A Day in the Life

Subtitled: Dragon (on the) Fly

Springtime in Minnesota lends itself to a certain spontaneity, none of which usually involves schoolwork in the traditional (read: pencil & paper) sense. Yesterday was one such day—a day in which the sun shone, the temperatures soared and the reluctance to do one’s duty increased in direct proportion to the heat.

One cannot plan for such a day. One must simply let it happen.

And so it did.

Yesterday.

All day.

Like this:

Wake up. Drink coffee. Read blogs. Pray. Notice for the first time all week that it is the feast of St. George…today. Because St. George is the patron of both your father and your son, you feel a strong sense of obligation (read: guilt) to make a dragon cake. Even though you have no eggs. Or icing. Or candy slices for the claws. Or…you get the picture.

Plan an impromptu trip to the grocers.

Eat a large, happy breakfast of scrambled eggs and sour cream muffins (this would be why you ran out of eggs) with your large, happy gang. Notice the sun streaming in the windows. Notice the birds at the feeders and the squirrels leaping from tree to tree. Feel like…procrastinating.

Notice the three little girls ignoring their breakfast cleanup in order to slip out the back door. Listen to the happy squeals coming from the tire swing. Feel permissive.

Notice the dog ignoring basically every household rule in order to slip out the garage door and run wild. Listen to the frantic squeals coming from the son who accidentally let the dog out. Feel annoyed.

Find the dog. Regain your sanity.

Find a wood tick on your daughter. Freak out. Call your sister (who is older, wiser and who lives on a farm) for advice. Listen to her freak out for five minutes. Call your doctor.

Find three wood ticks on the dog. Begin to really regret that day trip to the forests of Wisconsin. Entertain thoughts of vomiting. Deal with the problem instead.

Notice by now that the boys have joined their sisters in the backyard. They are all wearing swimsuits. They have super soakers. They are not doing their math. Feel permissive.

Keep planning that impromptu trip to the grocers.

Pack the kids up (ignoring the fact that they are super soaked) and take them to the grocers. Ignore the fact that there are shelves & shelves of brand new super soakers. Get what you need for that dragon cake and go.

Make your cake with the help of the big kids. Notice the time. Remember choir. Freak out.

Load cake, kids, dog and camera into the van. Careen down the highway to your destination—the church—where you can apologize to God for your careening while your children sing (like the angels they almost were) up in the choir loft.

Remember your homeschool co-op meeting that is to take place at church that evening. Freak out. Call your husband to have him meet you.

Send the lot of them—dads, dogs, daughters, cameras, the whole kit and caboodle—over to a friend’s to eat cake while you attend your meeting. Ask your husband to take a photo or two of the cake (because of course you haven’t). Sit quietly at your meeting and listen to the board members discuss the brand new bylaws. Think of that cake.

Go home. Clean up the monumental mess left by the cake prep. Be joined by your happy, laughing family members an hour and a half later–cakeless but sated.

Find more ticks on the dog.

Find no photos of the cake on the camera. Scratch that. Find one–an afterthought on the part of your busy husband–taken after the cake had been half eaten and from across the room. It looked more like a dragon fly than a dragon.

Sigh. Forgive your husband (the next day).

Go to bed.

The end.

Ad Jesum per Mariam,