30DoW - Putting today in a bottle

My energy has been sapped lately, so instead of staying on topic I was going to write about Izzy's time capsule that we've been working on and have every intention of burying sometime this year on our ranch in East Texas.  But I just read Chris' blog and I am actually speechless on the matter. There is nothing I could say that could come even close to what he wrote.  So I will just stand behind that entry and leave it at that.

Instead, I'd like to relay my very eventful day.  Let this be a snapshot that goes into the time capsule, as it were.  For those who haven’t been following along, Izzy and I are staying with my Mom in Baytown, a town east of Houston where I grew up.  My mom and her boyfriend/ex-husband recently moved into an apartment together (much to my chagrin).  She just had what was supposed to be the last of 5 surgeries in a year (she found out yesterday she needed “just one more”), so Izzy and I came down to visit, along with my Aunt and 12-year-old cousin from Mississppi.  This, in addition to my mom’s boyfriend/ex-husband’s 2 grandkids, ages 9 and 13.  Oh, and two small yappy-ass dogs.  It’s an apartment-full to say the very least.

Now let me stop for a second and explain my usual day in Austin.  It always starts early, Izzy makes sure of that.  But if I’m honest, the day doesn’t actually start until around 10am.  That’s when we get out and about to do our activities (library, park, shopping, whatever).  We both eat lunch around noon, take a nap from 2-4:30, dinner at 6:30 and in bed by 8pm.  It’s routine, it’s structured, it’s quiet and more times than not, I’m in control.

Baytown, it should be mentioned, is the exact opposite of Austin.  It’s dirty, there are no trees, everyone is driving leased trucks or SUV’s, people think recycling involves tires only, in fact, the only thing green in this town are the stoplights.   And as it turns out, my visit here is becoming the mirror image of our lives in Austin.

I wake up at 7am to a 69-degree apartment.  There are people everywhere.  Floors, couches, and blowup mattresses.  This morning we went out to the pool for the first time by 10am.  Guns N’ Roses “Appetite for Destruction” was playing (on repeat) for at least 2 hours before we headed back in for lunch.  Making lunch was like an Excedrin commercial.  I was tripping over dogs and kids in the kitchen, the boyfriend/ex-husband was angry that I wasn’t paying enough attention to him, the TV is blaring Paula Dean, we eat and then back out to the pool.  Kids fighting, screaming, running, falling, coughing.  Dinner, rinse, repeat.  We come in for the last time around 9pm.  It’s an assembly line by now.  Pile the swim toys by the door (comprising of 3 large innertubes, 1 small swim ring, 1 pair of floaties, 3 boogie boards and 1 wagon carrying 3 pairs of goggles, 2 snorkels, 2 balls and a Backyardigan figurine), throw the towels and bathing suits over the banister on the patio (at which point my Mom always makes a comment about how the neighbors will judge) and stand in the shower assembly line.  By 10:30 everyone is showered and wanting “snacks”.  Which means more dogs and kids in the kitchen arguing about what everyone else is eating.  Then we watch a movie that everyone talks through until the toddler is curled up in a corner sucking her thumb actually begging for “nite-nite” (the 2 previous attempts do not work due to “snack” sugar highs).  By 2am the apartment finally hears silence.  By now, I have realized that silence is an actual sound.  In fact, after 3 days of the same routine chaos (with 2 more to go), it is the most beautiful sound in the world.

I realized at around 5pm today that I had become delirious.  A trip to the store needed to happen and I was the only one up for the job.  The two older kids wanted to come so we loaded up and went for it.  At one point they started fighting in the store and I lost my temper and yelled like a crazy lady.  I turned and saw myself in the pharmacy mirror and realized I had no makeup on, my clothes were a mess and I was standing in the grocery store at 5pm on a Friday in my hometown.  And I did not give a shit.  It was a major turning point for me.

It’s all been so truly insane, I had to get it all down here.  On the upside, we’ve spent so much time in the pool Izzy has learned to swim in 2 days time (with floaties, of course).  She was timid in the water on Wednesday, but by yesterday evening she figured out that she had better get in the game or she was going to have one lame ass time.  Now she gets “in the loop” of going in on one side of the pool, leisurely swimming through the chaos of kids to the other side, only to do it all again, and again and again (for hours in fact.)  I’ve enjoyed the time spent with my mom and aunt and the kids have been fabulous when they aren’t all arguing about the most mundane bullshit.  I am however now thanking God that I was an only child and have decided to share that gift with Izzy (seriously, I treasure silence far too much to have another child.  I think the decision has finally been made once and for all.)

And once I get back to the calm, green, quiet of Austin I am going to try to never complain again.  I know it’s a stretch, but I’ve never appreciated my life “before” as much as I do now.  I know there’s a lesson in here… I just hope to hell I don’t forget it.