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Had a realization about him today . . .All of this time I thought that he had yellow water wings on. Today, upon closer examination I have realized that it is a yellow Hawaiian shirt!
I used to think that the Arby's logo was a pile of roast beef. It's really a cowboy hat.
You know – everyone is saying that today’s thirties are yesterdays twenties. Thirty is the new twenty. I guess that means that people in their thirties are way cooler than they’ve ever been.
I remember looking at people who were in their thirties as past their prime. Back in the day, they wore Dockers with braided belts and white cross trainers or Timberland shoes. The mark of the late eighties and early nineties . . . at least here in Utah.
Now I find myself in the same fashion, yearning for the styles of the mid to late nineties. Wasn’t that nice when I could wear big pants hanging off my back end with flips and great t-shirts. Fashion these days has gone the more high maintenance route. Bejeweled halter tops, spiky heels that you can barely walk in – jeans that hug your A – in short, things are tighter all the way around.
This doesn’t work for me so much . . . I’m approaching thirty . . . 2 pregnancies and 2 c-sections leave me with a bit of an a**-back (my favorite phrase) and it seems that the doctors didn’t connect the dots that well when they sewed me back up after the c-sections. It seems a bit lopsided truthfully.
Admittedly, I am caught wearing things that are a bit behind today’s fashions. I find myself relating to the crowd that I scorned in my yester-years. After all . . . they were only a few years older than me . . . But I see how it happens. I look at the people just 5 years younger than I am – and darn – they are way hipper than I am. And yes Erin, my Nike’s were bought in 2002 not 1994!
My 10-year reunion is next weekend. Now I know – some who may read this entry will for good reason think that I’m pathetic. I’m only 28(.7) for heavens sake! Thirty isn’t even old, I don’t even think 40 is old, and 50 these days is a lot different than it was when I was little. Most people around the country haven’t even started their childbearing years by my age –
But at 28.7 years of age I'm having lots of realizations about aging, maintenance, and hipness. I have rarely worn make up in my life- even on my wedding day- I wore Chap Stick and mascara and that was it. I find myself interested in the stuff these days- but afraid of it. I don’t know how it all works really. This lovely little headshot you see placed to the side of me. Well, we had someone there to put make-up on us. I couldn’t wash it off fast enough. All of this maintenance type stuff is just that . . . maintenance. Stuff I have to do in some sort of daily routine that you end up relying on. Tasks seem to keep getting more complicated but they are becoming necessary. I may be throwing in the towel.
The bottom line is . . . I found grey hair – not just one – several, scattered through my blonde (darkening to brown with twists of grey) head of hair- wiry, silvery, nasty little grey hairs. It’s as if it happened overnight, and that they are filling in quickly. My dad started going grey in his mid-twenties, but isn’t that nice that when men go grey, they get that handsome George Clooney, Richard Gere look to them (like my dad). For me, the grey hair was just a big reminder that after all I am not immortal, I’m getting old, I’m not that fashionable, and I’ll keep getting older. I remember my parents 30th birthdays – the black balloons, the R.I.P. markers that my mom set out all over the house. And here I am – plucking the grey hairs from my head.
Literally as I am typing this, someone forwarded me a column to consider for TodaysMama.com – I read the title, and it seemed quite timely for my entry today “Youth is but a memory for this Mom” www.jellymom.com - Her latest column details her youth seeking exploits on amusement park rides with her kids. And I just came back from jumping on a rope swing in the mountains with my 4 year old to make myself feel better! But I'll tell you what makes everything all better . . . he tells me "Mama, you're beautiful!". Totally unsolicated. Just because I'm his Mama. If I have to get old and grey to have experiences like that - keep bringing it!
So – there is a place, that some days, you allow yourself to take the children. Against all thoughts of filth, enclosed spaces, food that I loathe (but sometimes want to eat) – You all know where I’m talking about – it’s the McDonald’s play land – The lazy mom’s choice for an afternoon of play. The kids are totally enclosed in slides and nets- and all I have to do is sit back, and eat the remnants of their happy meals. It’s better than ordering my own meal though right? Half of the McFats and McOils going into my body?
Every time I go there, I (or my children) seem to have some sort of altercation. Yesterday my 4-year old apparently pushed a 2-year old out of his way . . . his mom came and told me. My two year old snuck a chicken nugget into the playland . . . the other 2 year old’s mom came and told me.
So when it came time to leave - my 2-year old decided it was a game. “Come and get me mommy!” in a high pitched squeal. She knew what she was doing. I knew what she was doing. And I wasn’t about to do it. I sent my 4 year old out to the car with the friends we came with and I hit behind the corner of the play land. I sat for 10 minutes waiting for her to realize she had been left. She was of course the only child left in the whole playland area. But she didn’t care. She sat perched at the very highest point of the playland. Continuing to giggle by herself – calling “Mommy, come and get me”.
I threw in the towel. I went back and tried to reason with her, bribed her, tempted her, scorned her, threatened again to leave . . . The last thing I wanted to do was climb up that nasty tube to the very top and retrieve her.
Well – I did. And it was nasty. And I hated it. And I tossed her down the slide when I got to the top. I emerged from McDonald’s an angry, defeated woman. I said a few choice words to myself as I took of my flips and threw my purse on the ground to enter the tunnel. But I did it. And as far as I know, I did not wake up with any diseases.
As I drove home, I remembered an email my college room mate sent me, that comforted me in my McTribulation and cheered me up a bit:
“Let's see... (This is supposed to evoke laughter. No pity, please.) This was yesterday. First of all, I spent the morning in the ER because, as you all know, Sarah had broken her leg the night before. (She now has a hot pink cast up to her hip that seems to weigh 50 pounds.) So the ER is never pleasant. In the afternoon, I decided Sam deserved to go the McDonald's playland since he had been so good in the hospital all morning. We get there and within the first five minutes, Sam wets his pants at the top of the really long slide. He came down to me (sliding his urine-soaked pants down the slide) to "show" me and, of course, all of the other parents (seriously, sopping wet pants and socks). As they make a mad dash for their children, screaming, "Stay away from that boy and anywhere he has been!", I go straight to the elderly employee supervising the playland and inform her that she must somehow climb to the top of the massive playground built for kids to clean up a huge puddle of pee. I then carry him through the restaraunt where people are trying to eat their food and outside to the car where I had a change of clothes. We get him all changed but we did have to buy a pair of socks from McDonalds. They have a stocking feet rule. So then he goes on his merry way. He's having a good time when all of a sudden I hear a child, my child, screaming out in pain. It's Sam, who somehow hurt his lip which is now bleeding profusely all over his face. I pick him up, pawning Sarah off to some nice mother, and try to comfort him and calm him. Everybody is watching us, of course, because it looks like a good cut. (It wasn't anything. He just has a sore on his lip today.) His screaming continues for several minutes. I cannot whisk him outside because he doesn't have his shoes on and he doesn't want to leave, so I don't want to upset him further. After several eternities, much screaming, and lots of blood, I had us all ready to leave. We were making our way to the garbage can to throw away our stuff when I knocked over a full cup orange soda!! Are you serious?! Yes, I am serious. I did. So on my way out, I politely say good-bye to the kind employee and, oh yeah, by the way, I spilled some orange soda all over the floor. You might want to clean that up.
So do I win for "Worst Day"??”
One word . . .
McHell!
