A day in the effing life

12/20/2016, 11:16 PM

Man, I know that some days are just like this, but shit, you guys. I’m spent.

I started the day hungry, because I had to do a fasting blood draw this morning. My doctors didn’t schedule the draw until 11 fricking o’clock, which meant two things: 1) I got hangry, and 2) my doctors hate me. I mostly stayed away from people, for the sake of humankind. It was the biggest relief to stuff a cold, stale PB & J into my mouth at 11:15. It honest-to-God was.  

I worked for a little bit, because sometimes I do that. Then I had a break between clients, and I decided to go to the effing mall. Again. I’ve already been there, oh, seven or so times so far this season, which is about seven times too many. But seriously, I needed to get my kids some bathrobes for Christmas, and I’m cutting things too close to the Amazon Prime deadline. My kids are NOT forgiving about late gifts, and mommy already messes enough shit up— I’m for damn sure giving them their damn bathrobes on mothafucking Christmas Eve. (Sorry for all of the cussing, Baby Jesus.)

After visiting EIGHT stores in search of aforementioned bathrobes, I found one for each kid, in two separate stores. Riding up the escalator of the second-to-last store, I had the realization that I would literally rather be counseling someone back from the brink of suicide than be doing what I was doing. I’m serious.

BTW, Evie’s robe is going to be like 3 sizes too big, but whatever, she’ll grow. She will have the damn thing ON CHRISTMAS and that’s what’s important, right?

Back to the office for an hour, to work with a client who is doing exceptionally well, and then to the gym. Those two hours of my day were glorious, golden. I moved right from a therapy flow to a solid workout and left the YMCA with the sheen of hard work and accomplishment on my body. (AKA, sweat. I was sweaty.)

The hubs had somewhere to be tonight, so it was just me and the kids. Arriving home all pumped from my good session and good workout, I offered to cook for them—I mean, we’re talking full-on “I will actually turn on the stove” cooking. They wanted Easy Mac. So they had watery noodles with cheese powder out of a plastic cup and I had some leftovers that I found in the fridge. (Now accepting nominations for Mom of the Year.)

After supper Evie stood up to clear her plate. Halfway to the kitchen counter, she froze. And then all Hell broke loose. A loud, ungodly sound came out of her…something I can only describe as “rage sobbing,” because she was screaming but tears were coming out of her eyes. And it was appalling because it came out of nowhere—like zero to “I’m losing my shit” in a second flat. I sat frozen at the table, spoonful of soup halfway to my mouth, not knowing what the hell was going on.  “I STEPPED IN TEDDY’S PUKE! AAAHHHH IT’S SO GROSS, I STEPPED IN IT, WHAT AM I GOING TO DO?”

Yeah, she stepped in cat vomit. Our cat Teddy is a fatty and regularly eats so much that he throws up.

I attempted to be soothing, telling Evie that it was okay, we could just wash her foot off and I’d clean up the floor.

“I CAN’T WALK! I CAN’T WALK!”  Rage sobbing. Mild hyperventilation. It was fantastic.

So, because my nine-year old daughter was rendered an invalid via cat puke, I grabbed her under the armpits and manually hauled her towards the bathroom. She helped me out by hopping lightly on her unsullied foot as I pulled her up the stairs. Once we got her feet taken care of, the rage sobs ceased almost as abruptly as they’d begun. She, miraculously, could walk again. All was quiet on the Western front.

Then Jonah got up from the table and walked right through the vomit. And he yelled at me. “WHY DIDN’T YOU TELL ME, MOMMY?”

Because clearly, my son needs to be given a directive to NOT walk through cat vomit.

We got him cleaned up. Then I cleaned up the vomit on the floor, so that we could all stop walking through it and raging.

A few minutes after the vomit had left the building, the kids approached me, together, all clean feet and calm faces. They sweetly asked if we could go to Barnes and Noble. Their request was just too pure, too good. I knew they were in cahoots, had cooked up some kind of evil plan while they were tending to their puke feet.

The thing is that I really like Barnes and Noble. I like books, a lot. I like coffee almost as much as I like books. I like the smell of books and coffee mixed together. So I said yes. Consequences be damned.

As it turns out, while they were somewhat interested in books, what they really wanted was to look at Pokemon cards. Barnes and Noble was a bust on Pokemon cards, having no packs available under $6, which was Jonah’s entire life savings. (By the way, I don’t do buying Pokemon cards. I do buying books. The kids know this about me and thus brought their own money. Smart kids.) Because they’d both behaved exceptionally well at Barnes and Noble, we stopped at Target to look at Pokemon there. They both found what they wanted at Target, they bought their cards, we left.

At this point I was feeling like a smooth operator. Everyone was content, and we were going to get home at a good time. The steaming cup of tea and the episode of the West Wing that I was about to enjoy was in my mind's eye, just moments away from becoming a reality. 

Then Jonah opened his pack of cards and WAS NOT HAPPY with the Pokemon that he got. Meanwhile Evie had ended up with not one but TWO of the cards he wanted, which she hastened to gloat about. Jonah started hitting Evie in the face with his stocking cap, repeatedly. This just made Evie laugh, and so Jonah had progressed to slapping her with his hand. “I had to, Mommy,” he explained. Of course you did, son. Of course you did.

Bedtime took freaking forever, because they needed baths, and they dawdled around, and by this point I was all unfocused because I realized that I needed to have their teacher’s Christmas gifts ready by tonight, and also I needed to have their Christmas program outfits laid out tonight so they are ready for tomorrow, and also, the Christmas cards haven’t been sent and presents need to be wrapped and fudge needs to be made and Oreos need to be dipped and a grocery list needs to be crafted. Tis the season to have a mental breakdown, y’all.

I did the teacher gifts and the Christmas cards. The rest can fricking wait. Mommy needs a hot shower, and maybe a sedative.

How was your December 20^th, 2016, friends?