Yesterday

I have been reading a lot about how to make your blog more successful. One way to do that is to have a unifying theme. This is what the experts say. My theme is to always write humanizing experiences and offer life saving tips on how to be a better person, from someone who hasn’t gotten all the way there yet. But this post is going to stray from that theme just a tad and it’s going to be a Dear Diary. I’m going full Bridget Jones everyone. So yesterday I woke up late, Joe and I just bought this new bed for ourselves, I’m not sure how I feel about it yet, stay tuned, but anyway, we bought a king sized bed. First time ever! I’m still not sure we deserve that size, but the book I am reading tells me to buy what you deserve and you will make the money you want , so I’m pretty sure I have 2,000 dollars coming my way. So I wake up and I fire up my laptop and right off the bat, tears. My second grade parents had organized a video slideshow for me, of all my second graders, letting me know how much they miss me, for teacher appreciation week. I am so lucky with the families that I have. I feel like I am constantly changing the playbook for them with this remote learning and they are so patient, so understanding. They never call me and say get your shit together already. They are just wonderful. So I stumble out of the bedroom, still sniffling and pull my kids away from the tv show they are watching, because it’s binder time everyone! It is school hour on Terri Lane. In the mean time, something is going on with the one dog this week, so that he is peeing on the floor every thirty minutes. When he does it, for some reason I have an involuntary response where I lean over the sink and towards the window and yell to the kids to clean it up. I’m not sure what this is all about, but it happens. Payson finished his work suprisingly early and I check the schedule at the top, where it reads music. Please take zero offense by this, but sometimes we don’t do everything in the packet. Ahhh, look away, I shouldn’t have typed that. But no, it’s true. I do the core stuff with my kids and then we all pat each other on the back and sing shake it off by Taylor Swift and fire up Nailed It on Netflix. So yes, I have been ignoring the additional work at my house, because I am either going insane, being protective of my children’s well being, or lazy AF. But today I thought, my god, it says music. We should DO the music. So I look at the sheet. It must have been written in greek for all I know. I ask my son if he knows what it means. In my defense, it said assessment at the top, which should mean that the child ought to know something about what is being assessed. “That’s funny, Mom. I have no idea what that says”. Okay cool. So my kids are basically a place holder in the school system. I call my daughter over, who is in fifth grade and does band. She starts yelling to Alexa to help her. Good god in heaven, mighty savior of the flute, why are we so inept at this. I began crying, I don’t know why. This one piece of paper got me so upset and stressed out and then I began spiraling thinking that my papers were making my families stressed out. Payson asked me if I was mad at his music teacher. No buddy, I’m not mad at your music teacher. It is teacher appreciation week. That is basically blasphemy. More Crying.

I finally decided I needed out of the house and put on work out clothes even though I had no intention of working out. If I”m going to be honest, my pants aren’t fitting too great right now and so just like Regina George, this is all that fits me right now. I told the kids Bye Felicia and started driving up to Augusta, listening to the Office Ladies podcast. On my drive up there, the gas light came on. Well wouldn’t you know, I hadn’t filled up my tank in six weeks plus. I stopped at a gas station and you are going to think this is the dumbest thing you have ever read, but I could not find the button that opens the door for the gas. That is how quarantined I have become! I have lost all sense of reality and world knowledge. I sat there for a minute slapping all of the buttons and doing a ton of negative self talk. When I finally made it to Starbucks, the line wrapped around the entire parking lot. I was not annoyed by this, instead I found it comforting. After all, what did I have to return too but more music notes I could not discern and more dog urine. When it was finally my turn to pick up my drink, this woman whips it over out of nowhere by the bank and walks in front of my car. “Excuse me” she yells. “I ordered ahead and that can’t mean that I have to wait in that long line back there”. Yes bitch, that’s exactly what that means. I mean I love the innocent, play stupid card, I basically wrote the book on it, but just like Stanley and Michael said during pretzel day, boooooo get to the back of the line. Doesn’t she know? This woman cutting the line, that this is apart of these times now? We all pay our dues, we all wait in line, we all suffer as a community to get whatever coffee, flour, or toilet paper that our families need. That woman then proceeded to walk right to the left of my car and demand her drink from the drive thru window. The nerve!

As I made my way back to Terri Lane, and sipped on my white chocolate mocha, I said some affirmations to myself. That is something else I am reading. That you are supposed to chant affirmations to yourself and you won’t be as screwed up as you thought you were. So I am driving down the road and I am saying you can handle this day. You can handle anything that comes at you. I then see a Fedex truck parked in my driveway. I consider this to be odd and when I park, Fedex man hops right out and hands me a box. Readers, please suspend judgement, but weeks ago, my anonymous friend referred me to a wine club that sends monthly goodies. Normally I would reserve this money for other more practical items, but now I just let the wind take me where it wants too. I had forgotten about said wine club, because it was backordered like anything else until this exact moment. “I really can’t leave this alcohol with your kids Mam.” Oh my goodness, melt me right into the ground why don’t you? I stumbled all over myself. “Oh of course, yes thank you.” He then informed that he tried to drop it yesterday, but no one would get up off the couch. At this point in my mind, I have flashes of me ripping open the box in front of him, smashing the top of the bottle off of my porch and taking a big ol’ swig in front of FedEx Fred, so I can give him something to really talk about. I then take the box silently into the house, no longer feeling the euphoria from the coffee or any other human enjoyment. I open the door and my son proceeds to tell me, “your crate of alcohol showed up, but he wouldn’t leave it with us he said.” In an attempt to gain back some dignity, I told him it was a one time small bottle, sent lovingly from a friend for the pandemic. He looked at me, dripping in the same judgment as Fedex Fred. And that Ladies and Gents is how you do a Wednesday.