Yep. All of the ingredients – but we just can’t get there.
(This is an embarrassing, actual photo of my dinner as I received it one night –
my fulfillment of a childhood comfort food craving, apparently, the only way it comes)
Monday morning:
We *finally* get into the car (after a few trips to retrieve forgotten items).
Seatbelts on.
Reverse.
Back the car DIRECTLY into the trash AND recycling bins.
Curse in front of my kid.
Exit car, clean up trash in the street (in heels and a skirt).
Re-situate garbage and recycling bins.
Back out again.
Make it to the carpool drop off *just* in time.
Rush to work.
Get further behind because of unexpected meetings.
Monday afternoon:
Still at work. Can’t catch up.
Husband picks up kids (each at a different location). He arrives home around 5:30.
Monday evening:
Leave work late.
Fight traffic (because BATON ROUGE, y’all).
Arrive home around 6:00.
Cook dinner (super-fast) while being screamed at/begged for a “snack.”
DinnerHomeworkBathTeethJammiesPottyWaterPrayersBooksHugsGOTOBED.
*sigh*
Dishes (because ew).
Laundry (because no clean uniforms).
Sit.
It’s 11:30.
Scroll through Instagram where I see pictures of friends with their children doing AFTER SCHOOL ACTIVITIES. There’s dance and soccer, gymnastics and swimming, Girl Scouts and track. Whaaaa? I haven’t sat down all day – except in traffic and at my desk. We BARELY made it through the day meeting the minimum qualifications of some definition of “parenting” (does making sure they’re bathed count?) and you had time to get tights on someone and get them to a CLASS?
JUST getting the tights on my daughter would require U.N. level negotiations, Navy Seal-type operational strategy and a subpoena to appear in the court of PUT THESE ON SO WE CAN GO and even then, it’s no guarantee. Because she’s HOT. And everybody knows YOU CAN’T WEAR TIGHTS WHEN YOU’RE HOT, MOM!
I’m jealous of you.
But I’m going to pretend that I’m not while I shrug and say to no one in particular that “we’re just letting them be kids.” That’s half-true. I mean, we ARE letting them be kids – because that’s all we can legitimately do right now. When my children are in the bed and I take a second to look back at the day, I don’t know where I’m supposed to pull another quarter hour for swimnasticdance ball. But I’m determined to figure it out.
I’ve got mom-guilt overload.
Recently, my oldest told me that she wanted to “do ballet.” I don’t know if she knows what that means. She’s 7 and likes to jump around the house to the Moana sound track so I’m not sure if “Ok girls, let me see first position” is what she has in mind when she’s asking … but I take her word for it and start the Google search for ballet classes in the area that we have a *prayer* of getting to regularly. By the time we sit down to discuss her options, she wants to take “gymnastics.” Knowing how she defines “gymnastics” (more time on the monkey bars than she currently gets at recess to do “tricks”) and what instruction actually happens at gymnastics classes…
I’m still game. So, we start the search for classes – preferably at a place where we’re not paying for the entire semester in advance just in case her leotard suddenly *bothers* her and she can no longer wear it.
Become a parent. You will never roll your eyes so hard at another human being.
Look at my life.
Theres PLENTY of room for a soccer ball and a dirty leotard in the middle of the living room floor.
We’re the normal ones, right?
(I *totally* put that pic on Instagram.)
