I have spent the last ten days as not much more than an employee. I took off my mom hat, threw out the housewife uniform, and concentrated solely on THE JOB. It happens twice a year, and then the hectic pace slows down at least a smidgen, and it's back to life as I know it.
Maybe I'm just getting old. Maybe it's because I'm not aging one iota, but the kids are magically getting older without me adding one more day to my _____ years of age. Maybe I didn't drink enough through this period of job-obsession.
Maybe that fly sitting on my monitor needs to die. Are those his legs rubbing together or is he just happy to see me?
Random distraction.
It's a little tougher this year getting back to my version of normal in this house. It's always different for the summer sale anyway, because kids are home on break from school. But THIS year, both kids are working. The days of leaving a "mom list" on the fridge to be completed while I'm at work are pretty much gone. My son actually works more hours than I do, and he has finally hit that stage of the occasional big sigh and rolling of the eyes. Being the eternal "nice kid", the random attitude doesn't last long, and I usually get an apology within about 3 minutes of the 'tude, but combine that with the hours he's working, and I'm having to play drill sergeant to stay on top of the chores he's expected to do, let alone anything I would LIKE him to do.
And then, we have the bobby pin queen. The last ten days of removing the mom hat means I have also not tracked the trail of bobby pins throughout the house. I know they are there, because I have felt them underfoot as I've hobbled through the house with aching feet. The joys of living with a waitress have also meant finding random cash strewn about as if my house were a strip club at 4am. Waitress girl also came down with a head cold, which didn't stop her from spending the hours before a shift in a tattoo shop, but did stop her from picking up after herself, and the tables are now strewn with random girl shit once again.
Granted, I basically turned into a teenager myself. I have crap strewn all over one table. I have yet to open the box of espresso beans I ordered, which in my mind, is just criminal. Thank gawd for online bill pay, because I haven't looked at a single piece of mail for over a week, and I know the pile is buried somewhere under purse stuffing I eagerly threw all over the table to get my belongings into THE PURSE as quickly as possible.
I bought new curtains while on that shopping frenzy last week, and I did manage to put them up, but now, I question the remainder of the room. Through the haze of work-obsession, it dawned on me that once I slowed down, I'm probably going to find my mind obsessing over what to do about the busy pattern on the windows that now makes the entire space seem busy busy busy. Not that I obsess over things until they drive my brain absolutely bonkers. Nope, not me. *glances over at THE PURSE* I do LOVE these curtains, but now I don't love the room. Suddenly, the room looks like it has too much STUFF, and I'm trying to ignore this and adjust to the curtains, because this really could be a side effect of spending ten days handling, rearranging, and dealing with too much STUFF at THE JOB.
This really is something I need to let go of right now, because there are more pressing matters at hand. The table piles. The layers of dust on every surface. The kitchen that looks like a bio hazard dumping ground. The laundry I have not touched. But my brain keeps returning to the curtains. And I wonder why I have the computer desk in the north corner and not in the south. If I recall correctly, it has something to do with cords reaching, but my mind is too distracted by the pattern on the windows to actually remember the details. I vaguely think back to other times I moved that behemoth desk and swearing and having fits over having to move it back, so my intellect tells me NO, do NOT even go there. And then I glance at the curtains again and try to focus. Just focus. Do something with the room so I can stop obsessing.
But there are crumbs all over the counter tops. The stainless appliances need a chisel and hammer before I attempt to wipe them down. The last request to empty the dishwasher must have happened, but the sinks have managed to fill up again. I'm fairly sure the floors are filthy, because it can not possibly be my need for a pedicure that is causing my feet to stick to the floor.
And when I'm not distracted by the pattern framing the windows, I actually see outside to all the work that waits for my motivation outdoors. The huge clumps of grass from mowing because whatever fertilizer hubby used this year works a little TOO well and the grass is out of control within three days of mowing. The weeds...oh mah sweet baby Cheezits...the weeds are insane, and I haven't touched my zen garden in nearly a month because there has been NO ZEN other than what I find at the bottom of a bottle.
College starts back up in slightly more than a month, and that means the pile of college stuff that manages to fit in a small dorm room but doesn't fit anywhere but my kitchen, will be gone. But in the meantime, I really should dust it off and at least make it look like an organized pile. AND reassure my overwrought brain that I only have to live with it for 31 more days.
Have I mentioned that my oven is busted? This happened shortly before the job-obsession, and of course, right in the middle of preparing a meal that required its use. I wasn't too concerned with it, as I knew the days of job-obsession were approaching, which is the time of year when the grocery list includes every quick fix, microwave delight my children could ever want but I never buy. But now job-obsession has turned down a notch, and the oven is still busted. I have the DIY hubby, who is also the OnTheRoad hubby, so he's been trying to diagnose the problem when he is home, which isn't a huge amount of time. Meanwhile, as he runs his little tests and then leaves for another week, it means a non-working oven for at least the next five days. And, when I'm not job-obsessed, I'm a rabid meal planner, so this planning that can not include the use of an oven means I have to think twice as hard. And I don't like having to think very hard when I'm coming down off a job-obsession high. I had a brief thought of just ordering a new stove and having it installed while hubby is off in nowhere land, but then he'd probably come home and take the new one apart too, thinking it was the old one and that I had just cleaned the non-working oven. There's also the problem of the bio hazard kitchen, and having a new oven installed would mean letting people in my filthy house and then having to deal with them catching some kind of rare disease while touching my kitchen surfaces.
There's probably a bobby pin stuck inside a gas valve.
What has the endless rambling accomplished other than to whine incessantly that the days of teenage maid service aren't what they used to be? Nothing. Avoidance. The opportunity to make more espresso, ignoring the crumbs of some unknown substance sitting next to the bean grinder. Briefly thinking that crumbs near the toaster are one thing, but leaving crumbs near the espresso corner is just UNACCEPTABLE, and having random thoughts of just torching the place. Seeing that the bathroom is NOT the dirtiest room in the house, and that's just a disgusting statement considering I have moments when I would prefer to pee with my eyes closed so I don't have to look at it. I realize I have far too much going through my brain that needs to be done, and it's shutting down on overload. Internal error. Fatal error. System crash.
I gaze outside and daydream. I briefly consider it is an absolutely gorgeous day. The breeze coming into the house is absolutely lovely. It gently sways the curtains. The patterned curtains. The busy curtains. In the busy room.
STOP IT STUPID BRAIN.
Maybe if I just move around rugs?
*whimper*
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