What I'm trying to say is I had a hard weekend. A hard, gross, stomach flu filled weekend. We thought Linc was feeling better after a minor round of stomach stuff last week. His appetite was back, he had energy, he wasn't dispensing disgusting fluids. He seemed fine until we took him to a birthday party on Friday night where he ran around a park, guzzled apple juice, and then unceremoniously hurled all over me. Good times.
I don't know what it is, but our kids have the uncanny knack of only ever getting nauseated on my watch. Oh no, they'll have the sniffles when Sam is around, maybe an ear infection or something any rookie could handle. But the projectile vomiting they save exclusively for me. It is the strangest thing. It's like they save it up, and as soon as Sam heads out the door, their tummies let loose.
It's just really not my favorite thing about parenting. Needless to say, by Sunday afternoon I was feeling a little cagey and ready for a break.
(Now, I better stop and clarify something here. Linc does this to himself. If we did it to him, it would be child abuse. But when he climbs in the dog's crate and insists on shutting himself in, it's not abuse. No, then it's go get your camera time. I thought I should clarify that. I am an obnoxiously claustrophobic person and would never shove a baby in a tiny space for a picture. But, if he's going to do it to himself and scream when I try to take him out because there's not enough air in that tiny space, then we might as well get photographic gold out of it is all I'm saying.)
Anyway, as I mentioned, it was a traumatic weekend. On Sunday afternoon, before Sam had to go to work and leave me alone in the house of digestive horrors again, I ran away for a few hours. This parenting/working/keeping a marriage alive/keeping a house from falling down around your ears stuff is hard. I couldn’t wait to get in the car and get away from there for a while. And then, I sat in the car and cried against the steering wheel because I felt guilty for leaving.
It will not surprise anyone who knows me well that when I had a little time to myself, I spent it shopping. I walked through the store and tried to enjoy not having anyone tug on my pants chanting, “Mom mom mom mom mom” without shutting up long enough for me to answer. I touched shirts that had never been vomited on. I tried on shoes that had never stepped in presents left by adorable puppies who happen to be about 93% house trained (which is close, but unlike the horseshoes and hand grenades thing, not quite as effective bottom-of-the-shoe-wise as 100% trained). I called Sam and cried over the phone that I was sorry I was such a jerk that I had to get away before I lost my mind, but I just had to go somewhere that didn’t smell like a sick room for a little while. He told me to stop feeling guilty and enjoy myself.
When I came home (with the perfect pair of boots for fall, but that’s a story for another day), Sam was on his hands and knees scrubbing the floor. At first I thought someone else had erupted and he was mopping up the carnage, but it turns out he was just cleaning as a gift to me. The floor was shiny, the kids were asleep, the dogs were playing outside, and just like that I was transformed from crazed nurse-slash-janitor back into the partially sane, generally peaceful gal I usually am.
By the evening, Linc was pretty much back to his old self, too. We put on a musical and he sat next to me on the couch, alternating between smiling at the show and ordering me to “Wawdat!” (watch that) while pointing up at the TV. When a new song began, he would gasp excitedly and look at me with wide eyes, then smack my leg, point to the screen, and remind me to “Wawdat.” I tried to get him to dance with, but he wasn’t quite up for that yet so I just sat with him and pulled him onto my lap. I could feel that he’d lost noticeable weight from being sick. Whenever I got too involved in studying him, staring at his little hands or putting my nose in his clean hair, Linc would grab my cheek and point my face to the TV. “Wawdat.” We are watching a movie, mom. Pay attention.
I went to bed feeling transformed. Who knows if it was the sickness passing, the support from my dear husband, the retail therapy, or the movie date with Lincoln that did it. Or perhaps it was all of the above. Did I mention this parental juggling act is hard? Sometimes you have to admit you’re in over your head. Some days I realize anew that I will never have a really clean house from top to bottom all at the same time. From time to time, I will get vomit in my hair. At least once a month, I will have a day where I feel like I am the bug and the whole world is one big windshield screaming towards me.
But those same ties that leave me feeling caged in and needing to break free some days are the ones that make me feel safe and found and protected all the other moments. That’s what this weekend reminded me. Even when my family makes me want to pull out my hair in frustration, they are the ones I want to comfort me and make it all better. Sometimes I need to step away to see it, true, and a little shopping does always clear my head, but in the end, nothing heals me like coming home. It may be dirty and stink of little boys and half trained dogs, but this crazy 90 mile an hour windshield is where I belong, after all.
And now, because it's stuck in my head, I offer you the Mary Chapin Carpenter version of "The Bug." I tried to share the Dire Straits version, but I just couldn't do it. I'm not that cool/too cool depending on how you look at it...
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