one week in

I am about a week into summer and feel like I have already gotten a summer’s worth of material.

 One week and one day ago, I was giving finals. And the power went out, which I can assure you are ideal final taking conditions. In the 1800s.

So I was out in the hallway joking around with a few other grown ups. Someone said something inappropriate (not me for a change) and I literally doubled over with laughter. And when I went to right myself, pain shot all the way up my spine. And stayed there. As I hobbled down the hall. Now, I am coming up on another birthday. Usually birthdays don’t phase me. I dig them. It means going out with my friends, getting to pick where we go, pedicures and presents. My husband and a few friends have given me the grow up lecture more than once, so the years creeping up don’t usually phase me. But as the pain lingered in my back with every step and it took a pep talk to get me out of my chair…this birthday I am feeling every one of my years.

Friends recommended good doctors and chiropractors, but I have always been one to self-medicate…and I figure I still had a few more days before I needed to officially start acting like a grown up….so I tried all the logical things, in this order: margaritas, Swedish massage, heating pads, hot tubs and muscle relaxers (just one).
The ache continued. And so did my busy schedule.

 Friday: last day of school. Staff work day = teacher sign out scavenger hunt. 

 Saturday: pool party + tball game+ tball party +  sweating through my graduation dress on a school bus on the way to graduation + graduation + hitting multiple graduation parties and learning the all important life lesson: despite what I thought, otter boxes are NOT actually waterproof (even briefly) and won’t protect your phone (or actually my husband’s phone) when you push him in the pool. And it will be a good 24 hours before he starts speaking to me again. And he will push you in too, even if you are wearing a dress.

 Sunday 2 am: Tess wakes up with a 102 degree fever.

 Sunday: Dance recital. The show must go on. We paid good money for these ridiculous outfits and she will dance on them in front of hundreds of people no matter how high her fever is. This is apparently an all day affair and deserves it’s own blog post. But the horrors I witnessed backstage were too much for my little brain to save and I have been trying to forget them. Every last thong. (or even worse, the ones not wearing them). I also did not realize that I was supposed to bring my 3 year old in full out makeup. And that pixie sticks and sugar packets aren’t only tricks for the moms on toddlers and tiaras. I borrowed some blush and someone gifted Tess some M&Ms and she made me proud. (even without mascara).

Monday: the day following car conversation and eventually my facebook status.

Tess: I have a baby in my belly
Me: I had hoped we wouldn’t have this conversation for at least another twenty years.
Tess: Her name is Princess.
Me: Oh, I guess you are pretty far along if you know that it is a girl. Do you know who the daddy is?
Tess: (with out a moment’s hesitation). Justin Beaver.

Oh my. Where does she get this stuff!

 Owen went to camp. Tess went to daycare. And I skipped my workshop and planned a birthday party which was complete with roller skating, an almost concussion, dodgeball, busted lips and a phineas and ferb cake (he asked for star trek, and with the hopes that he will one day have a girl friend, I went with his second choice). The only thing that was missing was parent roller derby.

 Tuesday: more camp. Gave up on my back ache and attempted to run it out. And surprisingly it didn’t make it worse. And lots of bad TNT. Rizzoli and Isles, you are not very good but I can’t stop watching. When everyone knows I should be packing, cleaning, or at least watching Dance moms in hopes of learning more of those useful pixie stick tricks. The day ended on a high note, checking out the transit of Venus (and plenty of Uranus jokes) and dinner at the food truck park (which pretty much consisted of snow cones for my kids and things you would never imagine on a hot dog for me. It was only Tuesday, but I was worn out….so I plugged in my heating pad and went to bed early.

 Until, someone crawled in my bed around one am with the 102 fever making a return visit.

Wednesday: Tess spilling (fill in the blank with any and ALL of the following: legos, cereal, popcorn, contents of the clean clothes basket, crayons, and more popcorn and the remainders of one of last night’s snow cones)  __________all over the floor. And a nice visit to our pediatrician who told me that Tess looked perfect. Minus the ridiculous fever and hopefully cross our fingers that it would go away and she doesn’t share it before we try and leave the country…in oh…only 48 hours.

After spending A LONG day with mom. Tess’s first and probably last library story time and only one episode of Rizzoli and Isels,  she had all her chattiness back for the drive home from picking O up from camp. Owen was giving us all a nice long talk on photosynthesis (ok, I know I am a science nerd, but I swear I don’t encourage this craziness!),

Tess: (says something along the lines of…) You can pick them but you can’t eat them right?

Me: (still thinking we were on the subject of plants). Right Tess, you can pick plants but you should never eat any without asking first. Some of them could be poisonous.
Tess: No mom, not plants. BOOGERS!
Me: (as seriously as I could muster), yes…some of those could be poisonous too! You can pick them but don’t eat them.
Tess: I’ll just wipe them on my shirt ok?
Me: Just as long as it is not my shirt!

Thursday: 6 hours of physics training. Mostly guys. Talking about Dr. Who, science fiction novels and trying to one up each other working equations. I made the ridiculous mistake of forgetting my calculator. And suddenly wished I had another muscle relaxer…even though my back was finally starting to ease up.

Then I went to another party for someone in my son’s class. Now, is where I need to confess that I am most socially awkward with PTA moms. I don’t speak their language. I own nothing bedazzled, nor do I want to. But. I do dig my kid and it has became ridiculously obvious to me the last time I let him play on the playground after school and they all knew his name, but none of the other moms spoke to me…that I need to do a better job of getting to know the people at his school. I don’t need a new BFF and I certainly don’t want to chair up any committees but, I do need to learn a few names and foster a few playdates and have someone to call when I don’t know what time the millionth fundraiser this year ends. So I have been trying hard to meet a few of the moms in his class. And have mostly crashed and burned. However, no crashing and burning was worse than this party.  One of the moms showed up at another party with another woman. She also happened to look a lot like one of the Indigo Girls. So, tonight’s party she was there with the other woman again. No hubs in sight. And I love me some Indigo Girls and was all about being nice and friendly and accepting.

Turns out, it was just her sister. And her husband showed up later. And we might not ever be invited to another birthday party. Or asked to work the PTA concession booth again. 

Friday: Tess’s last day of “school” ends with a luau. And we happen to have on official Hawaiian skirt and coconut bra that a friend brought back for us last summer. So we got all dressed up and headed off to school. With the grass skirt and lei. She was not so sure about the coconut top, I kept trying to get her to complete the outfit…at least for a photo op and as she got out of the car she insisted that she couldn’t wear the bra because “her booties were still growing”.

 I guess, along with that baby in her belly.

 And my back is finally feeling better. But if laughter is what caused my injury, I think there might be a lot more heating pads in my future. And I’m ok with that.