My Second Shift

It’s 3:15pm and I’m looking up KISS pictures. 
You know the band Kiss?
 I did get a little more than I googled for...

...note to self that I must be very specific when I google kiss.

Connor wants a Kiss cake for his #10 birthday.  

I’m broke.

I’m also ambitious.

My fellow EC teacher comes in to speak with me and I think what a crappy mentor I am because I have to leave.  

I want to encourage, and help, and inspire… 

but I’m emotionally mentally unavailable.  

It’s not you, it’s me.  

Luckily, she gets it.  

We plan to meet soon.

I rush to the store.  

It was fast and easy.

I rush to the daycare.  

I express my concern that Carlee is not sleeping at night.

She is sleeping fine at daycare.  
It must be only her family she wants to torture, I think to myself.

I rush to the second daycare.  “Mom, I didn’t feel like reading.’

Oh good, one more thing to fit in.

I rush home.

My van sounds like a covered wagon when I make a left hand turn.

I'm no mechanic, but I don't think it's suppose to squeak.

Planner, HW folder, meat for dinner, mashed potatoes.. and forget the vegetable.  I don’t have time to open a can.  

We are eating southern tonight.

I have one hour to help with HW, fix dinner, and get Connor to practice.  

Darren is working late.

I am soooo ambitious.

While I season (salt/pepper) the hamburger steak (on sale), I am explaining standard equations.  

I am explaining why 1, 431, 640 does not read like one million forty thousand three one thousand six hundred four zero.

I notice Connor is working faster.

He is being really positive. 

But then,

the spelling words are to be written in stacks to understand the spelling and rule.  He is doing it wrong.

No I am not.

Yes you are.

No I am not.

I have a degree, yes you are.

No I am not.

I pause the potatoes in a microwave bag and show him what I mean.

Carlee is being abnormally quiet.

I run upstairs.  

The WHOLE bathroom is flooded.

Seriously.

She plugged the sink and the water is running, overflowing with water and six naked barbies.  

I cut the water off.  

I scream Carlee the way Rocky screams ADDRRIIIAAANNNN!

I throw 10 towels on the water and go back downstairs.

The word ‘excitement’ is spelled ‘excO tement' about four times.

We fix it.

I ask Connor to read to me while I mash the potatoes, burn the hamburger steak, and fix the plates.  We have 30 minutes to eat.

Carlee?

Yes?

What are you doing?

Nothing.

The book Connor is reading is a Goosebumps book and it’s about a killer car, and it is suspenseful because...

each word is going as painfully slow as a book can possibly go because the motivation is leaving.

Carlee begs for a drink.  I pour her milk.  There is a gatorade bottle with 1/4 liquid nearby.  She gets mad because she wants Gatorade.

No.

YES.

No.

YES.

She throws the gatorade bottle open across the living room.

Orange liquid goes everywhere.

You know how you shouldn’t spank when your mad?

Oh. Baby.  I spanked MAD.

What is happening here?

DEAR GOD, ITS ME MARGARET, I’VE GROWN UP AND IT ISN’T WORKING RIGHT NOW.

I get a text about a ‘situation’.

I have to get to practice early to deal with the ‘situation’.

Connor continues to read..... while I’m texting, Carlee is screaming, and the meat is sizzling.

We say a prayer before we eat  'Dear God. Thank you. and Help.'

Darren walks through the door.

I have three plates with cut meat and potatoes and no time to eat it.
I have a screaming toddler.

C. get your gear on, we have to go.

I yell highlights at my husband, thinking he probably wishes I was one of those wives that would meet him at the door in a trench coat.  

ha. ha. ha.  I laugh in my mind.
We have to go.

We have to go.

We have to go.

I try to tie Connor’s pads on his shoulders.

He looks like the Hunchback of Notre Dome and I think I’ve done something wrong here.

I deal with the ‘situation’.

It feels like it’s a one size fits all world.

I start to cry.  
I think I need to up my omega 3s because I’m telling you I don’t think I can stop crying now that I have started.

I wipe my snot on my Special Olympics shirt and pray my son is passed out from running in the heat, so he can’t see me. 

I'm embarrassing myself here. 

There is another mama who sits beside me and tells me she cries too and understands that we mothers just want what is best for our kids.   I am so appreciative.
I could almost kiss her feet...

….but even I have a line of weirdness I won’t cross.

I calm myself.

I come home after watching practice for a while.

Darren has cleaned the kitchen but managed to throw my meal away.

I eat a Kit Kat for dinner.  I have Carlee's milk with it.

She is on a hunger strike at the table.

Maybe this is why my weight is not going anywhere but up.

Darren didn’t get to the orange stain.

He did give Carlee a bath.

Working together is good.

I start scrubbing the Gatorade.

When I can’t control the situation, I want Darren to control it…

then we argue a bit.

We switch places and he goes to practice for pick up.

I pack lunches, get a shower, read The Princess Book (and remind Carlee there are no princesses throwing drinks), and start on paperwork….

This school paperwork is great.  

I keep rereading the one sentence I just typed in 45 minutes.

I eat another Kit Kat. 

I text Darren.

‘are things ok?’

‘is he doing good’

I get the text back  ‘looks lost’

What else is new? 

Our whole family is lost.

There is a blessing- Connor can run in heat and not puke.

Connor can run, run, run…. 

when he was little I swore he was 1/2 monkey with so much energy.

Darren comes home and we agree we can’t communicate properly when we have lots of dreams of sleeping in late.

My friend sent me a great article, and reminds me to ignore the bad words, and she so gets it.  

I love friends with perfectly imperfect lives.

I get a message from Connor’s teacher.

I am so thankful.

I don’t cry because I am thankful.  

Does Kit Kat have Omega 3s?  I think it’s working.

There are other people who get it.

So this is for all the people out there who get it.

This was my second shift.

It’s been a day.