Well, I made it.
Night one of back-to-school after the holidays, and I can’t say I’m coming in hot.
Christmas comes to lull you with its soft twinkle lights and never-before smelled scents such as “marshmallowcane birch;”
(Does the candle smell like it, or does it not?
A true mystery for all of time)
But Day One Back-to-School always comes at you ready to simply throw down.
Day One carries a shiv.
It doesn’t care about your cozy socks, and your fireside book.
It’ll tip that steaming copper mug right over on its side.
Winter Break is like a faithful old Golden Retriever curled up around your feet,
But Day One After Break is a feral barn cat with a missing eye and a torn left ear.
I could already feel it mocking me as I stood at my kitchen counter last night realizing that I’d never even cleaned out school lunchboxes from before the break.
I’ve never been so afraid to unzip things,
and I’ve had four newborns.
Sometimes “No yogurt. Please, no yogurt” is an actual prayer that you pray.
To have to jump so suddenly from gleefully decorating cookies and singing carols to trying to work out seventh grade math word problems with a shred of dignity left as your kids watch you cry “I don’t KNOW” just seems impossible;
yet, it is where I found myself at today.
Right back to my morning dissertation on the importance of protein.
Right back to arguing over who sits where in the van.
Right back to tiptoeing through the pre-teen minefield of “No. I didn’t say it looked bad,
I just asked if you combed it.”
So, as you can see,
today was off with a bang.
My hair would not lay flat no matter what I did, so I put on a hat to try to hide it all.
My hat that reads “Kindness matters,” which my 11 year old must not have read by the look that she gave my hair and that hat.
“Does it look bad?” I asked her, seeing her face.
“Will anybody SEE you?…” She simply asked me in return.
After an eventful school drop off that involved a very awkwardly mouthed conversation with my Jr. Highers from across the school parking lot,
I spent my afternoon further de-Christmasing my house.
Cleaned out the lint trap.
Dusted Lego shelves.
Ruined my holiday manicure attempting to chip a petrified Jolly Rancher off of a dresser top.
Usual Happy Homemaker fare.
Before I knew it the school day was over,
and back again I went to pick them all up.
From the moment the car doors opened they were bickering again.
The two youngest doing all they could do to our-irritate one another.
By the time we reached the top of our street a mere 10 minutes later,
I had so had it with my youngest’s antics that I stopped the car and shocked them all as I told her to get out, because she was walking the rest of the way.
“But I don’t have my shoes on!” She whined.
“You’re part Native American,” I called as the door closed behind her.
“Let’s call this cultural,” and then I drove the 2 blocks to home.
My husband, fresh off of working a 9 hour shift spanning from 2:45am to 12:15pm heard the wails from his horizontal place on the couch and attempted to “help” the incoming situation by just yelling the word, “STOOOOP!” on repeat until he fell back asleep.
But stop we could not.
This is Go Time in school week world.
Right away it was homework helping time, during which I attempted to print a document that I needed to no avail.
The computer is still not done with winter break, either, I guess.
After I set two up with their math, and got one in the shower, I headed to the grocery store for the things I needed to cook my family a lovely home-cooked meal.
The family whom I was verbally repeating that I loved as I drove.
All of this was on a time schedule, as dinner needs to be done by 5:00 if my husband is to properly digest his food before going back to bed at 8pm.
So, there I was moving quickly and familiarly around the grocery store, deep breathing myself through this day when I rounded a corner and BOOM, I was face to face with a stranger woman.
Dressed in L.L. Bean, unassuming long bob, gold zippers on her red pleated vest.
She looked roughly 10 years older than me.
Her husband was trailing behind.
“You look stressed,” she said, at first real soft.
I bit my lip to bite back the tears.
It was so wonderful just to be seen.
But just when I thought she was about to say something else kind,
instead she ended her two second TED Talk with a condescending, “CALM DOWN,” and one nod, and then she just walked away.
You know when people do that quiet laugh?
That one that’s not really a laugh,
but more of a warning sound that they’re about to be really, really not OK?
Well that sound started coming out of me,
and I quiet laughed to the check out line.
The cashier rang up my asparagus and lemons and my fish and brown rice and I pushed my cart CALMLY to the car where I climbed in and cried for at least 10 minutes, while I reminded myself that it is not OK to back over people in your car in a grocery store parking lot.
I finished crying and drove myself home.
I cooked the dinner, I did the dishes, I blew hair dry, and slathered on lotion.
I checked the homework.
I checked on a rash.
I read Nancy Drew.
I repeated myself a few times.
I took a deep breath, and I prepped for
Day Two,
and in the end I felt proud of my day
because of the one thing that I did NOT do today:
I didn’t drive over that woman.
This article was written by a guest blogger. The opinions expressed here are those of the writer and do not reflect the opinions of Bob Lacey, Sheri Lynch or the Bob & Sheri show.
Mom Outnumbered
Hi! My name is Kerri Green; Wife to Justin, and mother to four highly entertaining daughters -Alena, Chloe, Tessa, and Paige. I am an artist, a writer, a daycare provider, a lover of people, a believer that there is humor and beauty in all things, and the author of Mom Outnumbered; a blog about real family life, and my observations of it. My goal is to make people laugh, to be there for them when they cry, and most importantly, to let them know that they are not at all alone in this up and down world. I live with my family in Sebastopol California, and I am opening the window into our life. So welcome! Come in. Sit down. Just please don’t mind the mysterious wet spots.
