I'm not fun. Boo.

Maddie said the meanest (most mean??) thing to me a couple of days ago and it's really been bugging me.

She asked when Daddy was coming home. All I could do was feel sorry for myself in that moment. Garret has started some classes for his teaching certification to be completed and works nights one day a week. I'm kinda playing the single Mamma quite a bit these days. I'm not resentful, just busy. Busier.

I, transferring two pans onto the stove while simultaneously making a bottle for the squealing infant and not even looking in her general direction answer, "I dunno, why?" She turns away and rounds the corner with slumped shoulders. "He's just more fun than you. He plays with me.You're so busy all the time."

Ouch. This stings for a variety of reasons.

 A: I'm not sure who this little sass-a-frass thinks she is! Makes my blood boil, the blatant rudeness sometimes. Working on it, DAILY (both my patience with it and her having the fear of the good Lord instilled should it continue...). I mean, I make your meals, buy your clothes, throw you Pinterest-inspired parties, dress you, bathe you, BIRTHED you for the love of all that is Holy and this is the thanks I get? Ungrateful little...not to mention why does Daddy get to be the fun guy?? When did I become the responsibility-laden lame-o?? No fair. I just want the 4 year old to get that I am fun I just have a lot of responsibilities also. If I don't do these things, they won't get done. I'd love nothing more than to play all day but that just isn't realistic....but again, FOUR year old. Guess she has no way of understanding this just yet.

B: I'm a hot mess of a mom, I know this. I have a million things to do at every minute....I work, have two small kids, attempt to be a decent wife, friend, daughter, sister...oh, and somewhere in there, feed my own soul, craft, work-out, have an actual adult conversation and train for the effing Marathon I  agreed to in a moment of  psychotic inspiration (I mean, if a Boston Marathon bombing victim, that lost a LEG can do it, surely I can, right?!).

 And C: I try. I do but it's so hard. It's nearly impossible, to be everything I wish I could be....loving, attentive, patient....I fail miserably so often that when bedtime mercifully arrives I often spend the time I should be using to spend with my husband or doing something {GASP} selfish (my nails haven't seen new polish in weeks and I'm pretty sure I can smell my hair), I  rehash what I did wrong and dealing with that ever-present mom guilt. It sucks. And I feel like I do too.

So, when my beautiful, smart, spirited and busy baby girl says this to me, I feel...defeated. I'm running around in circles (on empty, no less), trying so hard to be everything for everyone and somehow still screwing it up. It's demoralizing and it hurts me to the deepest corners of my heart. My priority, FIRST and foremost is to show these children my abundant love. That involves time spent. Quality, valuable, God-what-I-would-give-for-more, precious time. Hours, heck, minutes I seem to be unable to find.

In this instant, I look at my filthy house, my half-cooked, home-made dinner, my increasingly frustrated baby boy, still waiting for that bottle and my brown eyed, dejected....rejected girl.

I turn it all off. The TV, the stove, my phone. I feed the baby, nuke some Mac And Cheese and Hot dogs, and sit down. We played, we laughed, we hid and sought, we giggled to their favorite book....it was not only what my girl had been inadvertently asking for but exactly what I needed. Need to relax. Need to stop. Need to breathe. Need to say no. Need to do what I had these children to do. Be their Mommy. They don't care if there's a mountain of laundry, unwashed dishes or what the hay the have for dinner (especially the little one....that kid'll eat me out of house and home for sure). They just want my time. That ever-elusive, unattainable thing I never seem to get enough of. But I can put aside the less (if not un)important things until that bedtime again, mercifully arrives.

This time is fleeting, I know. I hear it all the time. I work for a geriatric practice...all I hear is "enjoy every moment, it goes so fast"....I know. Trust me, I know. But some days, you want it to go fast. The whining, talking back, temper tantrum days. Those please just let it be tomorrow days. But we should be able to have those days. Those days where we feel we weren't everything we hoped we would be. The days we made mistakes. I'm trying to forgive myself those days. There is no perfect balance. Some days something just has to be on the back-burner but it will never be my babies. I'm trying to have days I have a little less to forgive myself for. The dishes, laundry, floors won't notice if I'm not present. They will be there tomorrow. They will wait. The loves in my life, of my life, will not. Should not. So I will play. In my dirty house, with unkempt hair and chipped nails rolling around on the filthy floor. It. Can.Wait. And I am fun damnit. Maybe the most awesome Mom ever. Ok,  may be a stretch.