Days

Here's how yesterday went:

I woke up to the sound of Maria, blaring away like a trumpet.  I got up and then I looked at the clock and I said to Mike, it's not even 7:00!  He said, we get up early, Joanne, we're like lumberjacks.  I said I think maybe lumberjacks go to bed earlier than we do.  Tuesday night was my first night off since the previous Thursday, and these weekends at this insanely busy restaurant where I'm working are sort of killing me, I sleep like the dead anymore.  Anyways, we got up and got Maria ready to go to school, she and Mike left around 7:30 or so.

I got Felicity dressed, Veronica was already in clothes that she had picked out with Mike, so I didn't have to worry about her.  I got all of Anthony's bags together, one with food that they had requested at his school, one with his braces and shoes, and one with his extra clothes and iPad.  Then I went upstairs and woke him up, I got him dressed with him lying flat on his stomach, which isn't hard as much as tricky, I have to line up his socks backwards and it's a pain.

Then I got his medicine, 1/2 teaspoon in a syringe, and some soda for bribery, and then I chase him around the house and fold up his hands on his body and then lay down on his hands on his body so I can hold his face with one hand and shoot the medicine with the other.  He gags, every time, and then he finally just takes it and then I give him the soda and then I cry a little bit, it's so freaking frustrating, I feel like I am making him sick.  Anyways, ::brisk clap:: there is NO time for tears, because I have to put them all in the car.  Veronica is the only one who can get in her damned car seat herself, so I strap in the other two, find my phone, start the drive to his school.

There is construction on the road to his school, construction which is supposed to last for TWO YEARS, so it takes us forever to get there and we are late.  By the time we get home (we stop to pick up pancakes from Old McDonalds), we've been in the car for 1 hour and ten minutes.

I decide that I should rake the leaves in our side yard, the only one I haven't done yet, so I put gloves and hats and boots on the girls, (it was cold but sunny and I thought they could get some fresh air) and start to rake while they play.  I only raked for ten minutes before Veronica had removed her boots and gloves and found some kind of a water source to soak herself in, so she was mad because she was, shocking no one, wet and cold.  Here's a picture:

Ooh I was mad clean through!  But we all went inside and dried off and warmed up.  We went to ballet at 12:00, which means 45 minutes of learning arabesques for Veronica and 45 minutes of me chasing Felicity around the center.  She goes outside, climbs up to the water fountain, insists on going in the bathroom to wash her hands, on and on, back and forth for 45 minutes.  This is the same place where the lady yelled at me and told me to 'watch my child' when Felicity was messing with one of the thousands of piles of papers they have there, so I am always nervous.  We went home and I gave them lunch and decided against putting Felicity down for her nap, as she is not feeling it these days, to quote Mike. At 2:45 we went to get Maria and at 3:15 we picked up Maria, the other girls were already asleep.  Maria feels like she deserves a treat every damned day of her life so I told her I'd buy her a half-price shake at Steak and Shake.  She, of course, fell asleep on the way there so I just looked like a hog, buying several shakes at the drive through, but whatever.  We got home and everyone was grumpy and sad and post-nap angry, but I threw them in the house and gave them their damned shakes and took ten minutes to get ready for work.

At 4:00 we left to get Anthony and we hit so, so much traffic again that we were late.  We picked him up and the entire way home Felicity yelled and cried, she had just had it with the damned car.  ME TOO, I told her, ME TOO.

We all got home and Mike was already there, we unloaded the kids and I went in and cut up a pepper to eat on the way to work, and THEN I got stuck in MORE traffic and I was like fifteen minutes late for work.  It was like 2.5 hours in the car yesterday and I think, what the hell?  Am I a stay at home mother or a over the road truck driver?  I hate it.  I hate my stupid schedule, I hate being so tired all the time, I hate that Felicity is two years old and spends so much time in the car.  Veronica hates dropping off Anthony at school, she hates going to get him.  I told her yesterday, I don't like it either but at least she is in a million dollar car seat, with her MOVIE OF CHOICE on the DVD player.  That wasn't an option when I was a girl, I told her.  Back on the prairie, where we often died of things like the common cold.  Ha, just kidding I didn't say that last part.

Anyways, I worked until 11:00 and then that was the end of my 16 hour day.  It's too much, I think, sometimes.  I went to confession last week and I - I guess it was two weeks ago by now- told the priest that I struggle so much with patience, patience with my children and my husband, the people to whom I should be the kindest!  He was very nice, he always is, he said I should try and take a few moments each day to really just unplug my heart, to just let everything out and feel everything, without judging it or having expectations of what I should be like, as a mother, and a wife.  He was very nice but all I could think was I will never get a few moments a day where I can be left alone like that.

I don't know.  So often I feel like I am doing it all wrong, like other people seem to be enjoying their lives or at least not miserable curs like I am, are they all lying?  Faking?  I hope so.  Or I hope they are more simple minded, that's what I tell myself sometimes.  I am so miserable because I'm so SMART.  I don't know.  I am putting Felicity in preschool one more day a week and hoping for the best.