It All Started with a Broken Shoe...
Not just any broken shoe - my favorite brown heels. I've had them for five years and I love them. They are unique and I've never seen another pair I like half as much. And so it began...the broken strap on my favorite pair of shoes was the irritating harbinger of one-of-those days.
I was yelling at Athena, always a slow mover in the morning, to get up and get dressed, and at the other two to move it, get downstairs and eat breakfast. I plopped down to throw on my shoes and the damn strap is broken. I gave myself 30 seconds to feel bad about the sad demise of my favorite shoes, then tossed them next to the trash can and ran for the closet to get a different pair. But the other pair of shoes didn't work with the shirt I was wearing, so I had to find a new top too. Few extra minutes, no big deal, right?
This was just the beginning, just the first tiny bump in a row of irritating stumbles that made me want to raise a white flag before noon even arrived, and surrender to the evil sprite of mischief that was screwing my day.
New outfit, check. Matching shoes, check. Kids ready to go, almost. Hair fixed, sun block on, lunches packed. Out the door. Um, not quite. Because it's really hot right now and windy. Windy at an order of magnitude we've never seen before at our house. As I'm running for the stairs, I notice the curtains in the girls' rooms are blowing out of the open window and streaming gaily into the sky, snapping in the wind like beribboned flags. And the reason the curtains can do this is because the screens are missing. What the hell? My screens have never, in 10 years of living here, blown off the house before.
No time to do anything more than yell for Quokka, my nine-year old, to hold the curtains inside while I slam the windows and lower the shades. It's supposed to be over 100 and my air conditioner is broken, so the shades might keep the upstairs at ludicrous-hot instead of volcano. We sprint downstairs and she points out the back slider, "Oh look, there's the screen!" Detour to haul the bent screen, which has snagged on the fence, into the house.
We run for the front door and as soon as the latch is pressed the door slams open throwing Athena back into the wall as a gale-force whirlwind of dust, leaves and twigs swirls into the house. We fight our way out to the car, avoid having the doors torn off, or being decked by a flying tree limb, and I manage to get Quokka and Athena dropped off at school. And then I breathed a sigh of relief just a little too soon.
My phone is missing - back to the house for that. Where I notice that my neighbor's huge wheeled trash cans are blowing down the street (and almost hit the other neighbor's car). Since my neighbors are both local police who work graveyard shift, as well as nice people, I run down the street in my cute wedge heels and drag their unwieldy trash cans up to their side yard. Back a little wrenched, but good deed done, I ran in to get the missing phone.
As I run back out of the house, I notice that my little crepe myrtle tree has broken loose from its post and is bent in half. Okay, run to the garage for some twine. Run to the back yard and attempt to anchor the tree to its post while the branches beat me in the head and violent gusts try to rip the twine out of my hands. So much for fixing my hair this morning.
Back to the car - one ruined coif, some rope burns and a violent sneezing bout later - I'm finally, finally off to work just a little worse for the wear. The drive is exciting - with wind shoving the car, and tumble weeds and tree limbs to dodge - but ultimately uneventful and I manage to arrive just a little bit late. Now I can breathe that sigh of relief, right?
I take a deep breath and begin scanning email and the phone rings. It's Badger's school. "Hi, Mrs. Puff, yes, we noticed that Badger's lunch box is missing. Does she not have a lunch today?"
At this point I just laid my head on the desk. Points for me, I didn't cry. I also didn't curse out Mr. Puff (a.k.a. Daddy Lion) on the phone with the young school receptionist. Instead, I calmly replied, "her dad must have left it in his car; I'll come and get her or bring her a lunch. Thank you." I carefully set the phone it its cradle. Then I beat my head on the desk. Not really, but I wanted to so very, very much. Badger has allergies - she can't eat milk or soy - so there's nothing in her school she can eat; nothing. I work 50 minutes away from her school. I had just arrived at work.
I called the Dad-e-Lion and, with preternatural calm asked, "Do you have Badger's lunch in your car?"
To which he replied, "Oh shit, I can't leave work today, I've got this thing and a big meeting."
I refrained from shouting obscenities and just hung up the phone. Work is really busy right now and my team is overloaded with projects - we're working at max capacity, all thrusters go and mach three with our hair on fire.
I was just done, giving up, throwing in the towel - at 9:00 am I was finished with fighting life - with the shoes, and the screens, forgotten phones, flying trash cans, and wind-whipped trees, and the messy hair, and the dusty, sneezy air. I already looked like some red-eyed, fusty refugee from the wind. I powered through email, gave instructions to my team and calmly explained to my boss at 10:30 that I really had to go rescue poor, starving Badger, because it just didn't make sense to drive 50 minutes back, make a lunch, deliver it, and drive 50 minutes north again to work, only to have to turn back around and drive another 50 minutes to pick up three kids from school before 6:00 pm.
He agreed with that logic, and to make an exception to let me work from home the rest of the day because shit still has to get done.
And this is how I found myself on a conference call with executives using the mute key to time my comments in the silent spaces between my toddler leaping through the room, naked but for a shiny, red cape, declaring, "I'm super girl, SUPER GIRL!"
Welcome to working motherhood - guilt, rushing and compromises, punctuated by occasional despair and the ridiculously absurd.
I was yelling at Athena, always a slow mover in the morning, to get up and get dressed, and at the other two to move it, get downstairs and eat breakfast. I plopped down to throw on my shoes and the damn strap is broken. I gave myself 30 seconds to feel bad about the sad demise of my favorite shoes, then tossed them next to the trash can and ran for the closet to get a different pair. But the other pair of shoes didn't work with the shirt I was wearing, so I had to find a new top too. Few extra minutes, no big deal, right?
This was just the beginning, just the first tiny bump in a row of irritating stumbles that made me want to raise a white flag before noon even arrived, and surrender to the evil sprite of mischief that was screwing my day.
New outfit, check. Matching shoes, check. Kids ready to go, almost. Hair fixed, sun block on, lunches packed. Out the door. Um, not quite. Because it's really hot right now and windy. Windy at an order of magnitude we've never seen before at our house. As I'm running for the stairs, I notice the curtains in the girls' rooms are blowing out of the open window and streaming gaily into the sky, snapping in the wind like beribboned flags. And the reason the curtains can do this is because the screens are missing. What the hell? My screens have never, in 10 years of living here, blown off the house before.
No time to do anything more than yell for Quokka, my nine-year old, to hold the curtains inside while I slam the windows and lower the shades. It's supposed to be over 100 and my air conditioner is broken, so the shades might keep the upstairs at ludicrous-hot instead of volcano. We sprint downstairs and she points out the back slider, "Oh look, there's the screen!" Detour to haul the bent screen, which has snagged on the fence, into the house.
We run for the front door and as soon as the latch is pressed the door slams open throwing Athena back into the wall as a gale-force whirlwind of dust, leaves and twigs swirls into the house. We fight our way out to the car, avoid having the doors torn off, or being decked by a flying tree limb, and I manage to get Quokka and Athena dropped off at school. And then I breathed a sigh of relief just a little too soon.
My phone is missing - back to the house for that. Where I notice that my neighbor's huge wheeled trash cans are blowing down the street (and almost hit the other neighbor's car). Since my neighbors are both local police who work graveyard shift, as well as nice people, I run down the street in my cute wedge heels and drag their unwieldy trash cans up to their side yard. Back a little wrenched, but good deed done, I ran in to get the missing phone.
As I run back out of the house, I notice that my little crepe myrtle tree has broken loose from its post and is bent in half. Okay, run to the garage for some twine. Run to the back yard and attempt to anchor the tree to its post while the branches beat me in the head and violent gusts try to rip the twine out of my hands. So much for fixing my hair this morning.
Back to the car - one ruined coif, some rope burns and a violent sneezing bout later - I'm finally, finally off to work just a little worse for the wear. The drive is exciting - with wind shoving the car, and tumble weeds and tree limbs to dodge - but ultimately uneventful and I manage to arrive just a little bit late. Now I can breathe that sigh of relief, right?
I take a deep breath and begin scanning email and the phone rings. It's Badger's school. "Hi, Mrs. Puff, yes, we noticed that Badger's lunch box is missing. Does she not have a lunch today?"
At this point I just laid my head on the desk. Points for me, I didn't cry. I also didn't curse out Mr. Puff (a.k.a. Daddy Lion) on the phone with the young school receptionist. Instead, I calmly replied, "her dad must have left it in his car; I'll come and get her or bring her a lunch. Thank you." I carefully set the phone it its cradle. Then I beat my head on the desk. Not really, but I wanted to so very, very much. Badger has allergies - she can't eat milk or soy - so there's nothing in her school she can eat; nothing. I work 50 minutes away from her school. I had just arrived at work.
I called the Dad-e-Lion and, with preternatural calm asked, "Do you have Badger's lunch in your car?"
To which he replied, "Oh shit, I can't leave work today, I've got this thing and a big meeting."
I refrained from shouting obscenities and just hung up the phone. Work is really busy right now and my team is overloaded with projects - we're working at max capacity, all thrusters go and mach three with our hair on fire.
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| I am super girl, hear me roar! |
He agreed with that logic, and to make an exception to let me work from home the rest of the day because shit still has to get done.
And this is how I found myself on a conference call with executives using the mute key to time my comments in the silent spaces between my toddler leaping through the room, naked but for a shiny, red cape, declaring, "I'm super girl, SUPER GIRL!"
Welcome to working motherhood - guilt, rushing and compromises, punctuated by occasional despair and the ridiculously absurd.
