I have always had a challenge with getting myself ready on time to leave so that I won’t be late upon arrival. I am not often a late person but the whole “get up really early and do what you have to” never worked well for me. Instead, as much as I hated being frazzled, I seemed to excel with the whole concept of getting up too late, getting sidetracked by something shiny, jumping in and out of the shower, cursing my very thick hair for taking so long to dry, pulling on pants while shoving a bagel down my throat, and then running out the door with a cloud of debris flying behind me. Still, I was usually at least on time, if not early.

Then I had kids and oh my lord. Time shifts in strange ways when you have kids.

Tonight Hayley had a soccer practice. Not only did I want to get there early (practice was for 7 pm but I wanted to be there by 6:45 if possible), I couldn’t be late because the coach was expecting me to assist (hence, “assistant coach”) him with the practice since it tends to be a bit more chaotic than a game is seeing as how all the girls are out on the field at once.

I started off well. I pre-heated our little grill at just a little past 5 pm. By 5:30 or so we had all eaten our burgers and salads, and I was feeling ahead of my game. After all, I had already reconciled with myself that there was no way I was going to deal with dishes (besides, there weren’t that many, just a few plates and cups and I never do the grill until it’s soaked overnight anyway), so I figured, hey! I have over an hour before we have to leave!

And it went downhill from there. First I decided to check my email since I’m waiting on something for work-related blogging. There was nothing in my inbox about that but I did somehow end up reading about ten blog updates. Oops. Then I realized that although I had packed the diaper bag for Breanna, I had neglected to put any actual wipes in, which would be bad, as I learned the last time I did that.

I rushed to find some cloth wipes, stuck them in the bag, and yay, diaper bag was done! And oh hey, speaking of diapers and wipes, maybe I should change the one she’s currently in, yes. No Breanna, please come back here, it’s not bath time, come put this fresh diaper on! With much wrestling, I managed to get her changed. Whew!

Except, wait, now I had to fill the water bottle up so I had something to drink since the temperature outside was approximately 8000 degrees plus humidity. I did that and even remembered to actually put it in the cooler section of the diaper bag – go me, there is nothing worse than sweating profusely in a park and realizing your water is at home on the counter!

Still doing okay, it was just a little before 6 pm so we still had lots of time. Wait, Hayley can’t play soccer with her hair blowing in her eyes. Cue brushing of hair which still brings about lots of whining and bitching even though the few knots are NOTHING like they used to be. I got her hair into cute pigtails but realized that they were totally uneven. I may let a lot of things slide – a LOT – but I’m a bit anal about even hair so I had to redo them.

I realized it was now almost ten past six and I started to hyperventilate a bit and was really relieved to see that George was getting ready now too. I may or may not have freaked out a bit about how no one can ever just leave me alone for two goddamn seconds and you know, I signed on to be a mom but I’m still a human being too and is it really too much to ask for just a moment in my entire life to force my really old contact lenses into my eyes and where the friggin’ hell are my tweezers now since taking my glasses off made me realize there is some serious pluckin’ that needs doing oh my GOD you people must think I’m just Robot Mommy and I don’t ever want to look half decent myself doesn’t anyone give a rat’s ass about me, Jesus Christ leave me alone and PLEASE could I just pee without someone trying to see what I’m doing?!

Oh. Sorry. Right.

So anyway, after my little meltdown – which I will deny ever happened – I managed to squeeze dry, old contacts onto my eyeballs after a slight mishap with a lens that fell off my finger and disappeared and I nearly cried. Then I decided to hell with the eyebrows – bushy worked really well for Brooke Shields, you know. I managed to pee all.by.myself (almost. I did have a cat try to rub against my legs but The Death Stare made him go away), and I raced out to find it was now 6:30 and we had to leave in five minutes, let’s go!

George went down to put the two carseats in his car since his dad had taken us to a doctor’s appointment earlier this week. Then I realized that I was all alone with two kids who needed to get ready to go out and I hadn’t brushed my teeth yet. Joy! I jammed cleats on Hayley’s feet, running shoes on mine, and then running shoes on Breanna’s. At that point I realized Caillou sneakers and a little pink dress looked goofy and for some strange reason I actually took the time to quickly change her into shorts and a t-shirt. George came in while I was frantically brushing my teeth, incredulous that I wasn’t ready yet and somehow I didn’t stab him in the eye with my toothbrush.

You’d think that’s it but no! I then had to stuff Hayley’s soccer ball back into her bag since she had taken it out, shut the sliding doors so I could set the alarm, and chase the damn cat back into the bathroom before leaving. At that point it was really tempting to just forget it and go take a nap. We raced downstairs, got everyone buckled in, and rushed to the park which is, luckily, only five minutes away by car. We arrived at about 6:50 and I was frustrated to be late.

Until I realized that the coach, who also has two kids, including one on the team, was not even there yet either. And then I decided if HE can be late, I can cut myself some damn slack.

It’s a total miracle that I still had the strength to run up and down the field doing drills with a bunch of 4-6 year old screaming girls.

All I can say is I am REALLY enjoying this beer right here at this moment. Ah, to time, the thing that never stretches enough for any of us!

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