Living in this chaos is hard. Agonizing. Crazy-making.

But the moment we clear it away, it will be time to put the house up for sale. And I think that's why we're moving slowly these past 2 weeks.

It's here. It's now. Look around. If we clean this up, if we shed this mess then you and he and I will have to say goodbye.

And, we're afraid. Sad. Resentful, or maybe mulish is a better word.

There's always an excuse why we're not quite ready yet to move on. Each morning, he goes off to work. Then it's our turn to get up and get going. Find a path to the fridge and the microwave to make some kind of breakfast. Trip over boxes and crap and God-what-is-that to the basket of clean laundry in the dining room.

Eventually, blessedly, we're off too. Camp, swimming lessons, art class, play date, store.

But then, we come home. And it's waiting for us.

Nearing this ultimate low point. The moment when the tide has slunk completely away. And all that is left is the stench and boil of the muddy ocean bottom.

This is the time, in the deep dark, that you turned to me and said 'it's always darkest before the dawn', and we giggled and made love again.

This is the time, you pulled my hair back off my face and told me close my eyes and rest, that our son needed me strong to be born.

This is the time, you called from far away. Woke me up with that ringing and said please, now, give us another chance. You wanted to come home.

This is the time we stood, lights burning in every room as we waited for the night to turn, as we prayed from our souls that his fever would break.

This is the time we shouted at each other in the rental car, speeding along Seine on stupid skinny streets with a stupid wrong map and trying to stop arguing but not able to, not able to...

This is the time, after all those times, that you gathered me up in bed and said 'Everything's going to be all right.... every thing will be fine. I promise.' and kissed my forehead and I believed you, and could sleep.

Weekend comes with sun and heat and day and we ... paint, spackle, study, eat. Pretend that we haven't missed every deadline we set, that the money will somehow keep stretching, that we have endless more summer days to finish this in between all the other things summer means.

In the night, we know better.

It's an ebb tide, close to bottom now.

Just around the corner. Just around the corner....

Posted by: Elizabeth at 06:51 AM | Comments (2) | Add Comment
Post contains 459 words, total size 2 kb.

Here's how I never end up posting...

Yesterday morning, after some homeschool and then parking Bear in my room with some lunch and the Fairly OddParents. Sat down and started to respond to my emails, catch up on people's blogs, and check out the other places I write.

Yes, I prostitute myself. For a little bit of money, but it makes a huge difference these days. I write this blog, contribute to this blog, and as long as I'm sharing...for no money at all, I just joined this blog too.

A couple of the long emails I'd written looked like they had the seeds of Corporate Mommy post in them, so I began a draft.

Then I decided that it was too mundane. I mean, really. Who cares about our kitchen renovations and cardboard castles when the G8 summit is underway?

But I had to stop my dithering because I realized that suddenly and literally? I was panting with heat.

Feeling like someone had stuck the sun down my shirt. I could not get cool.

I decided I must be having some kind of premature hot flash and jumped into a shiveringly brisk shower.

I got out and felt about as cool and refreshed as a Bayou swamp in August.

"Bear..." I shouted as a I walked and toweled and panted. "Are you feeling..."

And there, hugging the box air conditioner like a crack monkey, was my son.

"It's hot," he huffed, his Captain Obvious cape firmly attached.

"No Duh!" I agreed, snatching up the thingy that tells me the temperature inside and out - and YES, dammit, feeling relieved that it wasn't just me.

"Well?" he demanded. "Well? Well? Well!!!"

"You don't even know what the numbers mean!" I scoffed, wishing I knew where my glasses were cuz the display is itty-biity. What? It IS!

"Mom... it's at least a 100, right?!"

(When the hell did he learn temperature?!) "Um, 94."

"OK, I think we should got ot the pool now! Do you, Mom?"

I just stood there and dripped.

Pleasant? No.

"Mom!! Puhleeeeeeze! Hurry!" he shouted, his naked fanny wiggling as he pulled up his Transformer's swimsuit.

"Uh... OK."

I grabbed a handful of towels out of the basket, dug up the pool bag, and started packing it while (at the same time) sitting in my office chair and wondering if I should save my draft or hit 'Delete'.

Started typing again, a little inspired, while out of the corner of my eye my son lost his patience. A few moments later, I was racing him out the door.

We were at the pool for almost 5 hours. Yes, with copious sunscreen, cover-ups, and even a cabana boy who chased us around with a big ol' palm frond.

Did no good. I'm pink.

When I got back to my computer last night, I didn't even check half my open windows. Yawning, crispy, I had minimum energy left.

This morning, I decided that I was glad I hadn't published what I wrote yesterday because in my time away, I had come to firmly believe that the trivialities of my life were ridiculous.

I looked at what I wrote before we'd bugged out to the massive Rehm pool yesterday.

And wondered why I felt everything I had to say since I left my job has seemed increasingly.... un-postable.

There's something important here. Part of peeling back the cover of my life and seeing the broken bits.

But I just...can't. At this moment.

(deep breath)

Here's what I found on the screen, though. Unchanged from yesterday. Silly...

.Change in plans, as always.

Instead of putting away the laundry, or prepping the kitchen floor, or finishing the homeschool chapters, or even finishing the gardening and weeding... we're heading over to the pool.

It is infinity degrees out today and the cicadas are roaring and Bear and I are going to kill each other if we don't get relief because even the box air conditioner can't keep up (we need fans to help move the cool air around).

The kitchen was demo'd a couple of weeks ago. Upper cabinets are installed. Lower cabinets are dry-fitted. Primer paint is up - we're keeping the tile, losing the wallpaper. Two-tone (cream and darker cream) paint job this weekend, if, you know, we don't decide to go to Blues Fest downtown or Midsommarfest in Andersonville. Or both. Heh.

The cabinets are mid-grade; a medium-brown maple. Pretty. Floor is peel & stick, but not criminally ugly. Pale browns, greens & blues. Countertop's Corian and being professionally made & installed with an under-counter sink - colors a little darker than floor.

That's gotta wait until after the lower cabinets, plumbing, electric is finished and inspected. Yes, we finally got a permit - with caveats for about a dozen inspections on it. "It's an old kitchen, you need to bring it up to modern codes," the lady told me with a fake smile at Town Hall.

"Do you have those written down for me?"

"You can find them online."

"Where?"

"Oh," she sighed like I'd asked her to give me her firstborn. "I'm not good with computers. Just look. Come back some other time if you can't find them."

(Note: HATE the people who work at city hall.)

No idea about roof yet - money dwindling, we're thinking how to get it done.

Downstairs basement - room just under stairs back to windows completely cleaned out, washed (mostly). That will be the staging room - all the packed up stuff will be put there so we can completely empty the other rooms and wash the basement.

Upstairs, kitchen stuff EVERYWHERE. Ugh.

Otherwise, clothes are all washed, sorted, organized. All that is left is what we wear. Bear? Has PLENTY of clothes.

He has built a HUGE castle structure out of the empty cabinet boxes in the front room - complete with turrets, periscopes, secret windows.

Tomorrow is officially our 'last day' of homeschool. Although truthfully? We'll kepp going on his reading, writing, and some of the other basic stuff - like time & money math. But that won't stop us from having a party to celebrate.

Tomorrow night, I fully expect to be doing the limbo down the sidewalk and singing shanty songs loudly to myself and the eleventy gazillion cicadas.

Sara is fine. She had a urinary tract infection that made it impossible for her to hold her pee so despite coming to us fairly housetrained, she had a bunch of accidents for a few weeks. Now we need to re-housebreak her, which means a lot of time in her crate. She gets pissed and tries to break out because if she isn't THIS CLOSE to HER boy at all times, her heart breaks and she's miserable.

Also? She likes to get her water bowl in her teeth and dump it on her head.

She's doubled in size, is very soft and sweet and smart and has the goofiest personality. And LOVES to retrieve!

OK, he has RUN OUT OF PATIENCE. As I type this, he is looking for my car keys.

OH MY GOD, he's found them and I think he's serious. Just what was my frelling my husband thinking? Showing a 6-year-old the workings of a 2-ton automotive?!

Dagnabbit, Bear's heading for the...

Gotta run.

Love,

Me

Posted by: Elizabeth at 03:30 AM | Comments (5) | Add Comment
Post contains 1231 words, total size 7 kb.