and it's gone
These days I’m all about letting go.
- I let go of my last pair of size 2 pants. I’ve come to terms with the fact that they will never fit me again.
- I let go of the fact that no matter how much I beg and plead, my husband will not stop sending me useless texts.
- I let go of my anger that I cannot eat bread anymore.
- And last week I let go of what I consider a major concession to motherhood – the mom sedan.
Yes, my friends, the mom sedan is officially out of my life. For good.
Now I’m not complaining here – the mom sedan was nice. It was low-key and fairly stylish. It had charm in a mom-ish sort of way. But during my 3 year lease it felt like all I was missing was a pair of elastic maternity jeans, a “Baby on Board” sign, and a “My Child is an Honor Student” bumper sticker to complete the picture of domesticity.
I’ve mentioned before how much I dread domesticity, but at least my dread is now tempered by the fact that I have a 2-door car again.
So now all I need to do is learn to let go of my resentment towards Maya for taking my superstar metabolism away from me (and thus my size 2 pants). I also need to let go of my anger at the man who rear-ended my 3 day old car on Monday.
I’m working on it. I really am.
the plan vs. the reality
The Plan:
Fly to Minneapolis to attend a wedding. Spend quality family time together. Take a break from the computer/TV/Internet. Don’t be impatient. Don’t yell at Maya. Lay off of making fun of Ali. Don’t complain so much. Realize it’s not always about me.
The Reality:
I flew to Minneapolis. I attended a wedding. Everything remained about me.
Conclusions:
A: When presented with a choice of spending time with the family by riding on the Jimmy Neutron Atom Collider 5 times at the Mall of America or shopping at Bloomingdale’s, I will choose Bloomingdale’s.
B: When presented with a choice of being proactive when Maya drops a bottle of water all over her flower girl ensemble or screaming at her uselessly, I will scream at her uselessly.
C: When presented with a choice of listening to Maya sing “Like a G-6” over and over on a 4-hour flight or paying $13 for inflight Internet and clamping on noise-cancelling headphones…well, the choice is obvious.
Lessons Learned:
I am not perfect. I am on the Internet too much. I waste too much time on Twitter. I make fun of my family too much. I complain too much. I will never like amusement parks. I spend too much money at Bloomingdale’s.
The flower girl...after I utilized the blow dryer to dry her ensemble.
I also learned that no matter how many times I say, “If you don’t stop playing with your water its going to drop all over your dress,” she will never stop playing with her water. And it will drop all over her dress.
a mad texter
Ali likes to send text messages. Lots and lots of text messages. He does this for a variety of reasons but namely because:
- He is stuck in a line/is on hold/is waiting for someone or something and has nothing better to do, or
- He has nothing better to do.
I’m not going to lie – I don’t have much patience for his texts because more often than not they are so cryptic that even the FBI couldn’t decipher them. And the rest of the time? Well he’s asking me to do something I really don’t want to do.
So when I received yet another urgent text from my husband insisting I immediately stop by the pharmacy to purchase a travel-sized Crest with Scope I debated ignoring it. But then my guilty conscience got to me and I headed to CVS to comply with his request.
(And yet I get comments that I’m not a very good wife? I don’t get it.)
Anyway, why he needed it urgently is beyond me, seeing as we aren’t leaving for Minneapolis until Friday. But I was on the tail end of appreciating his efforts to find me a new car and decided to humor him.
So imagine how I felt when I went to put the toothpaste away and found all of this in Ali’s bathroom?
A buffet of tooth care.
I was beside myself with irritation. I asked him why he needed the toothpaste so badly when he already had enough on hand to brush the teeth of all the citizens of a small country. And he texted back:
“For my trip to New Orleans. At the end of February.”
Does this make any sense? No. But on the bright side I suppose I can’t accuse him of procrastination?
While I'm not going to win Mother/Wife of the Year Award anytime soon, I haven't killed anyone yet or shot myself in the head. And that, my friends, is how I calculate success these days. 
FANCY THAT FANCY THIS 
