et cetera, and the line

Item 1-Regarding yesterday's brief post: The backhoe, and by backhoe, I mean The Best Birthday Present Ever Effing Backhoe is not put together. The scoop part is attached to the body. But thanks to a certain three year-old, who happens to LOVE to work and to help, a part found itself missing. After looking for the part for two hours, and enlisting the help of The Mister's Parents, we came to the conclusion that we had lost two hours of our lives that we will never get back. That's SIX HOURS of lifetime wasted. And one plastic part that walks free. Bastard part.

But the best/worst part of the Bastard Part Story? The Mister came home, read the wordless directions (and please don't even get me started on the whole Wordless Directions Thing), and determined that the Six Hours Of Wasted Lifetime Bastard Part was? Cosmetic. Only. Not. Necessary.

Pardon me for a minute whilst I go bash my head on the nearest wall...

That's better, thankyouverymuch.

I possibly will maybe put the rest of the Thing together this afternoon. Possibly maybe not.

Item 2-Regarding the Alcohol In My Life and On My Blog: There is more alcohol on my blog than in my life. My first pregnancy pretty much ruined alcohol for me, and since I've been knocked and/or nursing continuously since September, 2004, I joke about drinking. Let's pause whilst I do the math to inform you of the number of years, days, and months since my body has been The Mister's my own.

Three years and ten months.

Forty-six months.

Two hundred seven weeks.

One thousand, three hundred eighty days.

Thirty-three thousand, one hundred twenty hours.

One million, nine hundred eighty-seven thousand, two hundred minutes.

Approximately. Because who's counting?

Aaaaaaaanyway.

When I drink (infrequently), I enjoy Guinness, Yuengling Porter, or Maker's Mark Whiskey. In small quantities, and not consumed with the intention of cultivating a buzz or being drunk. There is a family history of alcoholism on both sides of my family, and while I am adopted, the environmental factors of growing up with alcoholics make just as much of an impact as the genetic factors. I am too smart for that. Now. I am too smart for that now.

And really, caffeine is my Legal Addictive Stimulant of choice. I foshizzle do not need any depressants in my life. Moving on.

Item 3-Regarding The Line, and My Distance From It: There are days. We all have had them, when we wake up and the world feels more like a golf ball than a big ol' planet, and there's not enought space and not enough patience and not enough room to breathe or think or step back from The Line. And nobody can say the right thing. Nobody behaves properly. Nobody listens. And maybe there's a book that Somebody left sitting on the kitchen table, for the 657,984,321,897th time, and maybe the book gets picked up and thrown at the wall. And maybe the dishes don't fit real nice-like in the dishwasher, and the little bowl-separator thingy that can be moved for convenience's sake will not stay in place, and maybe instead of acting like a sane person, the bowls get slammed around in the dishwasher whilst the bowl-slammer shouts made-up curse words at nobody in particular. And maybe Somebody left a half-eaten apple sitting on the purple velvet sofa, and refused to put said half-eaten apple in the compost bin, or the filthy shirt in the washer. And maybe Somebody else refuses to clean up theirveryown mess, or put theirveryown laundry away, or won't stop. Won't stop doing what? It doesn't matter. They just won't stop.

And instead of The Line appearing in its normal state, a four-foot wide banner of red, with STOP!!! painted in humongo black letters, again and again down the length of it, The Line is a tightrope. It is the tightrope on which I am riding a unicycle, with my children and my husband wrestling together on my head, whilst I juggle lit sticks of dynamite thrown to me by clowns.

And that, people, is really bad news, because I couldn't ride a unicycle on the ground. And if my family were actually standing on my head, my neck would be broken instantly. And juggling? ANY juggling? Forget about it. And don't get me started on clowns, either.

I have not been observing The Line today. I called a couple people to come over, help me pull it together, and I think they thought I was kidding. So I'm here, in my house, with my sweet children. Sweet, possibly frightened children who are pretty much convinced their mommy's a nutjob.

And I feel like shit about it. I know how to be the better parent. I know how to act like an adult. I am not making excuses for myself; I was not able to do those things today. Physically, mentally, completely unable.

I love my home, my husband, my kids, but it's all so messy, and the mess is making me nuts. I am crap at organizing, and everyone in my house refuses to get rid of anything, and we still have stuff that belonged to The Mister's Grandparents that was here when we moved in. Stuff that hasn't been touched in years.

I really hate it here sometimes. Really, really. There is chaos everywhere I look. I folded and put away laundry for two hours today, and you'd never know by the way it looks. I can't even take care of the laundry, let alone the bag of LoopLoops HB spilled on the living room rug.

I don't have a good closing for this, a happy ending, or any ending for that matter. I'm going outside. To sit in my garden, where there is no chaos. And I am not going to listen to the team of voices on The Other Side Of The Line, urging me to fail again.