Cranky Pity Parties

I'm cranky today, and my husband says its never a good idea to blog when I'm cranky. The oh-so-unreliable filter between my brain and my mouth...err...fingers...slips off entirely when I'm channeling Oscar the Grouch.

The pity party started early. I rolled out of bed with my muscles screaming at me that I worked TOO hard yesterday. (Apparently yard work uses different muscles than any of my workout videos...Oh, who the heck am I kidding? Those workout videos have been using the muscles it takes me to DUST them for at least a month, and that's it) I shuffled into the kitchen, started the coffee...and then noticed the laundry basket sitting in the hall, reminding me that I had started on that particularly distasteful project but hadn't finished it, and if I put it off any longer, I wouldn't have any jeans to wear.

The gathering of the rest of the laundry inspired further fuming (which was kicked off when I bent down to pick up some random socks, dropped in the floor by a blond little boy, and my back yelled and my legs howled and my arms screeched) followed by teeth grinding and silent ranting at the injustice of my whole entire LIFE. (Don't judge me, this was all pre-7 a.m. and pre-coffee.)

By the time my husband walked by me into the laundry room to snag one of his clean, wrinkle-free dress shirts from the hanger...I had only finished half of my first cup of coffee, and it had yet to calm my morning grouchiness.

"Man, it must be nice to just ALWAYS have clean clothes to wear when you need them, without having to wash them yourself," I muttered. "And food to eat when you're hungry, and a clean toilet to sit your butt on, and a hall to walk down without wading through toys or sticking to the crap spilled on the floor."

He walked past me with an indulgent smile, and wisely retreated to the other end of the house, not to be seen again until enough time had passed for the caffeine to begin soaking into my blood.

But this is a valid point of self-pity/woe-is-me syndrome. No one ever opens their underwear drawer and thinks "I love my mom for always washing my Superhero boxers for me." And no one walks into the kitchen, looking for a drink, and thanks me for washing all the cups for them, or going to the store to buy the juice they are pouring into the clean cups. And no one wonders how there is plenty of toilet paper on the holder, or how their beds magically go from messy to neatly smoothed, or how the pantry is stocked with their favorite kinds of cereal.

And none of my kids, while searching for which cartoon to watch, stop and think "I'm so glad my mom taught me how to read so I can know which show is which."

Motherhood is a largely thankless job.

One thing it will do is BEAT the selfishness out of you, that's for sure.

When I ask the kids to help me clean up a certain mess, one of them will inevitably say "But I am not the one who made this mess," to which I will reply (in carefully measured tones that do not give away the full weight of my desire to SMACK them on top of their blond heads) "Well, do you know how many dishes I wash that I haven't dirtied? Or how many loads of laundry? Or how may toilets? Clean this up because you LOVE me, and want to help me." ("And because if you don't I'm gonna knock you into next week" ...usually the brain-to-mouth filter catches that part...usually)

So, you get it, the day started grumpy. Two cups of coffee later, it was still a bit of a grouch-fest. And the kids are SO READY for summer break that school time was equally grumpy for them and for me. (Because, after coffee, my best defense against being grouchy is TWIZZLERS, and we are out!)

To add insult to injury, I was moving a wooden shelf, and got a REALLY big splinter. It might be the largest splinter I've ever had. I pulled it out, but a sliver of it remained in my thumb, and I had to wait for it to stop bleeding profusely so I could stab a needle into the giant hole and dig out the rest of it.

Holy STUPID, that hurt.

So now I only have nine functional fingers, ZERO fully functioning muscles, 2 loads of laundry that need to be folded, one load that needs to be dried, and two loads still waiting to wash. Supper needs to be cooked, and my workout videos need to be dusted.

Poor, poor, pitiful me.

Except for one thing. Earlier today, for absolutely no reason whatsoever, all four of my children crowded around me and said "Group hug!" And suddenly I was squeezed on all sides by their little arms. And their sweet little heads were resting against my side, and my hip, and my back, and my legs.

And it turns out motherhood isn't so thankless after all.

I'm pretty sure the Lord put them up to that. He knows just the right buttons to push.

There's a verse I walk past on my wall every day, and today I stopped for a second and read it.

"If anyone is thirsty, let him (or her) come to Me and I will give them something to drink." (John 7:37)

So, the laundry will have to wait, and the supper, and the dusting, because I am THIRSTY, and I know where I will get something to drink...its at His feet.