The
“polar vortex” or whatever descended on the Willamette Valley
this week. This thrilled a great many people, who broke out their
skis, snowboards, sleds, and cardboard boxes that usually only get
used up on the mountains….where all this white stuff belongs.
Getting home on Thursday night was a bit tricky, but I managed. It
was Friday that taught me that my whole be an independent, do
everything myself single mom was a laughable idea. It took me almost
an hour to put my chains on, that I’d picked up for free at a yard
sale over a year ago and never bothered to try on. They fit. But not
really. In the course of dropping Kade off with Corey, picking up a
coworker, and getting to work, I had to stop about 10 times to fix
the chains. On the way up a hill to work, I discovered that I have a
rear wheel drive vehicle, so putting chains on the front wheels did
diddly squat in terms of traction. We fishtailed and barely made it
up the last hill over the railroad tracks, me cursing the whole time.
I’m pretty sure my coworker, who is the only one to really show
friendliness, thinks I’m just a bit deranged, and it’s doubtful
she’ll ask for any more rides.
I
was hoping to make it most of the day, since we hadn’t gotten to
work til after 9, but by 2 it became obvious that snow was seriously
starting to come down. I went out at my break to switch the chains to
my rear wheels. After an hour of cursing and getting my jeans wet and
my hands frozen as the snow kept falling thicker and thicker, and
even with the head maintenance guy’s help, I gave up and did the
only smart thing of the day; I called my mom to come pick my sorry
ass up with her 4x4 Jeep.
The
kicker is, she didn’t have to put the Jeep in 4low until much
later. But she came to the rescue, including kid, very happy dog, and
their friend and current roommate who is also a veteran of snow
climes. He tried to get my car up the hill out of work; he ended up
resting it against the guard rail instead. My mom tried, still no go.
We had given up and were going to leave my car at work after a few
donuts that made Kade deliriously happy, when the snow plow showed up
and graveled the hill so mom could power up it. She still got stuck
in the left hand turn lane at the top of the hill, so I had to get
out and push. That was one bright spot, being that my car is light
enough to be pushed. Oh goody. Finally, after a stop to grab a
hardened bag of cement and a little bit more pushing and thanking my
past self for keeping my priceless Muck boots, we got my car home and
in the driveway, where I promptly ignored it for the entire weekend.
It’s not my cars fault it’s not a Subaru or a shiny red Jeep, and
360 days out of the year she’s perfectly serviceable. I couldn’t
even get out of the driveway yesterday without my neighbors help, and
to top it all off, I spilled my morning milk protein drink all over
the floor of my car.
As
if that wasn’t lovely enough on top of being three hours late due
to late arrival at day care, my car wouldn’t start yesterday
morning. Heaved the kid into the car, buckled him in, stuck my bags
in the front seat, turned the key. Nada. Tried again. Nada. Not even
a tick tick
tick of
the engine at least trying to turn over. Realized, in a huge fit of
mommy brain last night, I had left my lights on. And I no longer have
jumper cables, and neither do any of my neighbors. The only bright
spot in all this is that my tax money came in last night (Thank you
Feds!) so while I’m still poor, I can at least pay for certain
things, like hauling my car in to get fixed and running for another
year, and a cab ride to work. But it did mean that, for the third
time in a week, I had to be rescued by my parents, and I was late for
work.
At
the bottom of things, I wasn’t mad or disgruntled at the snow and
ice itself, although that was part of it. I ran away from Vermont,
back to where things are more temperate, and here comes plenty of
miserable white stuff to remind me how much fun it is to live with it
every day, as if to mock my vague dreams of settling east of the
Cascades someday. It was more my ongoing failure to figure things out
for myself, to manage what life threw at me.
This
is an ongoing theme this year. First I jumped into a seasonal job
with no clear exit strategy, and spent a month scrambling on
unemployment, dreams full of the worst that could happen. Now that I
have a job again, other things are starting to stumble, mostly
keeping my budgets to match my bills. It’s not so much that I don’t
have the money (although that will be a concern until I get a few
more raises and get better at putting some away for a rainy day, say
when the car won’t start), it’s more been a struggle to switch
from being paid weekly to being paid twice a month. Kade’s birthday
party is this weekend, and a ton of people have already RSVP’d, and
I’m in the middle of a pay period. If it wasn’t for tax money,
Kade’s party would be awful lean.
Aside
from the money part of it, I was hugely stressing myself out on the
expectations I’d placed on myself, with help from Pinterest, to
have Kade’s party be cute and far more organized than I’m capable
of at the moment. I needed a theme, games to play, a cute piñata, a
schedule, artsy home cooked food….and all by Saturday morning. I
hate planning parties, because I’m not that organized and I always
feel slightly weird and awkward inviting people over, always sure
somewhere deep down that no one will come and I’ll be there with a
nice spread and no people. And that might be the case if it was just
me people were dealing with. Added to the stress over the snow and my
car and the sheer effort involved in my normally short and painless
commute, I believed the world was out to eat me.
But
even at all of three years old, Kade makes up where I lack, mainly in
the charming and personable department. He’s a golden, flirty, fat
cheeked, beautiful child. He draws people in with easy chatter in
that piping, little boy voice, waving around whatever
truck/car/monster truck he’s carting around that day, spinning
fantastic stories about his day and driving a bus to the moon or
flying a green airplane up to the mountains to go skiing. He bounces
back admirably from any injury, he’s almost always willing to go
along with whatever you are doing, and for the most part he’s easy
to redirect. He hands out hugs like he’s throwing candy at a
parade, throws himself at people to kiss them when he’s having a
good day, and waves his hands like he’s conducting an orchestra
when he counts. He draws people in, charms them, and raises the
estrogen level in any room he enters. I’ve had a ton of RSVP, not
for me so much, but for this golden child and, I suspect, a certain
level of free food and cake.
It
was Corey, as always, who drew my expectations and lowered my stress
levels back down to normal levels. This is not my mom’s gift, who
is famously blunt. Sometimes that’s what needed, when I need a kick
in the ass to kick start my laziness or overwhelming ostrich
avoidance tendencies. But that’s not what I needed this week, and
Corey recognized this. She pointed out that the kid is only three,
and really all that is required is easy to eat food, a big cake, and
a bat to swing at the piñata. As long as candy falls out, kids will
be happy, and if kids are happy and entertained, so will adults be.
Just because I want to be all artsty and cute doesn’t mean that’s
what people expect, especially because it’s never been my strong
suit.
With
all this in mind, I’ve lowered my expectations (and therefore my
to-do list between now and Saturday morning) considerably. Most of
the list consists of cleaning my house and fixing my car so I don’t
have to worry every morning about getting to work. Instead of
stressing over Saturday, once I get my house clean and smelling like
I do bake my own bread and cookies every night, I’m actually
looking forward to having people come over and watch as they get
wrapped around the Wild Blonde Rumpus’s fat toddler fingers.
