Totally Taxing Tuesday

Today has been a day for the books, folks.  I typed a Facebook status earlier (it HAS to be Facebook official) that gave a brief overview of my day and left me exhausted.  Here’s a recap of the recap:

5:40 No, I don’t want to get up.

5:45 Push snooze again.

5:50 Fiiiiiiine.  So, I got up and turned on the water in the shower and stared at the grout between the tiles on the floor and contemplated life.  For 10 minutes.

6:20 Stumble out of my room half-dressed saying, “N, why aren’t you in the shower?  Your dad will be here in 20 minutes!  B, get UP!  You need to be eating breakfast right this very second so you will get big and strong.”

6:22 N stumbles blindly into the bathroom and bangs his shin on the cabinet.  I ignore the expletive.  

6:30 B finally stumbles into the kitchen and grabs a bowl, the milk, and a fork.  Clearly this is going to go well.

6:50 N’s out the door for breakfast with his dad.  B is pondering what he will do in his next life.  Know what he’s not doing?  TAKING A SHOWER.

7:00 “I’m leaving in 15 minutes!” -  Me  “No, you’re not.  You’re not wearing a shirt, your hair is messy, and I don’t have a lunch.” - Astute observations from the 9 year-old.    

7:24 Lunch is packed, shirt has been located, hair is sufficiently smoothed, and I even swiped on some lipgloss.  This is a decent morning.

7:30 B is at school, and I’m on my way to Denton…

I even had time to stop at Starbucks for a Skinny Vanilla Latte, and made it to class with tons of time to spare.  The peace should have been a clue…because once my professor got into class, she literally said, “Pop quiz, hot shots…” and passed out a quiz on the reading that nobody has been doing…the reading that I actually did yesterday.  I was proud.  I thought things were going great. Then she dropped the bombshell that my rough draft of my 25 page paper was due in a week.  Y.I.K.E.S.  In my other class on campus, we got into a delightful discussion about savagery and the early colonies in America and other fun stuff.  And then the “fun” began.

After I sat on the highway for 90 minutes trying to get home, I had enough time to dump my backpack at home and make a pulled pork taco for “lunch” before I went to pick N up from school (B went to after school care).  I took him to get a haircut…a haircut I tried to make an appointment for, but since I didn’t have a particular stylist in mind (because I don’t know any of the names!), I didn’t get one.  So we waited…and it would have been fine, except he had a hitting lesson at 4:30.  So at 4:04, Allison got him in her chair.  I explained the situation, we discussed what he wanted to do, and we were out the door 16 minutes later.  I like Allison.  I dropped N at his hitting lesson, and went to get B from after school care.  We stopped at 7-11 (Oh, thank heaven) and got bottled water…but the poor kid pulled the door of the cooler too hard and whacked himself in the side of the head.  Tears came next, and he was pretty waterworks-y for the remainder of the afternoon.  We went back to get N, took him home to start homework, grabbed a snack, and took off for football practice.  I actually got to sit at football practice and read a little of my next homework assignment, but that was the only resting point.  On any other Tuesday, I’d be dropping B at practice, taking N to his practice, then going back to get B, grabbing him some dinner and waiting for another hour for N’s practice to finish.  Tonight, several players had football games, so we were shown serious mercy.  Even still, we had to stop by B’s dad’s on the way home, and that took forever.  And then we still needed dinner, and I’m happy to say that they still managed to get into bed ALMOST on time.

It’s a “last day of summer” miracle, y’all.

It makes me tired just thinking about it, but I’d be lying if I said the chaos made me mad.  I need it to be slightly chaotic so I feel like I have a handle on all.the.things. 

Tomorrow I’m teaching music for half a day at B’s old elementary school…and then I’m working on my research project.  And Friday, a classmate and I get to go to the courthouse to look at records from the 1860s.  I’m still hopeful it burns. 

Kidding! (Mostly)

Even with all of the schoolwork and the kid stress, I’m finding time to giggle at the random smiles that pop up on my face at any given moment.  Why?  I can’t really say.  It’s almost fall. The cooler weather is so close (yet so far away), and we are solidly into football and baseball seasons.  I was able to spend time with family I see less often than I’d like, and I’ve had some great phone conversations with my dad about fantastic changes in his overall health and well-being.  I have some of the best friends a girl could ask for, boys who give me hell but still let me tuck them in at night (and ask me to cuddle with them), and a heavy dose of optimism following me around.  Oh…and someone who could someday be a special someone…when I see a new message from the "adorable idiot" my heart races, I get a cheesy grin on my face, and I remember that I still have a whole lot of life left to live.

Aubs