Domestic Psychology | Tag Archive

Missing: one day

// April 29th, 2011 // No Comments » // me

Wednesday was a busy, errand filled day that ended with freaky weather. At a time of night when the children are normally tucked in bed and Doug and I are using Netflix to catch up on something the rest of the world watched a year ago, we were multitasking ourselves to exhaustion. Three children, two adults, two German Shepherds, a cat and a snake were piled in our basement bedroom. We watched cartoons on DVD, listened to the police scanner on a laptop, tweeted, facebooked, ran up and down the stairs for snacks and peeked at the damage outside in between the waves of hail, wind and lightning. I know what I accomplished on Wednesday.

A few hours after we finally got everyone settled, it was time to get up and have a normal Thursday. Instead of spending the morning on dishes and laundry, I stared at images of damage. Instead of getting dressed and running errands, I wandered our street, talking to all my neighbors who were also wandering the street. I managed to do the afternoon school pickups, but I don’t remember how. I know there was a lot of very slow driving past trees that were no longer vertical. There were trees on roads, trees on signs, trees on power lines, trees on houses, trees on cars and trees on lawns.

I don’t know how I managed it, but I lost an entire day. Thursday was spent stumbling about in a brainless, zombie daze. Nothing got done. The lawn is solid leaves and broken branches, but I stared at it instead of cleaning the mess. The cars are pitted and covered in filth, but I didn’t even pick the branches out of the windshield wipers. The roof of the house looks like a forest floor, but I didn’t do anything to make it better. My vegetables and house plants are completely crushed and the flower pots that held them are shattered. I know I need to sort it into compost and trash, but I haven’t.

Our family is unharmed and our damage is minimal, but I lost an entire day on what? I wasn’t pouting or weeping. I was just… nothing. Maybe it was the thoughts of what could have happened that shut my brain down. Those thoughts are too horrible to allow for even a second. Today, I started the cleanup that is going to take forever. I swept the deck and found it covered in hail dimples, like the cars. Then, I sat down and stared blankly. The sound of chainsaws in every direction makes my stomach hurt.

I would have been a terrible pioneer.

Ice, ice bay-bee

// January 13th, 2011 // No Comments » // me, weather

After several days snowed/iced in the house, Sarah and I ventured out to get the stir-crazy children something for dinner that would cheer them up aka Chic-fil-a. When we got in the car that hadn’t been used for days, I had my first wave of regret. The car was covered in two inches of icy snow. After unsuccessfully searching the car for the ice scraper, regret number two rolled over my frozen toes.

I tried scraping the windshield with a piece of cardboard from a notebook, a coloring book and a stack of Legos. The only result was frozen fingers. I texted Doug.
Me: “We have no ice scraper.”
Doug: “Look in the car.”
Me: “I am IN the car and there is no scraper.”
Doug: “Did you look under the seat?”
Me: “No scraper. There is no scraper.”
Doug: “The wiper fluid has anti-freeze. Just squirt it a few times.”

At this point in the story, I will interrupt the texting copy-paste to acknowledge that I can see you shaking your heads in response to this suggestion. I did not shake my head. I squirted wiper fluid even though the blades were frozen to the windshield. With each squirt, a fresh layer of ice glazed over the windshield. It was a lovely, textured ice, but it was the opposite of helpful.
Doug: “You could put the sidewalk de-icer on the windshield.”

This is the part of the story where we sat and stared at the windshield, waiting for the ice to move.
Sarah: “It’s moving!”
Me: “I’ll try the wipers.”
One click of the previously immobile wipers and the tiny de-icer pellets flew in every direction. Sarah screamed at the wipers.
“Stoooop!”

Cold and frustrated, we sat and waited for the car to defrost the ice. It took so long that the neighbor walked her dog, Amy called me whimpering that she was starving, Sarah changed the radio station twice and I mentally composed my response to Doug for his helpful wiper fluid suggestion.

After what felt like forever, we began our journey. I turned out of our cove and the car started to slide . . . backwards. Sarah offered her experienced advice from one year with a driver’s license. “Drive! Just drive!” The fact that the car was in drive, my foot was on the gas and we were sliding backwards as the car decided on its’ own that it wanted to smash into a utility pole didn’t deter Sarah’s insistence that I only needed to drive.

I backed into the cove and went directly to the driveway. Sarah stomped in the house, convinced that I should have tried harder to get out of the cove. I walked in the house and Evan burst into tears at the absence of Chic-fil-a in my hands. Noah mumbled something about not needing to eat dinner as he drooped out of the room and I made a desperate phone call to Doug.

“Even though they have eaten eleven small meals and seven between meal snacks, the children are starving and may call DCS to report me for child neglect if they don’t get Chic-fil-a tonight.” Doug brought home Chic-fil-a and was the most popular person in the world. His celebrity status lasted until a half an hour after our friend drove Tommy home from the movies. “Doug? I’m stuck in your cove.”

Dear Knox County Schools,

// January 5th, 2011 // 1 Comment » // school

I don’t feel any stronger about school being cancelled than I do about school being open. Have school open during winter weather. If I don’t trust the bus, we will drive the children. If our neighborhood roads are glazed with ice, we will stay home. Cancel school for winter weather. We will stay home and have fun. School, no school, either is fine.

I do object to the ‘wait until 5 in the morning’ to decide on a plan. Once we get up and start looking at websites to learn what you decided, the children are up and ready to start the day. If we knew the night before, the children would get a little bit of extra sleep to make up for the hours they spent, past their bedtime, asking repeatedly if there would be school. I can’t begin to imagine how working parents scramble for childcare at 5 in the morning.

As a child, we ALWAYS knew that the ten p.m. news would have the full list of school closings for the next day. That was a different time zone, but you really should be able to decide by 11 p.m. The sun isn’t going to melt anything between 11 p.m. and 5 a.m. Phone the officers who work the problem neighborhoods and make the call before the nightly news. Please.

First world problems – clothing

// October 7th, 2010 // No Comments » // children

Living in the shadow of the mountains, our seasons are a month of winter and a month of summer separated by several months of beautiful spring and fall. The transition to our brief spell of winter causes mornings of shivering and afternoons of sweating. I’m sorry. I mean glowing.

Every morning this week, I’ve dressed the youngest children in jeans, long sleeves and coats. Every afternoon this week, I’ve been subjected to complaints about me “making” them wear coats. Amy comes home from school daily missing her socks and wearing her jeans rolled up above her knees. I caught Evan with my scissors just seconds before he cut the sleeves off of his shirt.

This morning, the children left for school in shorts, hoodies and coats. I thought it would make the afternoons less miserable for them. Instead, they spent the wait for the bus complaining because I “made” them wear shorts.

Tomorrow, I’m sending them to school in jammies and bathrobes.

snow day

// January 29th, 2010 // 4 Comments » // school, weather

I know that it is 2:10 in the afternoon and the roads and skies are clear. School could have released one hour early instead of being closed the entire day. However, the looks on faces when school was canceled last night, were absolutely priceless. Sparkling eyes and contagious giggles electrified the air. There was even a little happy dance. I think the joy outweighs the risk of running out of allotted snow days. The giggling, dancing teachers clearly needed an unscheduled play day.

forecast parking

// December 3rd, 2009 // No Comments » // home, weather

We live in a tiny, older, working class neighborhood with residents who have been here for decades. The roads are more than a little bit steep. There are a few things that everyone in the neighborhood knows. When it rains, the creek is fast and dangerous. Once the leaves fall off the trees, the people at the top of hills can see into everyone’s homes. B burns leaves and branches in the creek whenever it is dry. If children do something stupid, someone in the neighborhood WILL tell the child’s parents. If something breaks, the city and county will both claim that it’s the other team’s problem. When there’s ice on the roads, the only people getting out of the neighborhood are the ones who were parked in the street at the top of the hill.

So, would someone please explain to me why all the neighbors are parked at the hilltop? Do they seriously think it’s going to snow tonight? Did I miss a big weather announcement for tonight? I know it’s forecast for tomorrow, but how often does that forecast come true in Knoxville?

it’s a bit windy out there

// February 11th, 2009 // 2 Comments » // flickr, local, weather

happy dogs

// February 9th, 2009 // No Comments » // pets, weather

Our dogs LOVED last week’s snow. Run, wrestle, eat snow, repeat. Then, they really LOVED this weekend’s spring weather. Fetch ball, wrestle, chase squirrels, repeat. These dogs are happy about everything except rain and thunder. Guess what is in the forecast for Wednesday? Don’t worry. They will stretch out on our bed and hibernate until the weather changes again.

too much Pax

// February 8th, 2009 // No Comments » // me, weather

Sunny days with temps in the mid 60s have the effect of G-23 Paxilon Hydrochlorate on me. My brain turns off and I just absorb the beauty of the moment. Too serene to get anything done and too serene to care.