(This photo has nothing to do with the frogs in the title of this post. This is Tink and Pan on Halloween.)
I haven’t updated the blog in a while. I hate to disappoint my many followers. All six of you. So, I’m posting again, but as my blog is not enormously well read, it’s going to be like in The Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe, when Lucy comes running up to everyone going “I’m back! I’m okay!” except no time passed for anyone else and they hadn’t even noticed and she gets this confused look and goes “But...I’ve been gone for hours.” Yeah, that’s me. Returning to my blog. Here’s why I’ve been gone and you’ve all lost sleep worrying about me:
I returned to work full time. That’s all. Rest easy, good people. I knew returning to full-time would knock me on my ba-donk-a-donk—now that we’ve got the two girls and all—so I just decided to give myself a break on all the extra things I do and focus on the necessities (like remembering to eat) till I got the hang of it all. So, I started back on site, full-time, in late September, and I’ve spent the weeks since adapting to the cardio regimen of getting two small children out the door in the mornings. Steve and I work together (we write for an instructional design company), but he leaves earlier to get to work at 7 a.m. and I drive the girls and get myself to work by 8 a.m. Theoretically.
Since returning to work, I have had one of those life opportunities to notice how very little I am capable of handling on my own. Thankfully, there are some truly great people in my life who take extra good care of me.
The one who usually ends up with the delightful job of talking me down off the ledge is my husband. He has also taken on the duty of waking, feeding, and dressing Anna before school. Depending on her mood upon waking, Anna will spend her mornings doing alternating impressions of Shirley Temple on crack, Garfield on Nyquil, and Naomi Campbell when she’s particularly disappointed with the kitchen help. He knew this and applied for the job anyway. I do love that man.
Also, my parents and sisters take good care of me by gently replying to my constant texting and taking my calls at all hours of the day. They tell me they love me all the time and it makes me feel all warm and fuzzy. (Chenille bathrobe fuzzy, not legs-in-the-winter fuzzy.)
Then, there are the lovely ladies who care for my children. Mrs. Jenny and her family take care of Maria for us in the mornings. My heart grows big like the Grinch’s after Christmas came without packages, boxes, or bags when I think about her and her amazing family. And, Anna’s teacher is also on our side. She is always reminding Anna that she doesn’t have to know how to do it all perfectly yet. And that it’s okay to ask for help. I have no idea where Anna learned to try to control everything.
Finally, there’s Nonie. Nonie is Steve’s mom and she picks up both girls and keeps them every afternoon. We don’t know what we’d do without Nonie. She takes care of all of us.
I’ll finish by offering proof of how it took less than one day for me to realize I couldn’t do all of this on my own. The night before my first day back at work, I was determined to have every bless-ed thing go perfectly, blast-it-all. I packed lunches, backpacks, diaper bags, and purses. I filled sippy cups and water bottles. I planned and assembled dinner a day in advance. I checked homework, emails, and the gas gauge. The ship was going to sail on time, or I was going to go down with it. Actually, everything did go extremely well most of the morning. I could tell I was on edge, tunneling my vision on getting out…that…door…on…time, but I was managing to keep it together. That is, until we went out to get in the car.
While buckling Maria into her seat I noticed a tree frog had scooted up into the door frame of the car right above her head. I scooped him into my hands, but he spike-hopped right into the car and disappeared into the abyss of junk that collects on the floor. Then, I look up and there was another frog on the door frame! Looking back on this moment, I realize God was just trying to show me early that I was going to have to ask for help. One mini-plague was really all it took to trip the wire.
I started frantically swiping at the second frog, while simultaneously skittering around and raging “Frogs? Are you kidding me? On my first day back at work? FROGS?” Anna thought all of this was hysterically funny, so she started chanting too: “Frogs? Are you kidding me? Frogs?” I managed to grab the second one and deposit it on the ground. The other one was still hiding in the sink hole of back-seat rubbish. I delicately got out a baby-wipe to rid my hands of tree-frog gunk, and then did breathing exercises before climbing into the car to explain to the excitable five-year-old that we would be driving to school with a tree frog somewhere near her feet. I remembered to pray a little after we pulled out of the driveway, which I’m guessing is the only reason I didn’t spontaneously combust when our little stowaway hopped up onto Anna’s backpack. Suffice it to say, there was some screaming. It wasn't me. Probably. I stopped the car and somehow managed to get the poor frog out the window. So, for the second time that morning, I wiped my hands with baby wipes, except that by then my nerves were so frazzled I couldn’t really feel my hands.
Thankfully, this was one time I actually got it. I just got it. Since starting back to work, I have unclenched my teeth, pried my white-knuckled hands off of the proverbial steering wheel, and stopped breathing shallow caged-animal breaths. Instead, the plan is to just keep thanking everyone.
So, thank you, God, for staffing up on guardian angels at the Samaha house. Thank you, husband, for jumping in to help even when you have to dodge the fiery laser beams shooting from your crazy wife’s eyes to do it. Thank you, Mrs. Jenny, for teaching Maria to fold her hands to pray over her itty bitty toddler food. Thank you, Mrs. Clark, for teaching Anna the snack-time chant, “You get what you get and you don’t fuss a bit.” Thank you, Nonie, for coming out of retirement to help us raise the girls. And thank you, parents and sisters, for being worth your weight in psychiatrists. And thank you for reading my silly little blog.
