I am a planner. Google calendar is my friend. I have five kids’ and two adults’ calendars
on my phone with alerts programmed to mine and theirs (though the youngest two
don’t have phones yet). If you don’t put
it on the calendar, I make no promises.
Even with the best laid plans, in my life in a blended family of seven,
I often resort to hanging on to the top spinning with controlled chaos and
waiting for the slow steady revolution of a calmer day…that if it comes, lasts
only until you have a split second to breathe and it spins again.
It started on a Friday afternoon
around 4:00 . Up to that point, my day had been relatively
uneventful. We were going to have the
three teenagers scattered for the night, but rides were arranged and I was
planning a low-key dinner-and-a-movie evening at home with the younger two. Then I got the email. And the chain of events, thought not all
directly related, unfolded over the next three days and the top began to
whir.
“I am not
going to make it home in time to go get the check, so can you go by and pick it
up? I will send directions. By the way, I forgot my phone at home today.”
Okay, so, I
knew he forgot his phone at home since he drove two hours out of town and I
hadn’t heard from him all day and when I checked, it was still on his night
stand. And I knew I might have to go
pick the check up. But considering it
was 4:00, and I had not heard from him (after all, he was with people with phones) and since he had to pick the girls up from
their mother’s by 6:00, I thought he must have gotten out on time. When I got his email at 4:20 , I was at the grocery store getting
dinner. I flew home, dropped the
groceries, got back in the car and raced to his office. While reading his email telling me to hurry
up and respond so he could get to the girls (seriously?), I missed my turn,
drove 10 minutes out of the way because I am still learning my way around my
new city, and barely made it to get the check by 5:00.
Phew! Now the relaxing evening can begin, I thought
as I drove at a more reasonable pace to drop the check in the ATM and stop to
get a bottle of wine at the Rite-Aid and get $20 extra for the one going to the
movie later. Wrong. When I got home, his phone rang and it was
daughter #1. She began to explain a
change in plans that included her mom dropping her off at a birthday party
(this was planned) and then bringing daughter #2 to our house instead of him
picking her up as usual (this was not planned).
Apparently the ex had left him an unreceived message indicating this
change earlier in the day. I explained
the forgotten phone situation to daughter #1 and told her I couldn’t get a
message to him, but if needed, daughter #2 could be dropped off at our house
and he would just realize it when he got to her mother’s house. Long pause for relay of this information to
the mother followed by the mother taking the phone (big sigh!). A repeat explanation of the forgotten phone
and she is dropping daughter #2 by our house.
Daughter #2 gets dropped by (late) and I race to the mother’s house to
try to catch him so that he doesn’t worry why she is not there. Before I make it, my phone rings and he is
calling from our house. Oh well, I
tried.
I fixed
dinner (late) and fed those that were home.
Son #1 was at the football game playing in the band, daughter #1 was at
the birthday party and son #2 was headed out to the movie. Husband and I caught each other up on our day
before I started son #3 and daughter #2 toward bed. By the time they were in bed, husband leaves
to get oldest two home by ten. All go to
bed and I lay half asleep waiting on son #2 to get back from movie that he
shouldn’t have been allowed to attend because the 8 o’clock show was sold out
and the 9 o’clock ended past his curfew.
Oh well. I tried.
The next two days went something like this: Son #3 (who is kid #4) and I arise at 5:45 am
to get to his swim meet an hour away. Husband
and kids 1, 2, 3 and 5 get up thirty minutes later to squeeze in every ounce of
sleep and meet us at the swim meet. Meet
ends by noon, we grab lunch and everyone goes to get a Christmas tree since the
next time we are all together will be two weeks away. I skip the tree purchase to run by the store
to get hot chocolate and jeans for son #2 who told me the day before that he
only had one pair for his upcoming week-long trip with his father. Husband bought tree with lightning-quick
speed and calls to see where I am. I
rush home to get decorating started. Son
#2 thinks that everything is taking too long and moves from the couch to couch
lamenting this torture. Son #3 and
daughter #2 are giddy and “helpful” getting into everything and impatiently
waiting to be able to put the ornaments on.
Son #1 keeps disappearing to play guitar and/or text his girlfriend who
he is trying to arrange to come to the movie in the street downtown later because
we are trying to fit some “fun” into the weekend. Daughter #1 helpfully puts lights on the tree
in the foyer only to discover when she gets to the end that she has a receiving
end plug for the lights and can’t plug them in to the wall. “I have a problem” is followed by her walking
off and leaving me to re-do the lights. We
finally got things decorated with EVERYONE pitching in like it or not, and in
the midst of me making popcorn and daughter #1 making hot chocolate (or should
I say “burning” hot chocolate) to take to the movie, I realize I have not
considered that this brood might need to eat dinner and we are minutes away
from leaving for the movie. We stop to
grab dinner at a drive-through and eat on the way to the movie. We get to the movie and set up seven camp
chairs, distribute popcorn and burnt hot chocolate, console son #1 whose
girlfriend cancelled to get her ears pierced and shivered though an unusually
cold (for Lower Alabama) night.
Sunday, son #3 and I got up at 6:00 am to get to Day #2 of
the swim meet an hour away. Husband and
kids 1, 2, 3 and 5 slept late and went to church. Son #3 and I grabbed a calm lunch on the way
home, arrived home to get son #1 ready for symphony practice and then youth
group (which he now will not miss due to the girlfriend’s attendance of the
same group), got daughters #1 and 2 ready to return to their mother’s and got sons
#1, 2, and 3 to shower and make lunch boxes before hitting the bed.
Husband and I hit the bed not sure how we were going to get
up the next day and realizing that we have not gone to the grocery store for
the week. Oh well, we tried.
