Mama Said There'd Be Days Like This

 I quit this day. I have been reduced to shoe shopping on the internet in sweatpants, wondering if Vitamin Water is an acceptable mixer for vodka. Is it an acceptable hour to pour Cabernet straight down my wailing cryhole?

  I got up this morning, got the kids breakfasted and dressed and teeth brushed. I slapped myself together with some shorts and a t-shirt. I got us all in the car and headed to a nearby playground. This playground has the most important feature a playground can have: shade. It is completely tree-covered and has comfortable benches. I was looking forward to relaxing with my book after going through the drive-thru for my beloved Grande 3-pump Mocha from Starbucks. Or as I like to refer to it, if only in my mind, as a 3 Pump Chump. Anyway, I settled on my bench with Catching Fire by Suzanne Collins, Book 2 in the Hunger Games Trilogy. Yesss! My magical coffee/book combo of happiness. Ronan climbed on top of the miniature firetruck and Isabel ran to the swings. I even mentally patted myself on the back because I remembered to bring Capri Sun Waters for the kids instead of half-assedly ordering a cup of ice water with my coffee. Sweet, marvelous, happy joy! Tra-la-la-la!

 I'm sitting there beginning to read, blissfully ignorant of the fact that Isabel has come to the bench for her juice and is trying to shove her straw in the little, hateful, plastic-covered hole in the aluminum juice bag. With a furious stab with her straw, she elbowed my hot coffee into my lap. I jumped up and yelled as the coffee is now burning my right butt cheek and running down my calf and in between my toes. Which is worse? A scalded butt cheek or a sticky bare foot in a flip-flop? "I'm sorry, Mom! I'm sorry!" "Isabel! You have to watch what you're doing!" I am assessing what else has been damaged. My book has brown coffee stains, my car keys and my cell phone screen are all sticky! Sticky!! I hate sticky. I hate being sticky or things that are sticky so much. So. Much. I grab everything up. "Kids! We have to go! Now!" I want to drop everything and shake my fists at the heavens. Poor Ronan is oblivious to what has taken place. "Why, Mom? Why do we have to go? I don't wanna go." We have been at the playground for a whopping fifteen minutes. "Come on. Now." I say in my mean-ass Mom voice.  We walk across the grass to the small parking lot. Every step I take is "Ew. Ew. Ew. Ew.", with the sensation of my sticky shorts rubbing against my scalded butt cheek and my sticky toes in my flip-flops and it's making make me limp to my car.

 "I can't sit in the seats like this." I think, as I decide what I need to do. The kids are belted in the backseat with Ronan in his car seat. They are both looking at me with wide eyes as if their lives depend on what Mommy's going to do next. I open the driver's side door, wedge myself inside, unbutton my shorts and slide them down just as an elderly woman walks past with her toy poodle. (I wish I were making this up. I really do.) I don't know if she saw me or not, because my ass was in the car with the door slammed shut. I shucked my shorts the rest of the way off and tossed them on the passenger side floor. I drove home sticky, (Oh God, the stickiness!!) and pissed off, in my underwear.

 After cleaning up and getting in dry clothes, I decide to suck it up and get back out there. I had to go to Target for stuff so, I schlep the kids back out to the car, and we head to Target. "Do not. Ask. For anything." I tell them. It is my nightmare. And they are my tormentors. They hide in the clothing racks. They run up and down the aisles. The are beasts in Target. "That's IT! You are both getting a spanking when we get home and no video games or computer for the rest of the day!", I said. "Noooo!" said Ronan. We get through the checkout lane and I am ready to kill anyone who so much as looks at me sideways. The kids are snivelly and sullen on the ride home.

 When we got home, I gave them each their swat on the behind. I made Isabel clean their room and Ronan I made come to the kitchen with me to "help" me make lunch. After the room is all cleaned up, Isabel comes out sniffing and crying, "Mom, I feel like you love Ronan better than me." Sniff. Sniff. I picked her up and sat down with her in our rocking chair. "Isabel, Mama is hard on you sometimes because I am trying to teach you to be a good person and not a mean kid. Ronan looks at you to see how you behave because you are his big sister. You know better than he does. I love you sooo much, even when I am mad at you." "I'm sorry I spilled your coffee on you." she said in a way that makes me feel like the Wicked Witch Of the West from Hell. "I forgive you, honey. It's okay now. I'm not mad anymore." I gave her hugs and kisses and holy crap, I think we've made it through this ordeal. Sheesh. I fed them lunch, stuck Ronan in the bed for a much needed nap and plopped Isabel in front of the TV with promises of painting our nails together later. So, here I am, now in my sweatpants and ponytail staring at Shoes.com, wondering what the second half of my day will bring. Hopefully cocktails.