept in without me noticing until I was cloaked in luxurious inky silence. With not a wail to be heard.