Ya, ya, innaminute…

I need to go clean the kitchen. I mean, really…breakfast dishes, still on the table, at this hour?!

Shameful!!!!!

But first…just, you know, one more minute of this stillness. This almost-silence. This ability to read an email, actually read it, all the way through (I have 212 messages in my inbox I’ve set aside as needing at least some level of reading, that have been waiting for just such an occasion).

One more minute of this blessed time of nobody is telling me how booooooreeeeeeeed they are…

I don’t know who was happier this morning, me or the Denizens. They went happily to school, dressed in their Specially Chosen Outfits (oh, the terrible dilemma this was yesterday, what to wear, what to wear!), with tie-dyed socks and in one case, wearing a wool hat (good grief) (it is currently 94 degrees outside) (wool hat) (sigh).

They were (in case you missed it) horribly, near-FATALLY bored these last couple weeks. The games had all been played. The art projects done. The friends visited. Grandmothers seen. Trips taken. Fairs attended. Video games played. Cartoons watched. Books read.

Everything on their checklist had been done, and in some cases done practically to death.

They were bored. B-O-R-E-D.

It’s a funny thing about kids. Kids who are otherwise awfully good about not being a nuisance will, when bored, turn into kids that strongly resemble Other People’s Horrible Brats.

Seriously. Who are these rotten kids, and what have they done with my precious angels?!

The pestering, the fighting, the squabbling…argh, I loathe squabbling, with the high-pitched whining about nothing and the way it will just sort of keep rolling on downhill…you took my thing, no I didn’t, yes you did and also you did that other thing, did not, did too, oh yeah well YOU did blah blah blah, did not did too did not did too MOMMMMMMMMMMMMMMM!!!!!!!!!!!

I don’t know why they insist on trying to make me a judge and/or jury on these things. My solution to these problems is to simply say, “Fine. Nobody gets the DS, then!” and I take it away.

This is because I am way too lazy to try to figure out who actually did have ownership rights at that particular time trying to teach them the skill of working together, and how to handle conflict resolution on their own, which are valuable skills greatly needed in the adult world.

Gosh golly, but I am such a great mother…(shut. up!)

Seriously, though, these last two weeks were hard on all of us. My ability to plop down a project in front of them (here kids, it’s a cheap latch hook kit!! knock yourselves out…) and get an hour or two of relative peace and quiet was gone. There was nothing left to hold their attention for more than a few minutes at a time.

Even the Electronic Babysitter had lost its charm. “Seen it…seen it…seen this one too…seen it…yeah, this is totally a rerun…”

I had gotten so desperate that the time limits on video games had gotten longer and longer until by yesterday (when I was patching the holes in Boo Bug’s backpack) (I did use a denim patch on the inside, but it was a tricky spot and it kept peeling up…I think the thing is now more Mighty Mender glue than backpack), I no longer cared. Go ahead! Stare at the flashing pictures on the computer screen! Stare at them all day long, if it will just make you SHUT. UP. for a danged minute, I don’t care if your brain liquefies and pours out your ears…just don’t get it on the carpet or the keyboard, ‘kay?…

They were sick of me, too. Did you clean your room? Did you do your chores? Did you put away your socks? I’ll set the timer, I’m going to check in five minutes, do NOT bother me right now!, no you can’t have a snack I just gave you snack and it is not my fault you’ve suddenly decided you don’t like apples, do you see a nametag saying, “Mommy, Head Short-Order Chef” on me? I didn’t think so!

Nag-nag-nag, quiet-quiet-quiet, don’t-don’t-don’t. I was pretty sick of me, too.

I hopped into Homer the Odyssey a little bit ago to pick up the CSA box. Just…grabbed my keys, slipped on some shoes and went. Just like that.

No fighting. No lost shoes. No thousand questions. Nobody picking at anybody else. Nobody arguing about who got there first, or who got to close the door, or who had won the race to the van. Nobody asking realllllly long involved questions, or telling realllllly long, involved tales.

In? Question? Form? Because there was this guy? Who wasn’t a guy we knew? And he did this thing? And also? Mommy? It was? Really? Funny?

None of that. Just me, my keys, a quick and quiet drive, grab the box, back in the van, back home, done. Less than ten minutes.

Ahhhhhhhhhhh.

I’ll go clean the kitchen in a minute. I swear I will.

But right this second…I’m just going to sit here and listen to the lack of sound, and cherish it…(for lo, it is fleeting…the pickup process begins in less than an hour…)