Jun 21 2008
Nothing Is Ever Simple
After spending most of the day in my pajamas…I decided in the early afternoon to head out to the grocery store, with a brief stop over at the local Blockbuster to rent a flick for the kids. Sounds easy enough. Were I alone, it would have been a snap. I tend to be very goal oriented when it comes to my shopping - need “x”, find “x”, pay for “x”, go home.
Going shopping with one child is a whole different ball game. Going shopping with all four is like playing a ball game in outer space where the rules keep changing. It’s inevitable, I can understand that, when you have four, completely different personalities coming together for a single purpose…difficulties, complications are bound to arise.
The baby was in his stroller, strapped in but struggling wildly against his bonds. Occasionally removing his shoes to chew on them. This I tried to manage by keeping him moving at a fairly good speed, which made it a little difficult to browse movie titles, but whatever, picking out an entertaining family flick was the least of my worries.
Behind me the other children were in formation, for about half a minute, before my nine year old and my five year old took off in opposite directions, with my thirteen year old barking orders at them because she suffers from a severe mommy complex. As the oldest she feels it’s her obligation to boss the younger kids around if I fail to respond to a perceived crisis. This all usually involves her calling her sister stupid, or telling her brother to shut up, or even shaking a surly teen finger at the baby, who I keep telling her doesn’t entirely understand english yet. Everywhere we went today, we trailed disruption and noise behind us like a toxic wake. Occasionally people glared, but mostly they avoided eye contact.
Mediating these little skirmishes and trying to remember what the heck I came to the market for to begin with, requires a higher order of thinking that I rarely possess. I’m also very aware that on outings like these I look like the nutty mom who can’t keep her kids under control. No, I don’t just look like the frazzled mom, I am the frazzled mom, I am the posterchild for frazzled mom-dom.
I come home and I wonder, what the heck I ever volunteer to leave the house for. Eventually I’ll forget all that and head out again. Really if I wanted my life to be simple, I would not have had four children. Simple, for the most part, is overrated.
