I’m feeling a little out of sorts.
That’s what happens sometimes when my better half skips
town.
To clarify that last statement, my husband, Chris, had to travel
to Asia for business.
I’m feeling a little out of sorts.
That’s what happens sometimes when my better half skips town.
To clarify that last statement, my husband, Chris, had to travel to Asia for business.
See, it’s not as bad as it sounds. Except that for 12 days he would be sleeping and eating and breathing in the same cities where this scary pneumonia has been running rampant.
I stopped short of buying him a face mask and latex gloves. But I did tell him to wash his hands after touching any thing. I hope he remembered.
But that’s not why I’m feeling out of sorts.
It’s because I had one of those weeks.
Have you ever had one of those weeks? Where it seems whatever could go wrong, does?
Allow me to start at the beginning.
It all started last Monday morning when I was bathing Emma. She is finally beginning to relax in the tub, except when Mom does something lame like rinse her hair. She hates that.
We had just gotten to her favorite part of bath time, being dried off in her fuzzy, hooded towel, when I noticed it. A scary-looking red rash under her arm.
I panicked and of course assumed the worst. With Emma under one arm, I find her doctor’s phone number and schedule an appointment for later that day.
I try not to drive myself crazy thinking what could be lurking under my little one’s arm and get her dressed and down for a nap. Then I go out to the garage and hop into my car to park it in the driveway. Then I do an incredibly stupid thing. Almost too stupid to tell you, dear reader. But of course I’m going to anyway.
I climb into our car, press the remote control garage door opener then proceed to back out of the garage. The hitch? I’m afraid the door wasn’t completely all the way up.
I am dumbfounded when I hear the sound of crunching metal and peer in my rearview mirror. The garage door is stuck right where I hit it, halfway between open and closed.
I run inside, half tempted to call my mom or dad to help me out of this jam.
“Get a grip, Kelly, you’re an adult,” I tell myself, then flip open the Yellow Pages and look under “Garage.”
Five minutes later I feel better knowing help will be on the way in just under an hour.
I sit down and begin to think that it’s a little too quiet. Where’s Lucy? Our miniature dachshund is usually nestled in one of three places: under our daughter’s crib, in the sun on our bed or in my lap. She’s not in any of those places. I search the house, overturning everything she could fit under. I look in our closet, which reminds me that I left my dry-cleaning in our car.
I open the car door, and lo and behold, there is Lucy! She wags her tail, ecstatic to see me. I would be too if I were stuck in a car for a half an hour.
So, now I feel pretty lame. I can’t take care of daughter, dog or home. Thank goodness my husband isn’t home to witness this!
Later that day, the garage door is fixed, our daughter’s underarm is healing (it was a minor infection) and our dog is safe inside our home.
Emma and I stroll the neighborhood that evening with my mom who has paid us a visit. I must look a sight.
I had pulled on a brown cardigan to cover up the baby spit-up stains on my shirt. What I failed to notice until after I got home was that the cardigan has a sizeable hole on one side.
Who has time to sew? No, wait a minute. Who knows how to sew?
“I look like one of those moms who left the house without looking in a mirror,” I told my mom after surveying my sorry self.
“No you don’t,” she said very unconvincingly.
Oh, well. Spit up stains or no spit up stains, garage door or no garage door, I survived another Monday in the Barbazette household. That’s more than a minor victory while holding down the fort and caring for our daughter and dog, and tending to a business.
I’m afraid I ran out of room to tell you all about the rest of our week. It’s just as well.
For now, we’ll just take it one day at a time.
