So after yesterday's morning of fun, I hightailed it home and got down to the business of being a housewife and mother--I blogged, what else? After finishing that, as part of my new insane, get fit fast program, I logged 7 miles with my good friend Leslie Sansone. By the time I had completed all the items on my To Do list: read, sleep, eat, I had 15 minutes of wiggle room before heading out the door to rescue Vaughn from his Hellhole (the YMCA) to prepare snacks, don a pair of capris and flip-flops, and grab the keys. The keys…the keys…THE KEYS!!! WHERE ARE THE KEYS? They are not in their proper place--I should say the designated key spot where they’re usually about 65% of the time. I glance at the clock and see I’ve got a few spare minutes. I haven’t been wandering much of the house today, so I go to the few spaces I have inhabited over the last 6 hours. Nothing. That’s okay. I know we have spare keys, but… they are also not in their designated spot. I know…I’ll call Dave. I’m sure he can enlighten me as to where the spare keys might be, which, helpfully, he did--one pair was conveniently located in the pocket of a jacket he had left down at his mom’s house at the beach, and the other pair was equally conveniently located in his work van, which was currently clear across town. Great! I spend a few minutes going through my fastest methods of transportation, biking, but then I would have to get out the Gator and wrestle with it for who knows how long, getting Vaughn’s bike connected to it, and then slog his bike 3-1/2 miles behind mine. I could skate, but it’s all uphill. Why oh why did we have to put him in a charter school? Why couldn’t we have put him in the perfectly adequate public school a few blocks away? Was it really so important that he learn to read and write?
I rushed around to change clothes, putting on my blister prevention socks, my well broken in tennis shoes, exercise pants and cami and grab my Ipod. Since I hadn’t walked the dog yet, I figured I’d take her along as well, because I’m that kind of 21st century multi-tasking kind of mom. Even in a crisis, I’m thinking, "Now, is there any possible way I could run an errand while putting out this fire?"
As I'm walk-jogging my way there, I try calling the school because for some godforsaken reason we don’t have the Y’s direct phone number written down anywhere, but the school didn’t answer. I figured it was probably just a matter of time before the Y called me, and sure enough, 15 minutes out the door, they did. I can hear Vaughn wailing in the background, while Ms. Shark proceeds to state the obvious: Vaughn was crying and she had tried to reassure him I was in traffic and that I was on my way but… I managed to pant out that I had “car trouble,” and I was hurrying as fast as I could walk and would be there in another 20 minutes or so (thinking I was probably underestimating a tad).
I cranked up my hyper booty shaking tunes and walked my Donque off. Poe’s poop reflex kicked in once we were well on our way past any public trashcans, so I had the pleasure of whiffing her neatly scooped poop perfume all the way there.
Thirty minutes later--Ms. Shark asked where did my car break down? Way off in Gresham? And I explained that my “car trouble” was in not being able to locate the keys to operate it. To top all this off, as Vaughn and I are walking out the door, with me still huffing, all stinky and dripping sweat, we pass Teacher Hottie in the hall, with me deftly tucking my head further under the bill of my hat, issuing a brief grunted greeting and hurrying past, pretending I’m Vaughn’s unkempt babysitter.
As we make our long journey home, I’m deriving no small amount of amusement from the fact that to the friendly waving neighbors we pass I appear to be a fitness conscious mommy, environmentally aware, all granola nutty, who conscientiously walks my child to and from school every day. Little do they know I’m just an absent minded slacker mom. Of course this pretty picture is somewhat marred by the fact that it appears I am dragging Vaughn along behind me (hard to believe this is the same child that at 3 years old walked all the way up to the top of Multnomah Falls, some 1.5 miles both ways), while I’m limping along, teetering on the outer edges of my feet to avoid the jolts of pain elicited with each step that are emanating from the rapidly mysterious formation of blisters on the soles of my feet. So much for blister preventing socks. In their defense, it could have something to do with the fact that it is entirely unnatural for human feet to trek 14 miles in one day, and also, since my pedicure, I have been religiously slathering my feet with lotion at night in an effort to keep the calluses at bay. I am now going to start walking on gravel so I don’t have to suffer from this affliction again.
One and a half hours, 1 billion “are we almost home yets,” 2 monstrous blisters, and a downpour of rain later, oh, and another poop stop where I had to use one of Vaughn’s snack bags because I had run out of the proper poop scoops, we arrive home.
Shortly, after we arrived home, so did Dave and quickly found the keys, lodged between the desk and the wall, right behind the designated key spot on the desk. I knew I should have pulled the desk out, but I was, ironically, just too in a hurry and, frankly, too lazy to take the time.
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