15 December 2011

Musings

Have you ever noticed that whenever you go to the post office in December the combination of the long line, the winter woolies you are wearing, the packages you are balancing and the sauna-like interior temperature of that particular brand of government office produces the reaction of flushing, then sweating, then feeling like you are going to pass out... but not before you get that damn package mailed.


I have taken to whipping off the do-rag, or hat when I feel like that.  I have no problem with being bald.  In fact, most the time I forget about it, (unless there is a draft,) as I rarely see it.  It's like when you have spinach in your teeth and everybody knows except you.  But I will say that when I do that, as was the case in line at the post office yesterday, people all around me shut the hell up.  All small talk ceases as they stare at cancer-gal and thank their lucky stars.  Sometimes I get lucky, and people will let me go to the front of the line... like maybe at Trader Joe's, where the shoppers are so conscientious that they return their own carts.  But there was no way in hell the other shlubs in line were going to let me cut in at the P.O.

On my good weeks, I've been able to do some stuff - like I took out all the trash and recycling this week, which I couldn't do last week.  And I helped N's scout leader carry in all her stuff after school yesterday - but then I high-tailed it outside lest someone else see me and think that I'm ready to volunteer again - 'CUZ I'M NOT.

This morning I couldn't get out of bed.  Just plain couldn't drag my butt out until past 9:00.  I slept fitfully, but that wasn't the problem.  Like I've said before, being tired isn't the thing.  Being the primary caregiver to two high maintenance children for the past several years has proven to me that even when I'm tired like the dead, I can still manage to drag myself out of bed and get them what they need.  But this morning that just wasn't happening.

Now that I'm up, I'm getting stuff off my list - cleaning the cat fountain, catching up on laundry, shopping for this weekend's birthday party presents, checking the upstairs furnace, etc.  I hope I can get everything off my list because the next two weeks are lost to chemo.  And I'm behind on Holiday preparations.  I have enough stuff for one kid for eight days, but not the other.  (I'll leave it to you to guess which is which.)  But why is it that there is always one (or more) easy kid(s) and one who constantly tries one's patience?  Just like a line at the post office.