Friday, August 23, 2013

5MF: Last

Five Minute Friday




I'm linking up to 5 Minute Fridays, a weekly writing prompt shared among all bloggers who participate.  This week's theme is graceful.  You can find out all about it here.


GO.

The last four weeks have been probably the hardest of my life.

{I cheated...I wrote for five minutes, hated what I wrote and am re-writing...but, well, it's my blog and I'll do-over if I want to.}

The last four weeks have seen a giant pity party from me while Professor and I, so sick we can't breathe through noses and ache for sleep, spend those golden hours between little ones' bedtime and our own scouring our mattress for signs of bedbugs.

Yeah, bed bugs.  Just like two years ago.

We've got bites but no signs of them, so the Orkin man can't come spray his death spray and relieve us from the itching and the worrying.

So, it was on a night of wrapping our extra pillows, storage containers, bedside cubicles, and such in trash bags and duct tape that something horrible rose up out of me and spilled all over the floor.

Wailing.  Ugly crying.  Ugly words: "We're educated; we're decent-looking; we've made two beautiful children; we...." on and on and on about how wonderful we are, so why are we still living like this?  In this basement, with these bugs, with these neighbors who are inconsiderate and rude and not-like-us?*

It was the ugliest pity party I've ever had, but Professor let me have it.  Kept taping away the bed bugs, soothing me as he could.

In the days since, there has been screaming baby nights and vomiting Pookie afternoons and not enough sleep, never enough sleep.  But you know what else there has been?

Grace.

Grace from my husband and grace to him.  Grace from my children in long naps and "sometimes it's hard to be a Mommy" reminders from a wise little mouth.

Grace from God in that I am still upright and fighting.

And what there hasn't been?  Any more pity parties.  I can't say I'll never have another one in my life, but that was definitely the last pity party of epic proportion allowed from these lips for the rest of my life.  Because I have better, more important things to do.

Like plead with the Orkin man.

STOP.

*Just a note: I do realize that bed bugs do not discriminate based on socioeconomic factors; they don't care about cleanliness, either, just like lice.

Friday, August 2, 2013

5 things that *didn't* happen today

I had a lovely post dreamed up about loving neighbors and such...and then the day happened.  Instead, I would like to share five things that definitely did not go on under this roof today...

1. I didn't leave a bag full of wet (but clean!) underwear outside by the drying rack.  And I certainly didn't do such a thing while escorting a non-compliant three-year-old into the house for discipline purposes. 
2. I didn't shut myself in the bathroom and sob into the phone to my poor, working, unable-to-help-at-the-moment husband...because that's a total SAHM cliche, and that's just not how I roll. 
3. I didn't stand in front of my refrigerator, willing it to fill with Diet Pepsi and cupcakes.
4. I didn't put Pookie down to nap an hour early because the baby was tired...because I'm totally okay with them not napping at the same time, meaning someone is ALWAYS with me.  This is entirely fine with me; who needs a moment (or two) to be alone with their thoughts anyway? 
5. I didn't spend too much time Googling apartments in a city outside Paris where Professor could potentially, maybe, possibly apply for a job.  Because I go with the flow and don't have control issues.

So, you know, those things didn't happen today.  Not a one of them.  Ahem...
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