She Comes By It Naturally

The week before the school musical was rough.

I don’t know why the slightest adjustment to our schedule messes me up so much but damn.

A Tuesday (big shocker) evening was stressful from beginning to end. O and I spent about 45 minutes at my mom’s which was the least stressful part of the day. Rain fell and we watched a rainbow appear. It was lovely.

Then…we went home and it all fell apart. We got home around 6:15. Guess who had homework. If you guessed that I was the one who had homework, you’d be right because obviously if O brings home work that has to be turned in the next day, I am basically the one who does it. I’m so over that shit. I actually wrote question marks on two of the questions because they were stupid and I couldn’t figure out how, from the boring-ass article sent home, one would figure out the answer. One such question was something like, “How could the original settles of the near the Indus river have avoided the flooding of their area?”

I mean…? What? They could have maybe, I don’t know, not settled there? What a stupid question.

Ahem.

Part of what annoys the shit out of me during ‘our’ homework time is that the more frustrated I get, the more Olivia acts out. I know she’s responding to me. I know if I’d just calm myself down it would go much more smoothly but the more she acts out, the more irritated I get and it’s just builds until I want to scream.

After the homework fiasco, it was time for Olivia to eat dinner.

You guys….I just don’t know. This child asks for snacks every ten minutes all freaking day long. But the minutes you put food in front of her that is an actually meal, she acts like she’s three years old. She reads and writes and plays with whatever is in front of her but she doesn’t actually EAT HER FREAKING FOOD. She screws around and then complains that the food is cold.

It’s infuriating. She is thirteen years old and has hands that work, why will she NOT pick up a fucking fork and feed herself?

Finally, she was done eating (sort of but whatever) and she and I could go upstairs so she could take a bath.

Please note that nowhere in the above paragraphs do I mentioned eating dinner myself. Oh hell no. I had to pack lunches (mine and Alyssa’s because she’s decided that when she was in fifth grade and wanted so desperately to pack her own lunch that this independence as premature and these days she’s simply too busy and put-upon to pack her own lunch.) while Liv was eating.

The bath took FOREVER but at last, she was clean and hey, would you look at that, she hadn’t flooded the bathroom. I’m calling it a win.

That was our Tuesday evening.

Then...Wednesday at work…OMG.

I go to the post office every single day at 10am.

Except on this day, at 9:22, the owner of the company brought an envelope down to be mailed and mentioned having more and confirming that I usually go at 10am.

I confirmed that I do go at 10 but said (stupidly) that if he needed me to wait a few minutes, I could go a little later than 10.

At 9:57, he came down with one more envelope (how freaking long does it take to write checks is what I want to know?) and said that if I could give him five to ten more minutes he'd have more. Obviously, I said sure because, hello, owner of the company.

I went into the restroom at 10ish.

I came out at a few minutes after 10ish. Still no more mail.

I waited.

And waited.

Suddenly, I realized I’d heard his voice in the conference room, which is around the corner from my desk.

It was 10:15 at this point, almost twenty minutes after he’d asked me if I could give him five or ten more minutes.

I was twiddling my stupid thumbs waiting for mail that obviously wasn’t coming any time soon.

Damn it!

I had a project that I needed to start at 10:30.

I know the post office isn’t going anywhere and it’s open all day but I have a schedule and a routine and I HATE it when it gets messed up.

Obviously, Olivia comes by this naturally.

I finally left for the post office at 10:23, having confirmed that the owner was not, in fact, going to be giving anything else that needed to go out. Actually, though, could you maybe just take these three letters/checks later in the day?

Sure, why not? It’s not like I need to rush home each evening and do homework or anything.

Gah, I’m such a bitch these days.