I used to be an excellent planner. Also, very, very organized and a bit of clean freak…with borderline germaphobe tendencies…especially, during the holidays or whenever we’d have company over.
Seriously, my husband’s favorite parlor trick was to take a glass from off of a coaster, slide it onto the living room table and then countdown…5…4…3…2… [whispering] …watch this!
I’d come into the room, place the glass back onto the coaster, wipe the table off with my apron, and then place the cheese platter in the center of the table, alongside a nice pile of coordinated cloth napkins, of course.
Heh. Just kidding. I never wore an apron. And too much cheese gives me gas (you’re welcome!). Also, doing the laundry was NEVER my favorite thing…soooooo, yeah…NO CLOTH NAPKINS, EVER!
Aaaaaanyway, then we had kids. Then a couple more kids came along and, well, nothing gets you over being a bit of a clean freak…with borderline germ-a-phobe tendencies…like your baby throwing up…in your mouth.
On the other hand, being a mom HAS helped me get over OTHER stuff, like my:
- Fear of needles — having spent nearly 3 years of my life pregnant and having gone through roughly 32 prenatal visits, 24 of them with children in tow, there were plenty of OTHER things to obsess about.
- The sight of blood — AND NEEDLES!!!
- The sight of any bodily fluid, really — because, BABIES and… [hurl] …NEEDLES!!!
- Running out of bandaids — got hair thingies and a tissue, you’ll live.
- Running late, again — 4 teenagers, 3 of them girls, enough said.
- Running out of clean clothes — see previous bullets, above.
- Having the house define me — meh, it could be messier…ME TOO!!!
- Flatulence during yoga class — been there, done that, yoga is stupid.
Just to name a few, but the one thing my husband and I have BOTH learned to live with is: NOT planning stuff until…the…very…last… [picks up cell phone, checks time] …possible…minute.
Which drives some other people crazy, I’m certain of it — especially, hardcore planning-types (sickos!).
For example: Garth (not his real name), our two oldest girls and I had Labor Day off, so we thought it would be GREAT if we could try…and I mean try, really, really hard…to get away for the weekend…you know…together…at the same time and everything.
“Do you know where we are going, yet?”
So, by that Friday, the younger kids were getting a little excited (and curious) about where we were actually going to try…really, really hard…to spend our mini-vacation.
“Not sure, yet.”
Me, too!!!
“But, I can tell you, we’ll be travelling either North or South.”
[cue house phone]
“Don’t freak out or anything Mom, but….”
Typically, whenever one of my children begins a sentence with…Don’t freak out…it’s really code for…Ya’ better pop a pod into the Keurig…because, it’s probably not going to be good-ish news.
“I’m in the E.R.”
See what I mean?!?!
[fires up Keurig]
Long story, short (on the day we were going to try really, really hard to leave): our oldest daughter was finishing up her shift at work, slipped, fell and broke her arm and…well…good thing they finished wrapping it by the time I got there, because…believe it or not…this was our first broken bone, ever… [knocking on wood, until knuckles bleed] … and HURL!!!
“Will I be able to travel?”
Even longer story, shorter: she broke her elbow, so the hospital wrapped her arm with a temporary cast and instructed us to see an Orthopedist in a couple of days; traveling with it would be fine, as long as she kept it elevated and iced…the ENTIRE 6 HOURS to Cape Cod…while there…and then back, again.
