Woe

I'm tired. I worked all day yesterday, worked a recital last night. Had to stop by Wal-Mart to get some stuff to make brownies for Jacelyn's school festival today. When I was getting out of the car at the store I saw another school mom leaving. She stopped and said hello; I asked her what she was doing and she said, "Getting crap to make brownies". Mmm-hmm. Yep. I felt her pain. And today, I work, and then tonight I am on the cleanup crew at school. 6:45 until whenever. Sigh. I have earned a peaceful, lazy mother's day. At least there will be beer tonight. Ostensibly for the runners at the 5K, but also for the cleanup crew.

Brian is in town. Or at least, he better be by now. He promised Jacelyn he would take her to her school for the festival today, and she has been so excited about it. He was supposed to come in late last night, and when I got up this morning and discovered he wasn't there yet, I was livid. It was 6:30 AM, and I was tired and cranky. I noticed he wasn't in bed, and then started checking out the other places in the house he likes to sleep. Every empty couch and bed just made me angrier. I called his cell phone and left a message, a not-very-nice message, about doing what he says he is going to do, about not disappointing his daughter, about having the courtesy to call someone, anyone. I shouldn't make any pre-coffee phone calls, I'm just too much of a grumpy bear first thing in the morning.

He called back about twenty minutes later, understandably on the defensive. I told him if he's too tired to drive, that's fine, please don't drive if he's too tired, but call somebody. He answered mysteriously, "But I don't know that I'm going to sleep; it just happens". Doesn't he have to sit or lay down first? And if he sits or lays down and realizes he feels sleepy, couldn't he call? Or does he just collapse on the floor? I asked him that, and he did not appreciate the sarcasm. I'm the one that has to make alternate arrangements, all before work, if he doesn't show up. What if his mother hadn't been home? Michelle and Joe are visiting family, they weren't available to watch Jacelyn. I don't want him to make the trip if he's sleepy, but he could make a phone call. Enough of that.

Yesterday Jacelyn's class had a mother's day tea. At 8AM all of us mothers (and a couple of grandmothers) dutifully lined up outside their classroom, waiting for them to let us in. The door opened and our sweet little children walked us to our seat (their tiny chair at their tiny table - very amusing). We had a menu (marvelous muffins, delightful doughnuts, terrific tea, outrageous orange juice, very cute), and we placed our order with our kid, who then brought us our food and drink choices. After snacks, the class performed some musical numbers, complete with dancing. We got a gift (a collage'd doorknob hanger) and one of those silhouette cutout things. It was very, very cute and lots of fun. I possibly made arrangements for Jacelyn to take ballet next school year with a friend from her class, made tentative plans to meet one of the moms for coffee when the new coffee place on Navy Blvd. opens, and joked about Jacelyn's banged-up head with the PE teacher, whose son is also in Jacelyn's class. She fell on the wooden steps at the playground Thursday and has an enormous goose-egg on her forehead and a faint black eye. The teacher was telling me how thick Jacelyn's incident file is (way thicker than anyone else's), and the PE teacher told Jacelyn she was going to check the playground equipment for dents. There were some helmet jokes, too. All in good fun, and Jacelyn has a good sense of humor about it. "I just fall down sometimes" she would explain. Poor baby. The Tucker genetics strike again.

The school year is winding down. Jacelyn has a field trip this Thursday, something on base involving the Blue Angels. The following week they have Field Day on Thursday, and then Friday is the last day of school. Yikes! Her first year of school will be behind her. Holy mackerel, I can't believe it. Then on to K5, which she is terribly excited about. K5 students get 15 minutes of homework every night except Friday, and she is terribly excited about that, too. I will have to remind her of that later, when she hates homework. She says she needs a desk in her room, so she will have a place to do her homework. She's a funny girl.

That's about it. Brian may be back before Jacelyn starts school again, which I am terribly excited about. In some ways. Mostly in the not-living-with-my-in-laws-anymore way. We've been discussing housing - rent or buy? We settled on rent. For a myriad of reasons, we are not ready to buy right now. House or apartment? HOUSE. He was seriously looking at apartments, but I think I have him talked out of it. I'll keep you posted.