Just shut up and eat your aphids

I saw an Internet article that listed my hometown among the 10 most boring cities in America. The researcher certainly never contacted me for comment because I haven't had a boring day here since 2003. I'm sure it has something to do with the people I live with, so if you're bored, I'm willing to loan them out!

Today is day three of the new school year, and already we've fallen off the wagon. Well that's not right, but give me another day! Maybe the right phrase is that our train of success has derailed. This morning the hubs had a very early meeting. "We" were up by 5:15. I say we because I grumbled something like, "it's way too early for me to even like you right now" and curled up on the living room sofa while he got ready. Not being morning people, events that transpire before the sun comes up tend to be bad omens.

So the king King was out the door before the princes and princess fully emerged from their rooms, and they concluded the rules went to work with him. As they were eating breakfast, the girl screams "he's trying to kill me!" With her that could mean a range of things from a brother is poised to whack her with a bat, to there's a bird on the window sill with an angry look on his face. This time it meant little brother had tossed a rose petal from the bouquet I plucked from the garden last night into her drink.

I assured her that roses aren't poisonous, fished it out, and handed her the glass. She continued screaming "aphids! The aphids are in my drink. Now I'll starve!" Because that makes sense. I guess a hunger strike is the imminent response to insect contamination of your milk glass. I was unaware. I said that aphids aren't poisonous or ladybugs wouldn't eat them, and even if they were, I didn't bring roses inside that had aphids on them, and even then, if one was in her drink, one wouldn't hurt her. The drama didn't end. In fact, I expect to get an email from her teacher inquiring if I really force my kids to eat bugs for breakfast.

While this conversation was going nowhere, the boys went to brush their teeth and fix their hair. And by that, I mean the oldest used his dad's beard trimmer to remove his brother's sideburns. What 7 year old has sideburns?! We also have an explicit rule that you're never allowed to cut your own hair or your siblings' hair. History (and sitcom television) has prompted us to leave no gray area on this subject. But like I said, the rules must have gone to work with Dad.

This pic was taken seconds before I used tiny safety scissors (that's all I could find at that moment) to clip the remaining strands over his ears, said a quick prayer that no one would look too closely at both sides of his head and realize how odd his hair looks, and loaded everyone in the car.

Maybe tomorrow I will get to be bored, but it seems highly unlikely.

So this just happened...

School started today, and we made it out the door, dressed, fed, and with all the necessary items with time to spare. That's one day out of the next 179 days that I can reflect on as a good mom day! I'm going to need it to carry me through all the rest that are more like yesterday.

Two days ago my seven year old was really adorable and sweet. He told me I was the most beautiful woman in the world (and hey, who am I to argue with his genius? Never mind that he refuses to wear his glasses, but whatever!). He also told me chocolate was sweet like me.  It's been years since I've been talked to like that. Thirty-@# to be exact, which is coincidentally how old I am. So I ate it up! I thought about buying him a pony. I'm glad I held off because then this happened...

Yesterday the oldest third of the King babies was aggravating the crud out of the other two. The doorbell rang. I kind of figured it was the big kid trying to pull something, but I played along. I don't know why. Sometimes I lack the necessary with-it-ness that moms must have at all times. I opened the door to an empty porch, so I shut it and waited. I knew he'd ring the bell again, so I planned to throw open the door and startle him before he could hide again. He did, and I did. Sort of. I flung open the door to my kid wearing a sheet and a stupid-scary Halloween mask. I screamed, slammed the door, and locked the monster outside.

That sweet little boy who loved his mama yesterday came up behind me with a plastic sword saying, "you're a wimp, mom. Scardy cat."  Yeah, he's been demoted from the sweet one to the grounded from technology one. He opened the door and whacked is brother square in the rubber face. A good mom would have stopped that right away, but this mom just had the pee scared out of her.

Kid 1 chased kid 3 up the stairs. Kid 3 hid in his closet (who's the scardy cat now?!) and climbed onto the clothes bar. I didn't even ask why. The end result is that the little end piece that holds the bar in place broke, and The entire wardrobe crashed in a heap. The kid is fine, but when you see him in his first day of school pics looking like he pulled a wadded shirt out of the dirty clothes, it's because there was a monster at the door, and the clean hanging clothes became a casualty of war.

Happy fall semester, y'all!

I'm Insulted. Again

  I have a serious heart problem. Don't freak out; my ticker is fine. I mean my soul, the part of me that loves and wants to make connections. That heart has a malfunction. You see, I really really don't like being wrong. Not that anyone does I suppose, but when my wrongness is pointed out to me, I quickly get offended.  It's so bad, I got worked up over a product review that claimed something I have bought and loved was junk. What difference did that review make in my life? Did one stranger's viewpoint (which I just have to say was totally off base) really make me look flawed?

Recently someone corrected my homophone use. (You know, words that sound the same but have different meanings-there, their, they're) I was highly insulted that this person wasted both our time to point out such a minor slight. The next day as I was reading my Bible no less, I happened upon a similar usage of that same word. I had used the right one! I really wanted to highlight the verse, snap a photo, and send it to the offender clarifying that I was right. That's not unlike what I see happening every day in social media-people use all kinds of scripture to prove their political view or to condemn any number of perceived injustices. I wonder how many times a day God just wants to high five our smug, self-righteous faces.
Let me tell you what REALLY offended me. I was cooking dinner, and one of the people in my house POURED seasoning into the pot! Seriously??? This person did not taste it first, and it was a dish this person couldn't even eat for dietary reasons. How would he or she even know what it needed?! I was furious that he would deliberately try to make me look like I didn't know what I was doing. (Ok, it was my husband) How DARE he? I was so mad in fact, I refused to eat the dish, that is, until he left to run an errand later on. It was good, just the right amount of seasoning. Dear merciful God, please don't let him read this. 

 Why was I so angry over such a small thing? Why did it even matter? It mattered in that moment because I felt like I was being accused of being wrong. And I must always be right. It's a flaw in myself that I hate. Actually, I rarely recognize it as a flaw. More like a gift. It's hard to be right all the time! :) It's also hard, if not impossible, to be humble and put others before myself when I have to be right. I spend so much time and energy being offended and trying to prove my accuracy (thank you, Google for speeding up that process) that I miss opportunities to feel joy and model appropriate responses for my kids.  "Fools show their annoyance at once, but the prudent overlook an insult." Proverbs 12:16

 I should probably get that tattooed on my hand so I will see it every time I start to angry text, Google, check IMDB to prove I'm right about that movie/actor. History has shown me to be a fool, and that definitely offends me.