(I’m aware of the misprint in the title- it makes me stabby, but once I publish, I can’t figure out how to change it- so there you go.)

Lately I’ve been desperate. I’ve known it. I’ve felt it creeping up on me, but I avoided it. This weekend it attacked me. I’ve been desperate to speak to someone, face to face, use actually words and not emoticons. I painfully learned that I am out of practice.

There have been some events happening in my life in the last couple of years that are ‘unmentionables’. We have been in a holding pattern just waiting for resolution. They’re heavy, arduous, complicated, and oppressive events where lawyers are involved. They are also apparently never ending. Figuring out how to deal and continuing to hold our heads up, while sending the image that “everything’s fine” to the general public has been as difficult a situation as we’ve ever been put into.

My kids aren’t terminally ill, I’m not going through a divorce, no one in my family has died. I wish there was a support group for it,  but there’s not. It’s something that we have decided and been advised that it’s not appropriate to openly share. Which is fine, except when these things are all you think about that you feel like a volcano about to erupt. The need to talk to someone just to be heard is so strong you can smell it. Anyone. It’s an aching need to share and get a hug and wipe your runny nose on someone’s shoulder.

If I began to open up, I would likely lose control and spew word vomit like a sieve. So I have been avoiding people. I stopped participating in my life. For fear of connecting, sharing, over sharing, and inevitably, regretting. Real life friendships have become distant, faded and under nourished things of the past.

As a result,  I have immersed myself into my online friendships, not that there’s anything wrong with that except it was at the price of isolating myself from the real world. There was a safety net on the screen and in the last years I had fallen into it- gasping for life and reassurance. I felt protected, impervious to fallout. I let it all out. Telling everything. Sharing every struggle. Revealing reasons behind my trepidation.  As I typed, it was like a purge, the tears poured out as the pain of our endeavors ended up in words on the screen and I finally had a release.  It felt good, but it also felt like the only place I could be me- honest and scared and unsure.

In real life, I had to put on the charade, the fake smile, and the insincere small talk. PUKE. If you know me, one thing I am not, is fake.  So my in human flesh relationships took a backseat. I couldn’t take the risk at sitting together and blurting out everything that was going on, so I stayed away. Away from everything. I’ve been isolated. I’ve been lonely.

I’ve been desperate for human interaction. The kind where I can see someone’s eyes and smell what they had for breakfast on their breath.  The kind that can see my eyes welling up from pain and just reaches out to touch my arm in a way that says, I get it, you don’t have to say anymore, stopping me before it got too real.

I’m afraid my kids have paid a price for my self-diagnosed confinement. I’ve not been as willing to meet parents of their friends at school and to open up dialogue as I would like, as I should have. I likely seem cold. It’s my defense. It’s me in lock down mode.

The kids have longed to meet kids in the neighborhood, but they just weren’t to be found. Recently some houses came up for sale in our empty nester subdivision and we’ve been holding our breath, pleading with the Universe that another Ethel and Hank wouldn’t snag it up.

This weekend, a new neighbor came to the door to introduce herself and her daughter. I was ecstatic for my kids, who are close in age to the new kid. But as I spoke in niceties and generalities and basic how do you do’s, I realized I was sorely out of practice of the spoken face to face word. I stumbled over my words, stuttering, not being able to pull the word out of my head that it wanted to say, and incapable of anything larger than 5 letters. Nodding my head, yeah, good, wow came out as stall tactics hoping my mouth would catch up to my brain and I would have some evidence that I had higher than a fourth grade education. It never did.

You know when a waitress brings you your food and says “enjoy” and your attempt at being cordial by saying “you too” comes back immediately to bite you in the ass as it dawns on you, shit, she’s not eating, I sounded like an idiot!

Well, that.

As I spoke to the new neighbor, we discovered that she also had a son in my daughter’s class. I asked her if she knew the boy named Liam? My daughter said, “yes, but I feel sorry for him because he’s in a wheelchair.”

Uncomfortable face to face talk just got a little more so.

I glanced at the mom, “Oh, is he?” Thinking, my daughter MUST have the wrong person, the mother confirmed that he was indeed in a wheelchair and explained he was born with Spina Bifida.  I said, “oh good.”

Yes, I did.  Sweat puddles under my arms every time I  recount the scenario.

In my head, I was thinking, oh good, she has the right kid, she does know him. Out loud, it sounded course and insensitive, oh good, your kid has a debilitating disease, I’m an asshole.

My dad had a similar thing happen at my father in law’s funeral. As he went to give his condolences to my mother in law, she said “thanks for coming.” His natural, trying to be kind response came out, “I wouldn’t have missed it for the world.”

We all shared in a good laugh over his flub so I’m hoping she realizes I’m just an emotional wreck and really only carry conversations with a 10 month old on a daily basis and that we’ll laugh about this someday. But today, I’m still just an insensitive asshole.

I belonged to a mommy group for exactly two weeks. It was twelve years ago and my daughter was a few months old. One of my neighbors  had just had her first baby and belonged to a group that she invited me to join. She thought we could bond as new, unsure, sleep deprived women looking for an outlet to share poop consistencies and complaints about how little our husbands helped out. I was game. There was just one problem… I wasn’t a new, unsure mother.

I also had a four year old. A four year old that had already trained me in being a mom. We had already been through potty training, trips to the emergency room to get a bee bee out of his ear and learned that pennies don’t go into electrical sockets.  He had already taught me that he knew the smell of fear and I shouldn’t doubt myself as a mother. I  already had my on the job training, but here I was, dragging a four year old to a play date with a room of moms staring at their babies that would just lay there while they question their every breath, grasp, and movement made, while rolling their eyes at the energy, non-stop car sound effects and incessant answerless questions from my son.

It was then that I realized I was at a different place than those mothers and maybe that wasn’t the group for me. My experiences were so different than theirs, at that time.  The next week cemented my suspicions when they did crafts and one woman shared a horrendous recipe for Turkey Tetrazzini- I knew I was out.

I’m going through a similar mothering identity crisis right now. I’m torn between being a mom to a baby that is into everything while  my house is barricaded with baby gates and being a mom helping a boy get ready for his college entrance exam.  It’s a weird juxtaposition that always has me doubting myself.

I remember being the mom to babies and toddlers and being able to envelope my life in cartoons, tummy time, and being preschool helper. Things were easier then. I knew who I was supposed to be as a mom. Then as they got older, I adjusted. I got good at telling them to do their homework, clean their rooms, and get their asses back to bed. It was easier when they were at similar ages. Now the spread is becoming too wide and it’s hard to find my place as an appropriate mom without over-stepping or not doing enough.

Throwing a baby into the mix has confused my role. I can’t just drown myself in his baby-ness. It’ s difficult to be a room mom for my other kids since I can’t bring the baby. I’m needed to be a mom in so many different ways to different phases and moods- MY GOD- THE MOODS.

My sixteen year old bought his first car last week. Incidentally, on the exact same day that my 10 month old took his first step. It’s hard for me to keep up and understand exactly what kind of mom I’m supposed to be when my 12 year old is begging for a Facebook page as I’m nursing the baby.

I’ve got a six year old that wants my undivided attention when telling me a story about Wyatt farting in class today- the same story she told me an hour ago. Then I have a 16 year old that would prefer I wear an invisible cloak and only speak when spoken to (which pretty much is only to tell him what’s for dinner.) My ten year old hates me one day and the next, wants to tell me each detail about the anatomy of the shark that she learned about on Animal Planet.

Though I should be able to bond with other moms with babies, I just can’t. My head is in ten other different places. I feel, once again, like I am in a different place than many moms. One second needing to mother one child more, and the next,  needing to pull back from another.  It’s a balancing game that I’m not always sure I’m getting right.

I go through weird phases of what I put out here in cyberspace. I used to be funny. I know. I had a hard time believing it too, but I looked back, and it’s true.  I have had moments of sharing way too much information. Then there’s the times when I’ve been vulnerable or nostalgic or poetic. I don’t know where any of it comes from or what predicts what I’m able to spew. All I know is that it’s all honest and comes from me authentically and sincerely.

Lately, more often than not, I’m quiet. I am cautious of what I share. Discreet. Afraid of being judged. Weighed down by a lot, most not things that can be shared, which makes my story and my unpredictable moods explainable, to me, but no one else. I share stuff from the surface. I wish I didn’t give a shit, but I do.

I write what I know. But when all I know becomes stuff that can’t be shared, this place gets pretty damn boring and you get a bunch of woe is me, I’m depressed, but I won’t tell you why or any details cryptic crap. I apologize for that.

At my other writing gig, however, I have put myself out there recently. I had deadlines and the desire to share real issues. The audience there is different than here. More broad, less people related to me read it and thus, no one worried about sparing my feelings on subjects that might be sensitive to me.  I shared some things about me, not knowing how they would be received. Some people understood, some agreed, and some, flat out, disagreed and weren’t afraid to say it.  I learned my skin isn’t as thick as I would like to think it was. I felt attacked and wrong for feeling the way I do. As light as it may have seem to some, it shut me up for a while.

I vowed to never speak my mind again and stick to superficial, non-offensive recipe posts. Just one problem. I was left with an empty feeling. Feeling like what I was doing was thoughtless and boring. Like I wasn’t really contributing anything worthwhile.

I don’t write to pay the bills (though that would be nice). I don’t write to please others (though that would be nice, too.) I write to clear my head, to organize my thoughts, to tell my story, and MAYBE reach one other person dealing with similar feelings, concerns or fears. It truly is a therapy for me. It helps when someone gets it and makes you feel less alone and less crazy.

Though it does hurt when people don’t get where you’re coming from or jump on their soapbox to tell you how you’re screwing everything up,  I think that sting is less than just being quiet and not speaking at all.

I plucked a grey (or is it gray?) hair from my eyebrow this morning. I’m pretty sure this is the portion of life when I’m supposed to start looking for a cherry red sport’s car, looking into plastic surgery and having an affair with someone slightly older than my son. But those things sound like they take lots of energy, energy that I don’t have.

I feel old and drained, but in a chasing a baby around and waking up at the crack of dawn to clean up puke from a sick kid kind of way, not in an arthritic, backache, fart when I walk without realizing it or caring kind of way.

My brain still feels young, albeit in an immature kind of way. I dress (probably) inappropriately for a women in her late thirties with five kids; I live in cut-offs sweats and old ratty concert t-shirts. I cannot wear black without getting bleach on it and cannot wear white without spilling something directly onto my boobs. My ringtone is Cee Lo Green’s Uncensored “Fuck You”.  I always get honked at in the carpool lane because I’m busy texting or playing games on my phone while blasting Nirvana. When I get my haircut, I always request “funky” and warn the stylist if it resembles a “mommy” or a poofy blow out that women get on Saturday mornings and keep for a week, I will be back for them to redo it.  I’ve been known to drink milk directly out of the jug and I hide chocolate from my kids. I laugh until I pee watching Tosh.0 and I use the word “dude” to preface far too many sentences.

I’m also fighting looking old like it’s my job. I have tried pretty much every wrinkle remedy known to Walgreen’s (ps- none of them work) and I may pluck transient grey hairs that pop up in my hairline from time to time and be in complete denial that I’m going grey.

I don’t try to not act my age, I just do what comes naturally. Though I’ll admit my interests might be slightly juvenile, I’m glad that I don’t feel drawn to join a water aerobics class or play Canasta or go and mall walk at 6am. But it does get me wondering, is there an age that I should be acting? Am I soon going to have expectations set on me because of my age? Will my cussing out the guy that cuts me off at a stoplight be frowned upon?

I will be turning 39 in less than a month. I’m torn about how I feel about that. Should I feel different than I did when I turned 29 or 36 or 38? Because I really don’t.  Except when I turned 38 , I was gestating a baby and dealing with hemorrhoids so my ass feels different. In a good way.

So it’s been a while since I posted because, really, it’s hard to post after suicide and boo hoo and admission that I’m all CooKoo for Cocoa Puffs and especially if that next thing you say is remotely upbeat because then you’re all, whoa, we’re on an upswing in our mania, aren’t we? And I didn’t want that kind of judgement or to have to write such a rambling run-on sentence like that, but there it is.

To catch up, this is going to be a rambling random post. Consider yourself warned.

Sunday, I went to a a funeral. It was my stepdad’s brother in law. His wife died a few months ago.  They were both 57 and had fought cancer for the last several years. It’s a horrifying thought, but they made peace with it, if that’s possible. They kept their wits about them. They often had bets going on who would be the first to go and laughed until the end of their lives, knowing they couldn’t change the outcome.

In February, he was told he had about a month left, if he was lucky. A hospice nurse moved in to care for him and he started planning his own funeral. He called my husband and asked him to be a pallbearer. NOT really a question that you can say no to, right?In the last month he had to make some changes since, sadly, his wife, had gotten an infection and unexpectedly “beat him to the punch”.  The story of their love and life together was forefront and gut wrenching.

The funeral was nice, if there’s such a thing. All of the words spoken were dictated by him and the people reading the words were hand picked to relay those words and thoughts. It was very personal and he had his favorite cake served at the end to every person in attendance.

The opening song was “How Great Thou Art”. His name was Art. I laughed. I was the only one. He meant that to be funny, right? I fail at funerals.

I brought my son to the doctor today for his 9 month check- up. Apparently his testicles aren’t descending, to which I say, “huh?” The doctor didn’t seemed concerned, but when I told my husband he told me that our old neighbor had that, to which I said, “huh?”

First, they look normal to me, but how am I supposed to parent those kind of parts when I don’t have them? And balls? Are just gross and weird and prune like, it just all freaks me out. So maybe I avoided them and just made sure there wasn’t poop on them and moved on to playing with his toes- a nice universal body part that I know how they’re supposed to look and function!

Also, yes, apparently my husband had some quite in depth conversations with the 50 year old single man that we used to live next door to. I’m puzzled still.

Next, I’m OBSESSED with this guy.

CLICK THIS TO READ THE AD FROM MY NEW FRIEND

I read the ad no less that 20 times and smiled each time and can literally hear how his voice sounds (I imagine a hybrid of Sean Penn in  Fast Times at Ridgemont High and Kristen Chenowith). I e-mailed him. I believed in Santa Claus until I was 13. I’m a believer. I’m going to hope that he is a real authentic person that probably wears Birkenstocks and smells of Patchouli oil and has sausage breath from the Beef Jerky.  I can’t offer him a place to live, but I want to be his friend and follow him on Twitter (you know, today’s version of being his pen pal.)

Last week, I went to a social media event. It was a big step for me. All the putting on pants and such. It was the first time my husband was left with the kids- all of them- since the baby’s been born. Leaving them and letting go of control AND being around people that expected me to speak in full sentences was very overwhelming, I’m not going to lie. Luckily, social media is still a relatively small market in St. Louis, so it was a small group of people and my anxiety attack and sweat stains weren’t that noticeable.

It was nice to be around other women that have friends in the computer. It was important to be reminded that sometimes I want to take this seriously and be around other women that do, in fact, make their living out of social media and the Internet. It made me realize that I need to start having direction. If this post is any indication, I have not yet found that direction, but I’m hoping I’ll figure it out soon. baby steps.

Stay tuned.

I don’t think it’s obvious if you meet me. I can hold it together long enough to hold a conversation and maybe even look you in the eye. I am able to put on a bra and wear shoes that match. Usually. I don’t talk to myself much and only hear voices in my head occasionally. If you saw me in the carpool lane, you wouldn’t think I look different. You wouldn’t feel sorry for me. You wouldn’t assume that I was counting the days until I can refill my Xanax prescription.

You’d think I was normal.

I think I am normal. Sadly, my normal is slightly askewed. I just happen to be genetically predisposed to be a hot mess. Depression, anxiety, suicide- it’s all around me, and to me, that’s normal.

I’ve not minced words about my depression. I have it. It’s well documented on this here blog and on my therapist’s notepad. Read the archives, I’m a fucking downer. I have good days, I have bad days. I have days when I feel like I won’t make it another day, where I just can barely hold my head up. Those days scare me.

In the last ten years, my family has buried two members who have taken their own lives. My aunt shot herself in the head and my young cousin hanged himself.  It’s painfully graphic and caustic. Their methods were messy, disheveled, and devastating, much like their perceptions of their lives through their own eyes.

Their actions were selfish and brought on an everlasting, brutal pain to their survivors that they probably couldn’t comprehend. I know this, but I don’t judge them for that because I know the conflict too well.

I hate that I empathize with them. I understand the despair they felt in their last moments and what lead them to that place. I hate that I sometimes feel like I’m in a hole similar to the one that they were in. I hate that my mom has had to arduously tough love me into “shutting the fuck up” when things have gotten that bad.

The stigma that goes along with mental illness, medication and therapy is what killed them: the censorship, the weakness, the failure of being stable and having to hide from it. The mindset that no visible open sores means no pain. The loss of dignity that comes with vulnerability. The sheer ignorance of the magnitude of this disease and society’s expectations were all deadly.

I suffer just like them. The difference is, I don’t suffer in silence. I put it all out there- hey look at me, I’m nuts.  So judge me, if you like. I’m batshit crazy, but I’m alive and fighting the good fight.

My struggle to lose weight is no secret. I can (and do) come up with tons of excuses. Currently in use: I’m nursing a baby that still wakes up in the middle of the night to eat and my foot hurts. So I’m ravenous and tired. Lame, I know, but it gets me through.

My husband and I have been through ups and downs with our weight together. Both of us were thin until our 20’s, so our love for good foods and a slower metabolism has been a shock to our systems (and egos). About ten years ago we went to a nutritionist and got down to our goal weights together. We were both really happy with ourselves, but then life happened and we ate our stress and our bodies didn’t stand the test of time.

I have always been the one that had the will power and that could eat right and consistently work out and get back (or close to) where I felt good. I was where he strived to be. Sometimes he was on board with me, but usually he was too tired to work out or was sneaking a Snickers or McDonald’s while at work. He could just never get to that mind set of consistent healthy living. He would get very frustrated and often wanted to try fly by night diets and easy cures (by the way, if you have swampland to sell in Florida, HE’S your man!)

The last three weeks, we’ve switched roles. He’s been eating salads, working out, and losing weight. He’s been feeling more energetic and overall been in a better mood. While I, feel like I’ve been left behind. As much as I would like to get on board and try, my body (and mind) seems to be holding me back. I’m tired, always hungry and cranky. My days are all running together and foggy, just getting done what needs to be done to get to the next.

While I’m happy for him and his new outlook, I’m jealous. I’m jealous of his progress, his energy, his goddamn cheerful attitude when he pulls in his belt another notch. I envy at his satisfaction with lettuce and cucumbers. And OHMYGOD if he comes downstairs and announces a couple more pounds down again, I will shove the scale down his throat.

Though he is mostly supportive and understanding of why I have been unable to jump in with him in his new and improved lifestyle, I feel like he’s secretly judging the way I’m living, my food choices, my lack of movement, and I get it, I did the same when the tables were turned.

I would always try to encourage him to get off his butt and come running with me and to not even buy the gallon of ice cream, because we both knew he would eat it all. I knew he was unhappy and I knew that, as hard as it was to get moving and eat better, it paid off and he wouldn’t regret it. But he was never patient long enough to see results and, in turn, would revert to bad habits.

And now, I’m a total hypocrite watching as he gets to a good place while I just feel like I’m sinking into the bad.

I know that men lose weight differently, but it’s always been an odd consolation to me that he struggled as much as I did. He wasn’t your typical man that could stop drinking soda for a week and drop 20 lbs.  Not that I wished bad for him, but misery likes company, and I feel all alone now.

When I was younger, I didn’t think I’d ever have kids. I didn’t really want them. They were usually sticky and loud and smelled funny.  In 1994 that plan was shot and I since figured out that your OWN kids aren’t nearly as bad as other people’s.  You mold them the way you like and you get used to the smell.

Same thing goes for pets.

Three years ago, if you told me I’d have a dog that followed me everywhere, slept at my feet every night and chewed my dirty underwear like it was a delicacy, I’d puke and then ask you for a hit of the crack you were smoking. I don’t like dogs. That was always my stance. They shed and are dirty. They stink and bark (kinda like the kids. What can I say? I have sensory issues. And OCD.)

Just over three years ago, as well as I trained my kids to understand that mom does not like dogs or vacuuming, they begged and begged for one.  I researched dogs and pretty much figured the only kind I could contend with was a cartoon dog and, apparently, they, are not real.

Then, my kids took out the big guns. Their piggy banks. “Here’s $300 of our OWN money, mom, please can we have a dog?” Seriously. What kind of cold-hearted OCD bitch says no to that?

NOT me.

I was spineless. And besides the few months I spent weeping while house training him and the occasional night when he wakes me at 3AM to go outside so he can bark at a raccoon and the time my daughter almost killed him and he threw up dark chocolate chips (from MY secret stash, no less!) for 6 hours straight, he’s been a really great dog.

When he doesn’t play in the mud or get on the table to eat our leftover pasta.

As much as I can’t believe it, he is a part of our family. From being picked up by his tail by my three year old, to having his hair (lovingly) pulled by the baby, he has never batted an eye. When the baby wakes up at night, Murphy is the first one at his crib. When the baby cries, Murphy paces the floors like an expectant father.

One of my favorite things to do is to watch them interact. They’re buds. Buds that haven’t quite figured each other out yet, but look out for each other nonetheless and it is,truly,the cutest thing.

Even when I have to pick dog hair off of him and pry the chew toy out of is mouth.

My brain has been scattered. This post is the result.

It’s been painfully hot outside and equally painful inside with five kids that are stir crazy. I think they are looking forward to school starting next week. That was all part of my plan; to make school a better option than summer break- check. My job here is done.

The baby has decided he is not a fan of sleeping through the night anymore. So yay for baby will power. He goes to bed at 9, wakes up at 1 am and then again at 5am. Admitting this is essentially admitting to my failure as the mom of an almost 9 month old baby. It seems that success is gauged on how early and how long your baby sleeps through the night. I suck.

And at these wee hours of the night, when I have to go down the hardwood hallway, I hobble, like a 90 year old woman who has had toes and heels removed. Plantars Fasciitis. It sucks.

I learned the hard way that I have very high arches and can’t wear just ANY shoe to run in (ahem, espescially Saucony, ahem). So for months now I’ve been doing stretches, staying off of it, using inserts, all for naught. Then I read that the worst thing you can do is be barefoot, which is pretty much my foot uniform and maybe why it’s not getting better. But the pain and the grimacing and the feeling of being a big bum had gotten enough… so… I broke down and paid way too much for a pair of Orthopedic flip flops.

I am officially old.

My plan to run in The Race for the Cure 5K was  also curbed by my foot pain. However, I still planned on walking.

I had someone that I went to high school with that was creating a team since she, herself, was a breast cancer survivor. We didn’t really know each other in school, but last year, while planning my class reunion, she volunteered to help. She sent me an apologetic e-mail in June explaining that time had gotten away from her and she was unable to create a team for the race, after all.

Throughout the year of planning the reunion, her cancer had resurfaced. I once even met her at the hospital for a short meeting- before one of my prenatal visits and one of her chemotherapy treatments. She never complained and was very matter of fact about her health declining the week of the reunion. She told me she had a bad reaction to the chemo and her immune system was too compromised to be around all of those people. I felt awful for her that she couldn’t enjoy the night that she helped me put together. She sent me a message the week of telling me that she felt awful that she may not get the Power Point done with all of the class pictures.  She really was selfless and never led on to how dire her situation actually was.

Monday she lost her battle.

It’s very surreal to me. I know cancer is a dick, but frankly, I’ve not been subject to see a lot of its destruction, on a personal level. The fact that she was only 38 is baffling to me.  The fact that there are two little girls that are missing their mom right now breaks my heart. The fact that I still have texts from her on my phone makes me sad. The fact that I bitch about my foot hurting and my perfectly healthy baby not sleeping makes me want punch myself.

Most people enjoy the summer. They look forward to all the activities. Anticipate vacations, cookouts, swimming and not having to deal with waking up the kids for school and homework. Not me.

This summer, with budget cuts what they’ve been around the house, we’ve been extreme home bodies. My husband works nights and, thus, sleeps during the day while I break up fights between each and every one of the big kids like they are on a conveyor belt of arguing. The baby has been cutting teeth and, well, being a baby. Can you see where I’m going with this? It’s not been the greatest of summers.

Waking up the kids for school and listening to them whine about homework is a small price to pay for my sanity during the day. And I’m almost there. This is the last week of having the kids home for the summer. I can almost smell the germs that they’ll be bringing home.

Which means Back to School shopping. Now, I am not one to go buy the kids all new wardrobes for school. I think that’s weird and completely unrealistic. If shoes from last year have holes worn in them (which two of them totally did) it’s their lucky day, but mostly, we buy school supplies because I have yet to figure out a way to get around that.

I lose it this time of year (assuming I ever had “it”). I get anxiety. I write out  lists and try to consolidate all the things we need and get everything in one fell swoop (FYI, that NEVER happens.) One year, I woke up at 5am, with my list in hand and went to Walmart on Saturday morning of the tax exempt weekend. I saved only $8.43 and picked out a lunchbox that my girls hated and had to return them.  My time and energy would have been much better served by staying in bed.

This year I even, for about 5 seconds, thought about trying to do coupons and Extreme Coupon it, but that shit is STUPID and would require going to like 10 different stores, using up all of my ink on my printer and wasting way too much gas just to save .13 on a notebook. That shit is tiring.

So I ventured out the old fashioned way, with all kids in tow and four different lists. I opened up a package of pens so I could use one to mark off as I bought things (I was OBVIOUSLY well prepared). There was a fight over the last package of pink mechanical pencils and me standing firm on NOT buying a Justin Bieber folder. The baby started fussing, so I filled the cart with Pillow Pets and threw him in to play. He chewed off a tag and started gagging on it. I had to reach down his throat and pry it out while the girls started crying that their little brother could have died at Walmart. We weren’t a spectacle at all.

I have a suggestion… teachers that are in charge of making supply lists… go to the store and see if the item you are specifically requesting even EXISTS. 264 tissues? Nope. And stop writing the lists like I know what you’re referring to. Because… I don’t. School box 11X7, no handles? No fucking clue. Or if there is a specialty item that can only be bought at one store, say, Office Max, PLEASE mention that so I don’t go to 6 different stores before discovering graphing composition notebooks.

I made it though and I have everything they need or close enough.  Until they come home on the first day and tell me what I missed.