The Housewife--One of Those Days

I woke to Young One beating on my arm, yelling, "The basement is a lake." Oh crap. I seriously took a heartbeat to think about burying my head under my pillow while wishing the world away.

When I got to the basement, my initial assessment was that all was lost, but when I looked closer it was less of a lake and more of a pond. I tried to do the I Dream of Jeannie arms-crossed-eye-blink to make it all go away. When I opened my eyes, though, it was still there. You've got to give me credit for trying! As a kid, I thought that one day my magical powers would just instantly arrive. Maybe this morning could have been the day. I'll keep working on the wink part.

I've just spent the last couple of hours soaking up water with a shop vac, throwing out the ruined stuff (which was mostly junk), and cursing the fact that I was ultimately responsible for the flood in the first place. You see, in a fit of industry yesterday, I cleaned my laundry room sinks. Not a bad idea, in theory, right? I thought that I should soak them with bleach water to get some grime off, and remembering that the water softener drains through one side of those sinks, I realized that I needed to set a timer to remind me to drain them before going to bed that night. The timer went off during dinner, a particularly busy time in all households, and I shut it off without resetting it. "I won't forget," I thought. Famous last words.

It's these little reminders of our humanity that sometimes give us pause, right? I mean, here I've been plugging along, taking care of a sick kid, juggling medicine and thermometers and laundry and trying to figure out foods that appeal to him and neck rubs and warm blankets and Popsicles and lack of sleep and doctor trips and nausea from medicine and temperatures so high I think he'll have a seizure and missing school and friends phone calls and cleaning up spaghettio's off the floor because that's what he wanted for lunch but then the dog ate most of it when he was away from his plate and then BAM. The first day back of relative normalcy around here, the day that I thought I would catch up, and God sends a curve ball.

It's moments like these that I remind myself of the importance of sometimes just surrendering to whatever it is that needs me most. These little bumps in the road remind me that I need to just let go. I didn't curse or cry, I just dug in and got the job done. So much of being an At Home Mom is just that--slogging through the days, the monotony, the repetition--it's enough to make even the most patient of people go nuts. Then there are those days when you actually stand back, hands on hips and realize, I'm making a home for my family. That's the paycheck and if I have to slog through it a few days of the year, so be it. I definitely had those days in the working world too, but these are so much more rewarding.

The pond is almost dried up and I'm thinking about using it to my advantage. There are a few things down there that just might become innocent victims of the flood. Like that box of stuffed animals that Young One just can't part with. Could I claim that unused weight bench that D just had to have as a victim too?