Most vs. Some

I wonder if I will ever be able to accept how fast taking care of two very young children goes from being pleasantly busy to CALGON, TAKE ME AWAY.

Most days feel like the movie Groundhog Day. I wake up, change diapers, make meals, get them down for naps, change diapers, feed, change, rock, console, feed, change, and so on and so forth until I feel like I will just become an emotionless robot after a time, just going forward about my day mechanically. On days when things are different, a new errand thrown into the mix or being somewhere else, then I feel like OH NO, the schedule is off and then spend so much effort trying to do the same things I always do, the same things that sort of drive me crazy with the monotony.

Most days though, I am fairly happy about it all, if a little robotic, and sometimes the redundancy seems to be a comfortable sort of tedium, pleasing and harmonious to us all.

Some days however, Faith gets frustrated because something isn’t working quite right and starts howling, or she refuses to take a nap, which wakes up James, who in turn then keeps her up. I, in turn, lose my mind. It seems like an impossible task to find something that she will eat willingly and when I suggest something simple and usually agreeable like a sandwich she will suddenly scream and writhe on the ground as if I am tormenting her and adding another degree of torture to her already hideous life. Or the inescapable temper tantrum that comes with trying to get her tiny toys to line up JUST RIGHT in her toy plane. The black dog has to be in the very back with his head turned just so, the white dog has to be on the right side near the front, NO, NOT THAT NEAR THE FRONT MOMMY AAAAAGHHHHHH, and then when finally they are all in place and she tries to carry the plane across the room and they slide off their assigned spots, then I want to go run and hide from my own two year old daughter because she turns into a really scary monster. The times when they cry all day because of lack of sleep or boredom, or who knows what. I don’t ever know. Then Jeff comes home and I want to say “Here, take your children while I run far, far away and maybe I’ll be back soon,” but I can’t ever say that because once he gets home he has to help his father build a fence or he has to till the garden or fix his motorcycle or . . .

So. Yes. Some days are bad, most are pretty good, but all of them I am so thankful for. I have a feeling that one day I will look back on the days when I grabbed my hair in my hands and howled at the ceiling and smile to myself and maybe miss those chaotic and frustrating moments. Or . . . not.