Clean Up in Aisle Hell

I'm not exactly sure where to begin....I berated 2010 for being a pretty awful year but 2011 seems to be starting out only sad.  Thankfully the sadness is only touching my life and not invading it.  What I mean is my family is safe, happy and healthy.  We ourselves have not met any tragedy so soon into the New Year.  We are lucky.

I am torn between acknowledging the pain and loss of others or doing what I think I sometimes do best, and that's making people laugh (duh).  So I think that's what I'll aim for and if I miss the mark, at the very least I hope I've provided a small distraction for a moment that was at the very least somewhat enjoyable.

As has been discussed ad nauseum here at Driven, I was fired this summer.  Before being fired, I worked a 40+ hour work week at times.  Now I stay home and have a couple of part-time gigs.  And I am left feeling just as strapped for time, if not more so.  Why?

Well I no longer set an alarm.  I typically wake up between 7:30 and twenty to eight every morning.  Except for yesterday morning when I was woken by a telephone call at five after eight.  A phone call from my credit card company letting me know I don't currently owe them any money.  Yep, you read that right; they were calling to let me know I do NOT owe them money.  Thanks Tips.  However it was good they called as it did get me up.  Next my 16 year old son was in our bedroom asking for a ride to school because he had neglected to plug his car in and so it wouldn't start.  For those of you living somewhere decent and always have, the rest of us here in the tundra need to plug our vehicles in on these nights when it drops to -30 (Celsius).  Anyway, I needed to get my ass in gear as he and his sister needed to be at school in twenty minutes.

Downstairs I went, bedhead and all, to find my cat had vomited on the floor and on the couch.  My six year old had also slept in and needed to be fed and readied for school as well.  This all needed to happen in the next half hour.  Never mind the mob of animals surrounding me for their breakfast, which by this point was nearly half an hour late as well.  It was pandemonium.

Luckily, Steven's car started.  I got Reese fed and cleaned up all of the cats offenses and just when I thought I might get cheeky and sit down for the first time since I'd gotten out of bed?  This call came from the bathroom:  "Mom, I pooped in my underwear".

You have got to be fucking kidding me.

He hadn't had an accident since I don't know when. 

So off to the bathroom I went and sure as shit (tee hee) he had pooped in his underwear.  And not just a little.  So it was off to the tub for him.  While waiting for the tub to fill he said he was sorry for pooping in his underwear and that he didn't mean to.  Which of course I knew he didn't, but it was some timing.

I carried on with my day.  By 2 p.m. I was in full swing of getting ready for a meeting I had to attend last night.  During make-up application, the underwear pooper decided he needed to brush his teeth.  Fine.  Then he fell in the toilet.  Don't see the connection? Neither do I.  All I know is that it necessitated another clean up in Aisle Hell.

Off I went to the meeting.  It was facilitated by a less than dynamic speaker.  And lucky for those of us attending, a number of the guest speakers could be described as 'less than dynamic' as well.  And the meeting finished with my favourite thing of all: we were read aloud to.  I think I've covered this before but I am 33, possess a University Degree and by every definition am highly literate.  My feeling is I was not alone in my level of literacy.  Yet, there we all sat, being read to.  Not that anyone was listening anymore.  At this point people had lost all focus completely and a number of conversations were being held as the facilitator spoke. It was a monumental waste of time that ended with driving home in near white-out conditions to find my dog eating sticky tack on the couch while my husband and oldest son sat near by completely oblivious.

On days like yesterday, I long for an office.  An office where I would go and drink coffee quietly in the morning.  That office would be free of vomiting cats.  I would read silently to myself.  Bliss.

In the meantime I will be grateful for the fact that my family is happy, healthy and in tact.  I will be grateful that I no longer work at a job that I hate and brings out the absolute worst in me.  And finally, I will be grateful that yesterday is over and today, everyone managed to keep their bodily functions in check.

Quiet

Quiet is a rare commodity in the house of six people and three animals. Quiet is like a favourite relative whom always leaves you feeling really good about yourself, relaxed and refreshed and whom you miss all the more because of the rarity of his or her visits. Quiet is a temptress. God I miss quiet.

Which why at ten to one in the morning I am blogging instead of sleeping which is really where I should be. But this quiet is intoxicating. The only other sounds I'm hearing aside from my typing is the hum of appliances, the dog breathing and the wind outside. No one is asking me for juice. No one wants to play Power Rangers, watch music videos on the laptop or show me something on You Tube.

Bliss.

I would like to increase my effort in regards to writing and it's now or never. Well, that's not true. It's now or 5 a.m. I honestly think I'll have to start getting up that early to get any extra writing done. My youngest is typically up before 7 a.m. and in bed with me telling me to "scooch over". Scooch over to his giant bear of a father who is radiating heat and noises I'm not comfortable snuggling up with. He then demands a movie be turned on (child not bear-man) and I try to sleep through the exuberant songs of Bear in the Big Blue House or the "hi-ya" of the Power Rangers.

Given current circumstances though I think I shall forgo stolen moments of sleep in honor of the mighty word. I think it's a fair trade.

I'm off to bed. Complete and utterly relaxed by quiet.

Shhh.