Hard Times

Today was one of those days.

It started out fine. Good even. We took the kids to town because I wanted Mexican food, and I had thought that I wanted to do some shopping. We went and ate, and it went really well. I don’t know why I can’t give the kids more credit, they are so good 98% of the time, it really shouldn’t surprise me anymore. After lunch we stopped at what I thought was a thrift store because I’m looking for another dresser for kid clothes.  Everything they had was new, and expensive (and in a parking lot ?), so we didn’t even get out of the car. Lucy seemed to be struggling with having to be in her carseat AGAIN after having only been out for long enough to eat lunch, so we headed for home.

 

And that’s when things started to go downhill for me.

 

Once we got home, Jake took off because one of his buddies was having some sort of car repair emergency. Adeline was crabby and Lucy was just being Lucy. They were bickering and Lucy ended up getting sent to her room for something or other I can’t even remember. I got some stuff done (somehow) and that made me feel better at least, but the kids…well they had reached the witching hour and things were spiraling out of control. At one point Lucy had somehow fashioned a sort of hammock by climbing on the back of the chair and sitting on the edge of the curtain so she could look out the window. That got her sent back to her room, because no. Just no. Adeline was just being generally yucky (or Acting Ugly as we call it). The second it felt late enough I started dinner.

 

While I was making dinner, I had Hazel in her car seat on the table in our kitchen, and Lucy had to come in too because I couldn’t trust her to not climb a wall while I was cooking. That made Adeline feel left out, so she insisted on being in the kitchen with all of us. So at one point, Hazel was furious (and therefore screaming bloody murder) because she wasn’t moving and Adeline and Lucy were running back and forth ribbiting loudly. I was standing in front of the fridge trying desperately to remember what it was I needed to get out of there, when in reality it was the microwave that I needed to be getting something out of, not the fridge. Right then it just felt like nothing was ever going to be fun or easy ever, ever again.

 

But then when I was putting Lucy to bed, she wrapped her arms around my neck like she always does, and added a few little pats for good measure.  Jake asked Adeline if she remembered where we got her bear slippers, and she told him “at the Bear Slipper Store” of course. Duh, dad.

 

I’m going to buy a self-bouncing bouncy chair for the baby, as much as I know it is going to drive Jake crazy, considering he just bought me a swing for her. But she doesn’t LIKE swinging, she likes bouncing, and I can’t face having to cook dinner while listening to a screaming baby for however long she decides she must have The Bounce.

 

So that’ll make things easier. And easier is good. The baby is only a month old. We’ve only been home for three weeks. It’ll come, I know it’ll come. I just struggle so much with knowing what I want things to be, how I know they can be, and having to actually get to that point. I struggle with living with the now rather than barely tolerating the now while waiting for the better that must be around the corner.

 

Now is good. Now is perfect, I just have to learn to see it.