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Ding Dong!

Ding Dong!

Who in the hell was ringing my door at 11 in the morning? On MOTHER’S DAY no less.

I pulled open the door and Blake, the annoying neighborhood kid stared up at me.

“Can Tommy play?” he asked.

I sighed. “Yes.” I called Tommy.

“Did you know it was Mother’s Day, Tommy’s Mom?” Blake wondered.

“Yes. Why aren’t you with YOUR mother?”

Blake grinned. “She told me I should go out and play.”

Well gee. I wonder why.

“Can we play in your garage? Can we play with the water guns? Can we—”

“Blake, you guys can play with chalk. How about that?”

Tommy came down and they went outside. They started coloring with chalk. Then some other kids joined them. I thought they’d be entertained and would leave me alone. I sat down in front of the computer so I could work on revising my novel. I had figured out the perfect way to re-word a paragraph so it flowed better. My fingers were flying over the keyboard. YES…it was—

DING DONG!

Oh for the love of chocolate.

I marched to the door.

“YES, Blake?”

“Some kid called me dumb,” Blake, the neighbor tattletale, said.

And why was he telling me? Tommy didn’t call him dumb. Some other kid did. Why wasn’t he bothering THEIR parents?

“Just tell the kid it’s not nice to name call,” I said, and started to walk away. I had to get back to the computer before I lost my train of thought.

“Tommy’s Mom!” Blake shouted and OPENED the front door. He’s notorious for just walking into people’s homes. One day he’s going to be scarred for life when he sees my husband stroll past in his boxers with the holes in them.

“Close that,” I demanded, coming back over. I grabbed the handle and clicked it shut. Maybe I’m the neighborhood grump. Who knows?

“Tommy’s Mom, some kids aren’t sharing the chalk,” he continued.

“Tell them to share. Blake, I really need to get back to—”

“But Tommy’s Mom—”

“Blake, unless a kid is injured I really don’t care.” Yeah. I’m totally the neighborhood grump.

Blake left after that. I got back on the computer.

And then Natalie announced that she had to pee. We’re potty training so the second she tells me this, I get excited thinking that THIS is the moment that she’s finally going to pee in the potty and not on my floor. So I led her by the hand to the bathroom. She climbed on the toilet.

And sat there.

And sat there.

Oh, and sat there.

The perfect paragraph that I had in my head had faded away.

Sitting cross legged on a bathroom floor was NOT how I envisioned my Mother’s Day.

“Are you going to go?” I asked Natalie.

“Yes.” She nodded emphatically.

But did nothing.

“Can you please do something in the potty?” I said.

So Natalie farted.

“I farted!” she laughed.

“Yes but…where is the pee?”

“I don’t know?” Natalie shrugged and seriously looked baffled.

So no pee. I switched on Wow Wow Wubzy on the TV and got back to my novel. I poised my fingers over the keyboard.

“I’m hungry,” Natalie informed me.

So I got her a snack. She wanted grapes and apples. But I guess I cut the apples wrong because she took all the apple bits off the plate and set them aside.

“I no want,” she said.

“But you said you wanted apples.”

“I NO WANT!”

“Young lady, you do not speak to me like that. Especially on Mother’s Day.”

Later I tried to stretch out on the couch. Natalie sat on my face.

The cat puked on the carpet.

Tommy told me that I was ruining his life when I said we didn’t have an ingredient that he needed for a science experiment he was putting together.

My husband had to work that night so I had no break.

But...

That night as I put the kids to bed, Tommy apologized and said he was mistaken, that I wasn’t ruining his life after all.

And Natalie gave me a wet kiss on my cheek.

Oh, and Tom said that this weekend I could go out to lunch and see a movie with my friend Amanda.

Sweet. Impending freedom.