Whatever Works

Scheduled maintenance required

 

Sitting in my living room amongst the Seuss-like towers of clean laundry isn't the best scenerio for typing up a story.  But it's cozy and has a bit of excited anticipation attached to it.  I never know when a tall stack of men's pants or tiny kids' underwear is going to topple down onto my head.  It keeps me on my toes.

I've been trying to keep up lately.  With laundry, housework, my daughter's reading log for school, the latest Ashton Kutcher tweets, home cooked meals...

That's the story of my life. Throw in a tonsillectomy for one kid and the Coxsackie virus for the other and you've got a novella of my last month.  I get it all under control and then BAM!  The maintenance light in the car goes on.   

Why would this silly little orange light blind-side me so much?    I knew it was coming.  Even if I don't know what most other things are in a car, I can read an odometer.  (That's what it's called, right?)  I saw the mileage creeping up, but I chose to ignore it. 

I do that with most scheduled maintenance.  My hair has a semi-permanent inch of dark roots because I wait too long between visits to my magician beautician.  The straps on all my bras are twisted and frayed.  I still have Halloween decorations waiting to be deposited into their spot on the attic floor.  Oh, and my computer is waiting to download about 25 updates just as soon as I decide to turn it off and restart it.

Why do I wait?  Because right now, things are good.  My kids have recovered from surgery and viral invasions.  My laundry is clean and folded.  I can stop everything and sit here to write for a minute.  That's the maintenance I NEED today. 

And my brain is content.  And my soul is happy.

My son says he doesn't love me

My 3 year old has decided that he no longer loves me. He still loves his sister and Daddy with all his being, but he has placed my heart somewhere in his toy box, I think. Yes, I can feel it being rubbed up against his old Handy Manny tool set.

I thought he was kidding yesterday when he looked at me while we sat in the waiting room of his dermatologist's office and said, "Mom, I don't wuv you." I laughed and said it's OK. I joked with him about it as we drove home later. I told him it didn't change how much I love him. That didn't matter to him. He was adamant.

It didn't actually bother me until today when once again, my little blue eyed cutie looked up at me and declared his lack of love for me. I tried joking again, but this time I put some real effort into it. I tickled. I made funny faces. I pretended I was sad.

Nothing.

It bothered me all morning and afternoon until I put him up for a nap. For the record, he didn't actually take a nap. He sat up there quietly by himself for about 45 minutes before coming back downstairs. When he saw me, he walked over and stopped directly. He looked up and said, "Mom, I DO wuv you."

It made me so happy to hear those words. I scooped him up and kissed his face off.
But then it got me thinking... Was he up there in his room contemplating his love for me for 45 whole minutes?! Sheesh! What a day.

Making an ass out of me

 I assume a lot of things that I shouldn't. For example, I assume that my computer will always work and that soda will never spill on it forcing me to abandon its sticky keys and write blog posts on a tiny iPod keyboard while I have a headache. I also mistakenly assume that my son doesn't splash around in the toilet water after he pees and poops in it, but today we're discussing things I've wrongly assumed, aren't we? Yes, I'm a big ass. I don't really think the stuff I assume has any affect on the "u" portion of the saying; it's the "me" part that gets all the action. Like when I recently assumed my daughter knew the difference between an emergency and asking me to find her box of tissues that was directly under her hand. I ran upstairs thinking the worst, and unless the worst involved boogers, it was snot. Pun completely intended. At least one thing I assumed today was correct. I received the $20 necklace I had ordered a month ago (which on another note I had incorrectly assumed would arrive 2 weeks ago) and it is exactly what I assumed it would be: a necklace that looks like I paid $20 for it.

Spontaneous sometimes stops combustion

This was a hard week.  No way around it.  There wasn't much good news to be heard.  I tried to keep a happy face on, but it continually fell off.  I need to find some stronger glue, I think.  No, the problem isn't the glue.  It's the way I apply it.  I sometimes don't use it properly.  ...OK, enough metaphor.  By glue, I mean support.  My support system is absolutely the strongest I've ever had.  My husband is the best friend I could ever wish for.  The rest of my friends are fantastic.  My family is even better, if that's even possible.  It's just my own silly brain sometimes that forgets to utilize them.

So anyway, after this long week of tiny nit-noid stressors, I took the bull by the horns.  Fuck it.  Let's go up to Grandma & Grandpa's for absolutely no reason other than to spend time.  We had no plan.  Nothing pressing.  No set time for arrival or departure.  My poor husband had to work, so we missed him like crazy.  But we went on our journey with smiles on our faces and Halloween costumes in our bags.  Because of a crazy freak snowstorm, regular Halloween was canceled for my parents' area.  Going up on Friday put my kids right in line for an extra night of  "make-up" trick or treating.

It was so great to walk around my old town with my sister again - just like we used to as kids.  Only this time, she wasn't forced into it by Mom and we weren't sneaking cigarettes once we got around the corner.  This time we were watching our own kids run up to the same doors we once knocked on to yell, "Trick or treat!!"  This time we stayed on the street wondering if Mrs. So-and-So still lived there, or if the Chinese restaurant still gave out fortune cookies. ( They did.)

When we got back to my parents' it was just like old times.  Mushroom and onion pizza...kids swapping Reeses for Skittles and then for Snickers...no one wanting the Whoppers.  And my parents.  My wonderful parents all dressed up in their costumes smiling from ear to ear.  It made the whole week fizzle out into what it truly was: Nothing major.  Nothing that I couldn't handle without my wonderful family and a little spontaneity. 

And some candy.