Dress Rehearsal

Today I am staring at blue eyes and dimples. She is 2 months old, and her mom is away, receiving her last treatment. Nine treatments in total. 4 of them while this little thing was in her mom's uterus, but she came out just fine, and has been plumping up ever since. I am her first sitter, and was her older brother's first sitter as well. She smiles, mostly in her sleep. Today she laughed while sleeping, and it was the cutest thing. After her second bottle today, and subsequent giant burp, I got a waking smile out of her. I always smile after burping, so I completely understood.

Yesterday was c.r.a.z.y. Crazy I say. It was probably amplified in craziness due to the fact that the night before, the boyfriend's central air went out, and it was hot as Hades. Summer dumped on us the two days before, without much warning, and his ac's coils froze. We consulted the Internet to see if we could fix it ourselves, found out we could, and let them thaw. That meant sleeping with the windows open and a fan blowing on us. The 8 year old slept great, she has a ceiling fan in her princess room...but no such luck in the boyfriend's room. Both of us suffer from seasonal allergies, so sleeping with the window open on a hot night doesn't make for much fun...couple that with the early birds, literally, and I was miserable the majority of the night. Miserable, hot, sneezing and awake. I wanted to take off all of my clothes and sleep in the nude, which I do in my own apartment, but I was terrified of horrifying the 8 year old, should I actually fall asleep and she walk in needing something in our sleep.

It seemed as though I had just fallen asleep when she came in saying, "Wake up Lucy, it's time for breakfast! Dad's making pancakes and hash browns." Nothing like carb loading on a Tuesday. I walked downstairs and it smelled like McDonald's (yes, I unfortunately do know what McDonald's breakfast smells like). But I enjoyed it nonetheless, especially the coffee. We ate, laughed, and dressed quickly so we could get Macy to school on time, and me to the first sitting gig of the day.

It seems as though all seasons around here are traffic seasons, if it's not one thing it's another - snow, rain, construction...so though it's a mere 5 mile trip from the boyfriend's to the first sitting job of the day, it took me an hour. I was stuck in heavy traffic. I received an email on my "smart phone" from the second sitting job of the day "I forgot my phone and need you to call me at work..." so I did, which added to my stress. The conversation went like this:

Frantic Mom: Hi. Three things: One. I didn't have time to take the dog out this morning, so when you get there, you'll need to deal with that. Two. Today is Victoria's dress rehearsal for the play. You'll need to get her in her costume and make-up, there are specific instructions for the costume on the washing machine. She'll be particular about her hair. Good luck. Three. Yesterday we had the order form for the photos with the check written out on the table, but the cleaning lady came and now I can't find it, so you'll need to look for it, and if you can't find it then you'll need to write a new check for photos. Oh, and as I mentioned, I forgot my phone today and am about to head to a client's office so you're on your own and will have to wing it from here.

Me: Are you kidding? Can't you have them fax or email you another form and send them your credit card information for the photos?

Frantic Mom: Don't you have your checkbook with you?

Me: Um, no. I don't carry it, and you're kidding, right?

Frantic Mom: Well, if you can't find it, you can explain to Victoria why she isn't getting her photos. Seriously - they won't even take her picture without that form. No, just tell her that we're getting the video.

I'm thinking, I should never have made this call while driving in traffic. This is why they tell you never to talk on the phone while you're driving in general. My blood pressure was off the charts. I was trying to remember all of this, maneuver traffic, and text the other sitter at Job #1 that I was running about 10 minutes late.

I arrive at Job #1. Nine kids under the age of 4. I share this job with somebody else so we can handle it. Ironically though, I always end up being the only one that can ever smell a poopy diaper. It's the weirdest thing. I have done this job with 4 different people, and I'm the only one that can ever smell a poopy diaper, and the only one that ever changes the diapers. Yesterday we had two poopies. What is the likelihood? It's a 2-hour shift, and we go for months without any poopies, but yesterday of all days, two. And they were doosies, lemme tell you. The kind you can taste, they smell so bad. But I sucked it up (figuratively, not literally), changed them, and went on with the job. It's my philosophy to change a diaper. I think it's Karma. Someday I may end up in diapers again, and you never know which one of these kids may have to be changing my diapers, and I want them to remember that I always, always changed them immediately when they were wet or poopy, so I'd like the same in return.

After all the kiddos were safely returned to their moms at Job #1, I went to grab a quick lunch. I ordered a Farmer's Market salad - sounds nice, right? Lettuce, tomatoes, cukes, garbanzo beans, eggs, croutons, onions and blue cheese. I order mine without the blue cheese and onions. It arrives at the register and it has lettuce, cucumbers and garbanzo beans on it. I inquire about the missing tomatoes, eggs and croutons. "Oh, we're out of those." Oh really. And you couldn't have told me that when I ordered? I stood there, thinking, well, just goes with the day. I subsequently heard no less than 5 other people order the same salad, with no thought of customer service given to tell them at the time the order was placed that they were out of so many ingredients. Shrug.

Anyway. I don't want to just be bitching here. I did think to myself, that all of this would have normally been tolerated much more easily on a day that I had a lot more sleep. And I was dreading my next assignment, for I knew that the kids I was about to pick up from school and attempt to stuff into a costume had had a rough weekend. Their parents were telling them that they were getting a divorce, and I had no idea what I was walking into.

I checked into the homestead first. Dog out of crate, mad race to door. Check. Walk around the park, business #1 and business #2. Check. Off to find the costume on the washing machine - read the instructions, make sure all of the parts are there. Check. Pack after school snacks and stuff into my purse. Check. Now, where to find the picture order form and payment? Scouring the stacks of papers...could it be? I eventually found it, and stuffed it into my purse, next to the after school snacks. I had just enough time to get in the car and get the kids.

I raced to school, was the second in the carpool line. The kids got in the car. We raced home without a fight. Could this actually be? They followed my instructions and didn't take the dog out of the crate. What is going on? Victoria combed all of the tangles out of her hair and allowed me to get the headpiece in just perfectly. Is this the calm before the storm? I'm nervous at this point in the game. We get the costume on without a hitch, get in the car, get the audio book turned on, and race to...you guessed it...sit in traffic. Which we did, for an hour.

We pull up at the designated spot, 20 minutes late. A "guard" sees the costume and points us to the auditorium. I've left my car in a no parking zone with the hazards on. To be safe, I left Pauline, the non costumed child, strapped into the car thinking "I'm much less likely to be towed if there is a kid in the car..." and race in with Victoria, order form in hand. I confirm all systems go, and shove her backstage saying reassuring things like "You're the prettiest one here," and "Your mom will pick you up at 6:30, have fun!" I head back to the car, where the "guard" says, "Ma'am, just so you know, next time, you can't leave a child strapped in the car..." I cut him off and say, "Oh, ok, thanks." I get in, and breath a sigh of relief.

Pauline and I head home, do her homework, and I let her play computer games while I cook dinner. Four separate dinners mind you - Monte Cristo for Mom, Chicken Nuggets and Broccoli for Victoria, Grilled Cheese with American Cheese for Pauline and Grilled Cheese with Cheddar for me. Pauline and I sit down to dinner, have a lovely conversation and keep the rest in the oven for their Mom and Victoria when they get home, and head to the park with the dog.

We watch some boys having soccer practice, take a stroll. Victoria makes it home, changes out of her costume, and eats dinner with Mom, before heading downstairs to play more computer games with Pauline while their Mom finishes up her weekly Monday night conference call. I clean up their dinner plates, and join the girls downstairs, keeping the dog at bay and from destroying anything else in their house. Unfortunately, I was too late and he got a chapstick before I could get to him. They get in their pajamas and brush their teeth, and jump rope for a while before we read Chapter 2 of "Alice in Wonderland."

Their daddy calls to tell them goodnight, and Victoria is angry at him, she simply grabs the phone and says, "No thanks." I make her call him back and at least ask him if he is coming to her dance recital the next day. While on the phone she softens a bit and says, "I'm sorry daddy, I do love you."

By then their Mom is finished with her call and comes downstairs to find the normally rambunctious girls curled up on my lap, listening to me read. She says to me, "Is it just me, or are you the best?" The girls say in unison, "She's the best."

I leave feeling like, perhaps life is more than a dress rehearsal really, though this statement has been made a million times before...we do it every day, and every day really does matter.

It started so rough, so incredibly rough. And many times throughout it, I wanted to vomit from the sheer tiredness of it all, yet at the end of it, I felt incredibly fulfilled.

I climbed into my car and called the boyfriend, who had locked himself out earlier that day. We had a good chuckle. I told him I had started a new blog, and he said, "Well, if you're writing about me, could you at least make me taller?"

God, I love him.