Just Keep Swimming

Current status: 36° outside, sitting in the car waiting for it to thaw with two bellowing 2 year olds. Heat’s on in the back. Air conditioning is blasting full bore at my face in the front. It’s cold outside but I am the sweatiest of sweaty messes this brisk Tuesday morning.

Melissa’s having a sedated procedure on her heart today. Check in time was 6am – it’s the only time they do this test. We tried to come up with a viable solution to get both parents plus the babies to the hospital by six while the bigs don’t start school til 7:50am. The most promising idea involved us getting everyone ready and dressed by 5:30am, heading to the hospital and leaving Bean to man the fort until departure time for school. My least favorite, but by far the most simple, was for Melissa to Uber to the hospital and I could follow with the babies once the bigs headed to school. She’d already be under by the time I arrived.

Now, Bean is 11. She’s incredibly mature for her age and eloquent beyond measure, but one thing Bean lacks is any measure of chill whatsoever. She goes from zero to panic in about four tenths of a second and pours that lack of chill out on everyone within reach like a bucket of Gatorade at the SuperBowl. Not entirely shocking, but her brothers and her mothers aren’t big fans of this. Getting caught in an unexpected Bean Storm is about as much fun as spending a Saharan sandstorm in a canvas tent. Bean, however, was on board with this plan. The boys were on board. Everyone agreed they could handle this Big Kid Responsibility. They all wanted to help and solemnly promised to do their best. I was dubiously optimistic.

And then yesterday was, for lack of a better word, a nightmare. All sorts of things went off the rails in all sorts of arenas. I had my bonus baby all day. I want you to picture that scene from Jurassic Park where Chris Pratt is in the middle of a velociraptor circle with his hands extended in peace. That was my day, only with six raptors instead of three, a constant stream of calls/texts/messages on my phone and not one of my raptors was a cute little tamed thing named Blue. Everyone was grounded by the end of the night.

So back to the drawing board we went and Uber prevailed. Melissa left about 5:30 and I was already wrangling kidlets. Roo spent an hour wailing and flailing because he was sick (he’s not) and couldn’t go to school because GERMS, MOM! WHY DID I WANT TO GET EVERYONE IN HIS SCHOOL SICK?! Pook was as demanding and irascible as ever. My breakfast was a string cheese and a spoonful of marmalade as I ran upstairs to make myself presentable. I was gone for exactly fourteen minutes before I could hear the bigs screaming at each other over my blow dryer on the floor below me. Bean had decided to start hustling everyone into shoes and coats a full 20 minutes early and was in a panic because her brothers, who are seven and can read a clock, told her it was too early and refused to stop drawing. I had to bang on the wall with my fist to be heard over the din, and in that moment I sent a silent, thankful prayer for Uber.

It feels like everything in life has sunk into the deep end of the pool. I am a poor diver who is tired of treading water and I know I’m not alone in this. Literally every single person in my inner circle had big, massively emotional things happening yesterday. I think we’re all waiting for someone to toss a life preserver or to drain some water out of the pool, right? It doesn’t seem like this can go on much longer before we just plain drown.

I don’t have an answer, just a promise. I will make sure you don’t drown and will count on you for the same. Maybe the truth is that we are the life preservers for each other. Life is intense and scary and often overwhelming and the only way we get through is through community. So I will keep my phone on, even when it feels like my pool floaties have a hole in them, because I want to be there for you when you need me and because I love you. And sometimes that love looks like answering a call when dinner’s burning on the stove and the kids are screaming over shoes. Sometimes love means delivering tough truth that makes you mad. Sometimes love just means I’ll sit with you in silence.

We are not gonna sink because we’ll hold each other up. And by the way, this marmalade is delicious and I have plenty to share.