Brian uttered that phrase to me once after I cried, “I don’t know what’s wrong with me.”
I used to think Seasonal Affective Disorder was silly nonsense. I never would have claimed out loud that I suffered from it. But it’s been many years now of getting flat out depressed by the middle of Winter, and also noticing what a huge difference a day of sun makes. Also, Dr. Robinson told me it’s real. So, I’m saying it out loud now- I have the SAD.
Here in the beginning of March, when the grey weather has been upon us for so many months and I know we’ve got nothing but more of it on order, I need to find ways to cheer up. So I’m making a list:
Things that make me smile right now:
-Corbin probably allowed me close to 6 hours of sleep last night (albeit interrupted), which is a welcome change from the 2-3 hours I’d gotten the last couple of nights.
-Lola convinced me to let her come grocery shopping with me yesterday evening (*see note below), AND she was a very good girl, and it all seemed to be caused by the fact that she was suddenly excited to buy some “alphabeto soup.” That’s what she calls it, “alphabeto soup,” and I have no idea what prompted this sudden obsession. To my knowledge, she’s never had any, and I doubt she’ll even like it. (also funny: she calls pizza bagels “pizza donuts” and fish sticks “fresh sticks” and asks if I’m going to “cool them off with my cooldown button,” not sure what that’s about.)
-Speaking of cute things Lola says, she has finally started giving names to her toys and stuff when we ask. Last night she was burping her baby doll while I burped Corbin, and I asked her what her baby’s name was. “Chocolata.” Let’s hope for her future kids’ sakes that she doesn’t fall TOO in love with that, um… delicious moniker.
-Speaking of that baby doll, I love when she plays with her babies. Lola’s not HUGE into her baby dolls, but I just love it when she carries that thing all over the house. Something about a little kid carrying a baby doll all over by its foot, it’s such a quintessential image of childhood.
-That little blonde boy hair! (again, yes, its just so yellow and it grows sideways in the very front and oh! so cute! Lola’s was long and thick and black, so that’s why this is so fascinating to me.)
-The way Corbin smiles at his Big Sister. Oh, and the hysterical wide-eyed face he makes when I sneeze while he’s nursing; it’s so funny.
-I love to overhear Lola playing with her toys. She now makes them interact and talk to each other and they have little conversations where the little plastic birds discuss their mutual thirst and then the princess pours them some wemmomade. Warms my heart.
-I finally got my pictures! These ones:
*OMG, let me tell you about that grocery trip! I was so sick all day, and it kept getting later and later. And finally I was able to get to the store (we were SERIOUSLY out of groceries), and if I hurry, I can get home in enough time to make dinner. Then Lola throws a fit that she wants to go with, even though she’s not dressed AND she’s awful to grocery shop with.
So, I get her dressed, we get to the store, she INSISTS that we need to use the giant cart with the big seat in back that I hate. Fine. But we get through the first few aisles and our monster cart is making this NOISE. This metallic, loud, dear-God-where’s-the-migrane-medicine-aisle noise. So we go to swap out the carts, but the OTHER giant monster cart with the extra seat is stuck in a mass of carts. So I huff and I puff and I get funny looks for muttering obscenities under my breath and thennnn… we’re off.
Also, just a note on those carts that have seats behind the actual cart part: Put the seatbelt on your kid. Every time I stopped short, or turned in a hurry, Lola went face first into the cart. Woops! Sorry that grocery shopping bruised your face, kid!
So when we FINALLY get our turn at the register (I’ll save the rant on inconsiderate grocery shoppers for another day), I am all happy that I stayed under budget, I give the guy my card and…declined. …WTF!? Crap, it’s March first, my debit card expired today. This store doesn’t take credit, I have approximately 2.78 in cash, and who carries a checkbook these days? I can tell that the poor kid at the checkout is a little worried that I might just start sobbing, as am I.
I have slept 3 hours in the last 36, I am sick, it is late, my house is clear across town, and Brian isn’t answering! And if the muttered obscenities earlier didn’t win me any fans, you can imagine how lovely the scene was when I finally got ahold of Brian and my frustration overcame my ability to NOT loudly cuss like a sailor on my cell phone while my 3 year old deconstructed the bath products aisle.
Brian drove my screaming baby across town to save the day, and we got home in time for me to salvage dinner except, wait, the stuff I bought for a quick dinner is frozen and has to thaw. I fail. McDonald’s it is. Which is fine, because we can now have that stuff TONIGHT. Because yeah, that delightful dinner in Milwaukee I was looking forward to? Nope. Snowstorm.
Sheesh. I think I need another happy list now. It can start with winning the lottery last night. Okay, it was only 3 dollars that Lola and I won on a scratch off ticket that I bought at the grocery store to distract her while we waited for Brian. It’s important to teach these essential life skills at an early age.
StephiCakes 