Monday, December 29, 2008

Dumpage

Somewhere amidst the constant "go" in our lives is a blog post or two. I know there is. I just have so little time to pause and reflect these days. I'm tired a lot and busy a lot. And yet, it just seems there is not a tangible lot to show for it all. Today was a fine example. I'm showered and dressed and ready to face the day by 8 am and standing out in the yard by 8:01 am waiting for the fur-child to poop. Thankfully it is Spring in December right now and reached nearly 60 degrees today. A week or so ago windchills were in the negatives and I was dressing the dog in fleece and myself in anything and everything warm that I could find, and begging the fur-child to do his business super fast. As in, POOP ALREADY, wouldya??!!!

By the time I come back inside, the boy-child has finally stopped whining about wanting his daddy and accepted the fact that Daddy is at work. I have him dressed by 8:20 am and the girl-child is dressed by 8:30 am, and I am frying "white and yellow" eggs for the boy-child, who will not eat "cheesy eggs" (scrambled with cheese), which happens to be the only kind of eggs the girl-child will eat. I make a mental note, for the eleventy-seventh time to buy another small skillet at the Stuff Mart today so that I can multi-task even more and make two different kinds of eggs at the same time. The boy-child is famished and has talked me into bringing him cereal while his eggs are cooking. And "bread" (not toast, mind you...and no butter either--just bread). And yogurt with blueberries. All the girl-child will eat is Rice Krispies, and I have to manipulate her into eating some yogurt before I will allow her the second bowl of cereal. Meanwhile, I am scoping the grocery ads. It's THAT day today. We are all kinds of off-schedule with the holidays.

I'm checking for great deals at all the area stores and making my list. The Stuff Mart price-matches, after all. Then I'm thumbing through the coupons. I pull out about 100 outdated ones. I typically have $20 in coupons to use per visit. I haven't done my job for a week or two and the coupon collection looks a bit thin. ...pause to flip an egg and pour another bowl of cereal. It's pushing 9:00. I can't find Dear Son's favorite cup despite a brief canvass of the entire premises. Son is whining in the background that he wants his "blat cup!" which means he will settle for none other than his black Klean Kanteen. I'm at a loss, and so I do what I frequently do when I can't find stuff: I call Dear Husband. He suggests the cup is still in the family mobile after coming home from Grandma's birthday party last night.

I almost have my list ready and coupons are scattered everywhere when the phone rings. It's 9:15 am now and it's my secretary. I have a message to call back the psychiatrist that is treating one of my more crazy clients in an inpatient hospitalization. I ordered this patient back to the hospital ten days ago because she wanted to kill herself again. The kids are now done with breakfast and it looks as if the entire kitchen has exploded. I send Dear Daughter to brush her teeth while I search for a washcloth to wipe the blueberries off Dear Son. I make the quick decision to call the psychiatrist back immediately. If I don't do it now, I will be busy and distracted until 5:00 pm at which time I will realize that it's too late. I park the kids in front of the t.v. and admonish them that they better keep quiet while I'm on the phone or there will be heck to pay. It's amazing how they can turn into demon-kids the second I get on the phone--especially if it is a work related call. They are amazingly obediant and allow me a good 15 minute phone chat with the psychiatrist. We agree on a game plan for the release tomorrow morning of said patient.

Now I'm running way behind. The kitchen is still inside out, I have to figure out how to fit twenty tons of recycling in the family mobile before we can pull out of the driveway, Dear Son needs my constant supervision and assitance to brush his teeth and go potty, the dog needs to go potty again too, because he never went the first time, and despite Dear Daughter claiming to have brushed her hair, it looks like she took an egg beater to it. It's 9:45.

I put the dog out on his lead in the yard while I brush Son's teeth and help him elminate in his Peter Potty. I give the kids the choice to finish watching their t.v. show or play in the yard with the pup while I attempt to fit the recycling tonnage in the family mobile. The more I pull out of the garage, the more I find. I keep shoving, and shoving, and shoving, I pray for the sake of all that is good and holy that the recycling center is open today or I will not be able to fit the groceries in the car.

Dog in, kids out...after the whole jacket and shoes ordeal (that's an entirely separate post). 10:20 am and we are finally on our way. Bank deposit first, followed by brief meltdowns that the teller at the drive up didn't offer a lollipop. I pull a couple from my secret stash in the car to keep the monsters quiet. It works like a charm through the entire recycling ordeal. The parking lot is crammed. Everyone who lives in a 20 mile radius is parting with their Christmas trash. I wiggle into the fold like a piggy at the trough and proceed to part with my own Christmas trash. Thankfully there are two cardboard dumpsters now, though the paper dumpster was packed to the brim. I stuff and stuff and stuff handful by handful. There was no way I'm dragging this crap back home again. Apparently I wasn't the first to come along with that attitude. By some miracle I get every last bit shoved in.

It's nearly 11:20 and we've just reached the front doors of the Stuff Mart. It takes a ridiculous amount of time to do the shopping deed. It always does with the kids in tow. The next hour and a half is filled with bickering and arguing and bribing and scolding. Two different people comment how well-behaved my kids are during the entire ordeal. Each of these people happened upon us during the only two moments the monsters shut up and quit antagonizing each other and myself.

We make it through somehow and I pile the stuff in the family mobile next to the recycling bins, thinking of how we will consume it all and discard the wrappings, and in a couple weeks I'll be packing more crap into the family mobile to recycle again. I try not to pause too long on the futility of it all, lest I find myself in a full blown depressive episode.

It's nearly 1:30 and I have groceries to unpack and lunch to prepare and a dog to take out (he STILL didn't go) before I can get the boy-child to bed for a nap. He is exhausted, as am I--only I know I won't be getting any naps and I'm only hopeful that he will. He is not fun to be around when he's tired and cranky, and even less fun to be around when BOTH of us are tired and cranky.

At 2:30 lunch is done, most of the groceries are put away, half the dishwasher is unloaded, and the kids' lunch dishes are still on the table. I have to take the pup out again--he STILL hasn't done his thing. The kids don their shoes and jackets and come out with me again. This time the pup does his thing in relatively short order. I hand the leash to Daughter while I assemble the new single-handed super dooper pooper scooper I just purchased at the Stuff Mart. The kids and I go on a turd hunt. I know he did it near the Tulip Tree somewhere. Despite the five acres of yard, I know the approximately 20 foot radius where the poop occured. I think. I warn the kids to step very carefully so they don't land their feet in the poop, only to have Dear Son point out to me the squished poop pile. Too late. I angrily ask which of them stepped in it only to discover it on my own shoe. I use the super duper pooper scooper anyhow and discovered it does well even with squished turds.

By about 3:15 we are finally in Dear Son's room to read a couple books. Lights out at 3:30 followed by thirty minutes of non-stop begging and pleading to "get up." I don't allow it. I lie next to him wishing he'd quit waking me up with his nagging so I could get a little cat nap myself. He finally falls asleep, but I'm wide awake with all the stuff in my head that I need to get done in the next hour and 45 minutes before I have to leave for work. It's 4:00.

I take a twenty minute breather next to my daughter on the couch who has found the t.v. again. After vegging for 20 minutes I allow myself to notice the disaster that surrounds me. Puzzles, games, toys, dolls, transformers, dog toys, and more litter the living room. Christmas was just the other day, after all. In the next room I can still smell the remains of breakfast, and now lunch. The task appears daunting, and I yawn before getting up to strip the king size log bed and throw the sheets in the wash. It was a chore I never got done over the weekend. It's getting chilly in the house and so I start a fire in the stove. Dear Son wakes up from his nap extremely grouchy and insists I hold him. It's 5:15. I leave for work in 30 minutes. I'm not dressed for work yet and my own hair now looks like I brushed it with an egg beater. I manage to correct these issues all while holding my fussing 35 pound just-turned-three-year-old, and I still have 15 minutes to spare. Good thing "messy" is in as far as hair goes. Mine is right in style.

The dog wants to go out again and Dear Daughter wants to play outside before it's dark. She keeps asking if it's Spring and apparently doesn't believe me each time that I tell her no, and that acually Winter just officialy began a few days ago. We all go outside until Dear Husband arrives home just in time for me to leave. I have two sessions scheduled tonight. It's 5:45.

I make it back home at 8:10. Dear Daughter is parading around the house buck naked after her bath (when exactly does modesty set in, anyway?) I change my clothes and put clean sheets on the log bed while I wait for Daughter to get dressed.

By 9:30 the kids are tucked in and I survey the house. Kitchen is still a mess. Dishwasher is still half loaded and half unlaoded. Puzzles, games, dog toys and the like are still strewn all over the living room. Various holiday messes STILL linger about the house. I have a long day tomorrow. Two sessions before lunch, then just enough of a lunch break to come home to let the dog out (I'm seeing theme here) followed by seven more sessions, all back to back over the next seven hours. All in all, I will deliver the kids to Grandma's tomorrow and do nine sessions before I return home to tuck the kids in bed. The house will really stink by then, as I will have another round of breakfast remains to clean up by then.

I'm too tired to care any more tonight. Good thing we are on break from school. I'm not sure where I would fit in the homeschooling right now. Despite not doing school today, I reflect on the feeling that it sure seems like I did a lot today. And yet, a quick glance around my home would argue otherwise.

6 comments:

Riahli said...

Oh my goodness I have days like this way to often. I totally relate! It's so frustrating to flop into bed completely exausted and yet feeling like you didn't even get the basics done. Our lives are so full that when we have anything extra to do, it takes aways from the time we need for the regular day to day *stuff*.

It drives me crazy when I have a chore, like cleaning all the floors, to get done but it takes me all day because I get side tracked by ten million little frustrating things that the boys do or get into.

Just this Saturday I scrubbed the grout in my tile floors, even with a toothbrush, it was super shiny but I still went to bed feeling like I had accomplished little because the dishes in the kitchen were over flowing, laundry is (not was, still is!) pilling up and clutter from Christmas is (notice the is here too) threatening to collapse the table in my kitchen.

I even feel guilty sitting down to blog, which is literally the only thing I do for myself at this moment in life!

Oh well...

Maternal Mirth said...

One more reason I have cats: no standing in the cold screaming "Poop already, wouldja!"

Also, modesty will set in when she's married.

And finally, a clean home is a singleton's home.

Zip n Tizzy said...

Exactly the reason your childless friends will never understand what you do with your time.
We've got your back.
Happy New Year!

CaraBee said...

What a day! When I first began this whole stay home mom thing, I felt the need to justify my every day to my husband. He would walk through the door and ask how my day was and I would detail the thing(s) I had accomplished. Now, I just feel happy to make it through the day with the kid mostly clean, fed and not crying.

Lori said...

By the sounds of it you are doing A LOT! The thing with living with little people is that this constant "doing" and busyness doesn't always show and if it does show, doesn't last for long.
Just think what our houses would look like if we didn't do all that we do during a given day. I have to stop and remind myself that my home is for living not for looking at. I also remind myself of all that I am teaching my little ones through out the day by all that we do. The reason things take so long to get done is because it takes longer to let our children learn how to do a task, it takes time to teach those little lessons of manners, respect, and obedience, and all the "loving" time we put into our children through out the day...a cuddle here, taking time to hold and read a story, stopping and listening to what they have to say...may not show in our houses looking the way we want them to or think they "should" look, but all these things show itself in children that know they are important, and loved.

We don't see the fruits of our labor until our children get older. Being an older mom, I have been blessed to get to see the end results of all the daily work. I have read your blog for awhile now and I can say without a doubt that you are a great mom that is investing in her children now so that they can be great people when they are older. Keep up the great job!

MGM said...

Riahli, Really! You scrub your grout with a toothbrush. I was cleaning my tile floor the other day (with a MOP) and I thought of you as I eyed the blueberry stains on the grout. It sill did NOT, however, inspire me scrub it with a toothbrush. Though I am quite impressed with your detail work!

M&M, Yeah, but I saw YOUR kitchen (or at least the picture you posted of your kitchen, which may very well have actually been a download from Better Homes and Gardens).

CaraBee, My husband came home some days when my son was a newborn and my daughter was 2 1/2, and he would find me curled in a fetal position in the corner mumbling unintelligibly.

Zip n Tizzy, Thanks for the validation and support!

Smiles4u, Thanks for the encouragement. I respect it even more coming from you!