that to preface something i've probably needed to write for a long time but needed the appropriate inspiration and wormhole with which to preface my bitching about non parents bitching about parents. we all did it. told parents how to raise their kids before we actually were parents.as i write this, there are two kids and a cat in my bed. goose is "helping" me write, and little miss is watching power puff girls because they are awesome.
now that i am a parent, i'm a lot more lax with my appearance, my housekeeping pretty much everything i thought i would be awesome at. i was going to be a mom, an employee, look perfect every day, have awesome hair, always look well kept and would never ever let my kid go in public with a dirty shirt, no shoes and crap on her face. i was also going to publish my book, write a few more, keep playing guitar and conquer the world, before dinner, which i would make from scratch every night. i'm lucky these days if i make it out of the house without a fruit snack stuck to my ass. it takes me two months or more to edit a photo shoot that would have taken me a week before.
i thought parenting would be a lot like when i was just a stepparent. little miss was always very well-behaved, clean, and didn't make huge messes. that was the life! once she got a sister and turned four it's like a tornado has been hovering over the household. two girls and we've recently added two dogs and a cat. yes, we are crazy.
now that i'm a parent, i understand why when i was a teenager people didn't take me up on babysitting offers more often. i mean, didn't those boring old people want to get out of the house? now, i know. it's not that they didn't want to get out of the house or that they didn't trust me. (i was certified for crying out loud!) they didn't trust their KIDS! i love my girls, don't get me wrong. but the only way i'd let someone to whom i'm not blood related keep them is if i didn't want them in my life anymore.
goose is super sweet when she wakes up. literally until you pull the plug she's silly and sweet and lovey, but if you pull the plug before she's ready, you better run. you tell her to go to bed one minute before she's ready, get ready for thirty minutes to two hours of wallerin' fightin' kickin' screamin' pain in your ears.
our morning routine usually consists of my alarm going off at six, husband's at 630, and both of us snoozing til around 710. then we wake up, say a collective "ahh shit!" and start rushing around to leave the house by 725. it's 711, he's halfway dressed, i'm looking for a pair of pants that are probably on the couch. if they're folded i don't have to shake them. i then rummage thru the clothes on the couch for something that semi-matches for lucy. it's now 713 and i'm running back into our rooms, pulling my pants up and hopefully zipping them (which, yes, i forgot to do yesterday), head to sink to put in contacts. 717 i find a diaper and attempt to wake the goose. she's not having it. some mornings i find a pullup, some mornings the diaper goes on backward because she will not roll over. i manage to get something over her ass and clothes on her and maybe shoes if there are some on the floor close by. 722, husband goes outside to feed the dogs. goose and i brush teeth and head for the kitchen where i pull out something for lunch or not. 724 husband comes back inside and gets the baby, kisses all around, she's buckled into his truck by 725 and i'm opening the garage door to pull out in my car at 727. this is not a routine. this is chaos.
i'm a hot mess these days. i wore the same pair of jeans all week til last night when goose smeared spaghetti all over them and i was PISSED because i really didn't want to do laundry last night. woke up this morning in a panic because i hadn't remembered to put clothes in dryer last night so i went to find a few towels to throw in the dryer with my wet jeans, praying they would be dry by 720. what i find when i got to the washer? oh yeah, i didn't turn it on last night. so there are my jeans. still in the washer. still covered in spaghetti.
i didn't have it all together when i was single, by any means. when i was just married with no full-time kids, i actually combed my hair in the mornings. some days i don't match, but both the shirt and the pants are semi-clean and not too wrinkly. most days i get matching shoes on my feet. yes, i went to work once with two DIFFERENT shoes on.
that all said, there are some great times. like when goose gives me cuddles. when little miss and i paint a picture. when the three of us have girl time and little miss is insistent that we don't tell daddy we're painting our nails. those are the good times. the smiley times. the times when i'm not pulling my hair out, stressing about the dishes in the sink, the laundry in the floor, or the toys that overtake the house. i'd much rather have those toys and kids to play with them than not. sure, there's a lot of frustration in my house. a LOT. but there's also a lot of joy. squeals of hide and go seek. new words (usually appropriate) and developments and pictures hanging on the fridge that MY baby drew. they may look like nothing, but to me? to me they look like love.
amidst the chaos and screaming and throwing ourselves on the ground, there is always always always LOVE.
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