One of Those Days

I always have such mixed feelings at back-to-school time, but yesterday, I wanted them all to go back to school NOW! It was one of those days. You know the ones. The days when you feel like you'd like to run off and join the circus, or at least sell most of your children to one.

It started off quite harmless. The girls even let me sleep in and got their own breakfast. But then, I explained to them that they needed to clean their rooms and take a shower. I might as well have told them they were going to have to scrub a garbage truck and go swimming with sharks. It was an all-out fit festival around here. One was slamming doors and making brilliant statements like 'That is the stupidest idea ever' and 'Well, I'm not doing that idiotic plan.' One was screaming 'That's not fair! I showered yesterday. I didn't make the mess!' And the third? She was in a puddle on the floor sobbing uncontrollably.

Being the fair mother that I am, I told them that none of them needed to torture themselves by following my plan. That is, unless they wanted to eat dinner and go to the school open house. Then the plan was a requirement. That didn't go over too well.

There followed several hours of crying, screaming, sobbing, and stomping, peppered with actual cleaning and dressing. To say they wasted time complaining is a gross understatement. The actual time spent working was about 30 minutes, yet it took them half of the day to accomplish the unfair tasks. I'm such a slave driver. If only I had stopped there.

My second faux pas was to insist they wear actual clean clothing to the school open house. Being the unsound and totally ridiculous person that I am, I reasoned that being showered and wearing clean clothes was the best way to appear to meet your teacher and fellow classmates. Apparently I've got it all wrong. Especially since I didn't realize that stained cut-offs were the only pants the twins have that match.

You see, Sleeping Beauty and Snow White are in the same class this year, and wanted to match exactly the first time they met their classmates. I really should have known this since they have worn the same thing to school since...ummm...NEVER!!! So now it's my fault I haven't bought them matching shirts and pants. (Except for one shirt that is "really stupid and ugly.") i.e.:(Yes, those are hideous. I can't believe I didn't notice before.)

Anyway, so there were more tears and puddles of unruly children on the floor for the hour before we left to the school. They finally settled on similar shirts of different color but I was in no way relieved from my position as the most stupid, shortsighted member of the family. Because, after all, they did not really match and it was all my fault. And then I did one more terrible, horrible, no good, very bad thing: made Cinderella go to piano lessons. She says she only went because she has exactly six dollars in her wallet, and I told her that for every book that wasn't with her in the car and at her lesson she would owe me two dollars. Three books=$6. She wanted to keep her money. So, she "miraculously" found the books and got in the van, murmuring the whole way about how terrible I was and unfair her life was. Poor thing. If only she could have NO extra opportunities for personal development.

So, that's pretty much how mean and horrible I was to my children yesterday. But don't worry, they were more mean and horrible back, so I've apparently earned what I deserve. And while I haven't run off to join the circus yet, if the school district decides to not start school tomorrow, then you can definitely find me at the next Big Top coming to your town. I'll be the one with gray hair and bags under my eyes.