Your two-year old daughter marches around the family room, dancing to Sesame Street. She drops her banana and then smooshes into the carpet with her foot.

What it really means: You spent Saturday night shampooing the carpet.

The young man your husband hired to paint the entryway and hallway (against your better judgment because how hard is it to paint and how much will he charge anyway?) before Thanksgiving calls and apologizes for being unable to fulfill his promise.

What it really means: You will be painting walls tonight, even though your husband says he’ll do it.

You know how every once in a blue moon, someone will say, “Tell us about your most embarrassing moment?” I can never pull a good story out of the air. I mean, there was that time I was waiting for a meeting to begin and I leaned over to get something out of my purse and I (as one cultured friend would say) passed wind loudly. None one in the room even snickered. But that’s not really a story, is it?

Tonight, while I was filling my one-gallon red pitcher with water for the Rug Doctor, I remembered a mortifying moment from junior high.

I was in ninth grade. I’d become a model student–which is not the same as a student model, by the way. I was the student body president, a straight-A student, a sought-after babysitter, and an all-around good girl. I rode my bike to school early every morning to work in the library for extra credit. Teachers loved me. The school counselor loved me, and in fact, used to pat me on the backside, which I’ve come to realize was probably inappropriate, but hey, what’s a little light-hearted sexual harassment in junior high?

I had a good friend named Carolyn. We knew each other from church and we both loved to sing. I convinced Carolyn to enter the school Gong Show. Furthermore, I masterminded a plan for us to dress like hippies and sing a song about nuclear war. She went along with this ill-fated idea.

The day of the Gong Show arrived. We decked ourselves out in blue jeans and headbands and padded out in our bare feet, carrying peace signs. Then we sang this song with no musical accompaniment:

They’re rioting in Africa (la-la-la-la-la)
They’re starving in Spain (la-la-la-la-la)
There’s hurricanes in Flo-ri-da (la-la-la-la-la-la-la)
And Texas needs rain (la-la-la-la-la) the whole world is festering with unhappy souls
The French hate the Germans, the Germans hate the Poles
Italians hate Yugoslavs, South Africans hate the Dutch
AND I DON’T LIKE ANYBODY VERY MUCH!!
But we can be tranquil and thankful and proud
For man’s been endowed with a mushroom-shaped cloud
And we know for certain that some lovely day
Someone will set the spark off
AND WE WILL ALL BE BLOWN AWAY!!
They’re rioting in Africa (la-la-la-la-la-la-la)
There’s strife in Iran
What nature doesn’t do to us
Will be done by our fellow “man”

I thought this was hilarious. Of course, I was a ninth grader, but still. My fellow students did not find this amusing and the three judges–“radio personalities” from local stations–GONGED US before we even got to the line about the mushroom-shaped cloud, which, of course, is the point of the whole song.

The kids in the gym hooted and hollered and we slunk out, booed off the stage.

And that, my friends, is my most embarrassing moment. Until I think of something else.

So, no matter what happened today (routine household chores, including Rug-Doctoring the family room carpet), at least I didn’t get gonged. For that, I am thankful. Also, I found a Barbara Kingsolver hardback novel at the thrift store when I was dropping off stuff (I had to browse, didn’t I? Isn’t that a requirement?). In my world, that’s about as good as it gets.

I am so tired. I told my husband on Monday night that I have reached capacity–I just can’t do one more thing. I am overextended and fatigued and overwhelmed and why, oh why, is the Leaning Tower of Laundry in my bedroom?

Then my sometimes-boss (the private investigator) called and asked if I’d like to do some transcription for him. I asked about the deadline and how much typing would be involved and he assured me I could do as much or little as I wanted. Deadline would be Wednesday at 8 a.m.

I said, “Fine.”

My husband thinks I’ve lost my mind. But I could not turn down an easy $20 an hour. Christmas is coming. Ho-ho-ho. (Pass me a bottle of rum.)

I typed 27 pages, which translates into two and a half hours of work and fifty-four buckaroos. Now, I’m heading to bed, where I will finish my latest book about the Cambodian refugee.

I’m worried that Thanksgiving is coming too quickly, and Christmas will be holding hands with Thanksgiving, pushing through the front door without even politely knocking. There is no possible way I will ever be ready for Christmas.

Then again, ready or not, it comes and goes. “This, too, shall pass.” That’s the good news–and bad news–for the day.

Ever since the eclipse, Babygirl clamors to go outside to look for the moon and stars. Tonight, YoungestBoy went with us. We all walked up the damp driveway for a clear view. Almost black clouds spread thinly over the barely-blue sky. We craned our heads back and saw a lone star directly above us.

As we pointed and talked about the star, I saw our neighbor coming around the bend, her fiesty lab leading the way.

This young, soft-spoken woman is a graduate of West Point. Her husband, a fellow graduate, was deployed to Iraq at the beginning of October.

I said, “Hey, how are you feeling?”

She patted her round, protruding belly and said, “Pretty good.” She’s one of those women who truly make pregnancy look easy and beautiful. She is due in exactly one week. Her mother will arrive on Friday to support her through the labor and delivery and beginning days of motherhood.

Babygirl and YoungestBoy laughed at the dog’s antics while my neighbor and I made small talk.

How soon her life will change in every way. On one hand, I wanted to warn her: “In two years, you’ll be standing in a chilly driveway looking for the moon!” On the other hand, I wanted to say, “Just wait! In two years, you’ll be standing in a chilly driveway looking for the moon!”

She’s about to begin the biggest adventure of her life. I just hope and pray that her husband will return to join her. Everytime I hear of a soldier dying in Mosul, my heart lurches a little.

War. If I were the queen, there would be none of that.

If I had time, I would chart my moods. Every month, I seem to have a “floating anxiety day” in which I examine my mind for the source of my anxiety. I can almost always find a throbbing ache upon which to thwap my anxious feelings. I think they are hormonal. I have a day when I scream for no good reason. Last night, it was over chocolate milk and I made my littlest boy cry. I have a monthly day of incredible murky depression in which I feel hopeless under that little rain cloud that drizzles upon my naturally curly hair, rendering me not only despondent, but also ugly. I have a day when I am convinced I cannot go on under the load of responsibilities that I bear. I mentally pick up each duty, consider whether I can toss it through a window, decide it must stay and then replace it in the stack. Nothing can go. I must do it all. I have a lonely day when I wish someone would call me and invite me to coffee. I have a fat day when I am thankful no one calls me to invite me anywhere.

I just think maybe all these moods correspond to a particular hormonal pattern and if I had time, I would figure it out.

If I had time, I would paint the entryway.

If I had time, I would write up the Student Academic Plan required by the school district.

If I had time, I would clean out the storage room–again–and give away the gerbil cage which I hope to never need.

If I had time, I would join the YMCA and work out every day.

If I had time, I’d prepare the flowerbeds for winter and trim the ivy.

If I had time, I would scrub beneath the utility sink and clean out the freezer! Hello! Lentils, anyone?

If I had time, I’d find the post where I mention my lentils from Y2K and link it here.

If I had time, I would get a hair cut.

(Can we talk about hair for a second? I can’t figure out what to do with my hair, the previously mentioned, naturally curly, unruly, hanging in my face, hair. I’ve had short hair, which was supposed to look like Lady Di. Uh, natural curls anyone? I looked like a 75 year old woman who got her hair set every Thursday. That didn’t work out for me. I had a shoulder length cut, but oh, the constant straightening of that hair! I am lazy about my hair and so then, eventually, I look like I need an Oprah makeover with this long, crazy hair. But what to do with it? I have to have bangs. Really short hair doesn’t work on me. I’d like to work with my curl, not against it. I can’t find a hairdresser I love. And I don’t want to stare at my face for an hour while I get a hair cut. I am paralyzed. I wonder if it’s hormonal?)

[My husband just came downstairs and asked if I remembered to buy cucumber chip pickles. I did not. I said, “Hey, but write it on that list on the fridge. And he said, “No, I want you to write it on your heart.” Maybe I would, if only I had time. He is home and when he asked what my plans were for tonight, I said, “Oh, I’m just going to spend the evening dreading tomorrow.” He tried to help me figure out a way to cut down on my responsibilities, but all he came up with is not coordinating the nursery schedule at church, which takes about 40 minutes each year.]

Anyway. Where was I? Oh, I was busy making excuses.

If I had time, I would shampoo my family room carpet.

If I had time, I would put away my Halloween decorations.

If I had time, I would write my final report for Vacation Bible School from last JULY!

Well. I am clearly a loser, so I am going upstairs to read a book about a Cambodian refuge. That ought to make me feel like an ungrateful lout.

Because I am a glutton for punishment, I allowed the boys’ twin-friends spend the night. All five boys sat up and watched the television showing of a Harry Potter movie. They ate an entire half-gallon of ice cream. Then they asked for popcorn. And my boys dispensed pop to everyone.

YoungestBoy spent a great deal of time rolling on the floor and annoying the bigger boys. The visiting boys are loud, so LOUD that my boys seem sedate in comparison. First one visiting boy, then the other stuck his thumb in his mouth and then popped it out, making a suction sound. Pop! Slurp! Pop! Slurp! If my boys had been doing that, I would have ordered them to stop using my most irritated voice.

Then from my desk where I sat for three solid hours bringing Quicken up to date (I have ignored it since September), I heard, “Hey! You spilled it!” In a single bound, I leapt across the room to find a spilled glass of pop on my carpet. Granted, my carpet is in dire need of shampooing, but still!

The visiting twin sat placidly as a cow chewing cud as I stomped away for a towel to soak it up. I said to my boys, “Spring into action! Come on! Clean this up!” and they seemed to suffer from hearing loss and said only, “It’s not my pop.”

While I finished mopping up the spill, I said, “Would your mother let you put a glass of pop on your floor?” I was thinking of her brand-new gleaming hardwood floors, her expensive leather furniture, her antiques. He said, “Well, if there is no table.”

And then, I saw that the twin brother had also spilled his glass and was also sitting mutely, catatonically, perfectly still, except for the hand bringing popcorn to his mouth while the pop became one with the carpet.

ARRGH! That’s my pirate sound, saved for especially aggravating moments. I couldn’t believe that the boys just sat and let their pop soak into the carpet.

Well.

I finished balancing my checkbook at 11 p.m. and sent the kids to bed. It’s past 12:30 a.m. now and I still hear whispering and giggling and movement. And in the morning, somehow I have to get us all to church by 9:45 a.m.

I’m going to pretend that they are all sleeping and go upstairs. If I’m lucky, they won’t get up at 6:00 a.m. like they did last time they stayed over.

Last night, in a fit of annoyance, I shook my finger at my three boys and said in a threatening voice, “If ANY of you get up before NINE O’CLOCK or make any noise or WAKE ME UP . . . YOU WILL BE SORRY.” And then I stomped upstairs while they stayed downstairs and finished watching a video.

I knew, of course, that they would all be up before 9:00 a.m., so I’m not even sure why I said that, other than my being peevish and fed up with kids. This morning, Babygirl woke at about 7:20 a.m., a mere six hours after I finished The Secret Life of Bees. I wearily stumbled into her room, took off her wet diaper, rocked her awhile and turned on her newly rented “Elmo’s World” video. Then I told her I was going to lay down.

I dozed off and on as she interrupted my sleep every few minutes, but I did stay in bed for another hour, until 9:00 a.m. Then I cleaned the shower stall and eventually, showered. I moved slowly, the luxury of not having a deadline or an appointment. I came downstairs with a towel on my head, shifted laundry from machine to machine, watered the cats, and finally went back upstairs to dry my hair and put on my make-up.

My hair is naturally curly and almost half-way down my back. The turban on my head half-dried it, so the curls were a little frizzy, so I pulled the curls out a little more, thinking I’d get a wavy effect, but instead, I ended up looking like Roseanne Rosannadanna. This was not a good thing.

So, then I pulled on my hair with a flat iron and a curling iron and generally spent a lot of time trying to look normal. Whatever that means.

I finished playing with my hair and came downstairs. I folded laundry, picked up a few things, washed some dishes and sat at the computer. Then I glanced at the clock. Eleven twenty. Eleven twenty?! Eleven twenty? How’d it get to be 11:20 a.m.? I realized that I needed to speed up a bit. (11:20?!) YoungestBoy would be picked up for his soccer game at 12:30 p.m. No one had even eaten breakfast, except for Babygirl.

I went into the kitchen and popped waffles into the toaster. The stove clock said 10:15 a.m. The microwave clock said 10:17 a.m. I said, “Hey, did someone mess with that clock?” and I guestured to the battery-run kitchen clock hanging high on a cabinet.

YoungestBoy said, “I did!”

I said, “Why?”

He said, “Well, when I came downstairs, I thought it was 9:00 o’clock, so I changed it.”

In other words, “Mom, you said not to come downstairs before 9:00 o’clock, so I changed the clock so it would say 9:00 o’clock, even though it was really 8:00 o’clock.”

He had to climb on a chair, take the clock down and change the time.

Later in the day, he went to soccer with a family friend. The twins went to their twin-friends’ house. Then after soccer, YoungestBoy went to his friend’s house. While they were all gone, I put Babygirl down for her nap and my mother came over to sit with her while I went to a big school rummage sale. (Books, glorious books, at cheap prices.) When I came home and my mom left, the doorbell rang. There stood the neighbor boy.

I said, “Hey, the boys aren’t home.”

He said, “Where are they?”

I said, “They went to play at their friends’ houses.”

He held up a Gamecube game, twirled it around and said, “Can I come in and play anyway?”

I said, “No.”

He said, “That’s not fair! My Gamecube is broken!”

I said, “Bummer for you. Buh-bye!” and kind of eased the door closed with him still facing me.

Now. YoungestBoy is home. The neighbor boys must have been watching out the window because they came over moments later. The twins called to ask if their twin friends can spend the night. I said, “Well. Hmmm. What do you plan to do?” and they said, “Watch a movie on television,” and I couldn’t think of a single reason why I should say “no,” so I said, “Fine.”

Their mother called to ask me one question: “Have you lost your mind? Are you on drugs?” Wait. That’s two questions. At any rate, I said, “Hey, what’s two more when I’m stuck here anyway?”

And she said, “Well, I figured since your husband is gone you have one less pair of adult hands.”

And I said (God forgive me), “Do you actually think he helps out when he’s here?” Then I blurted, “WHO SAID THAT?” leaving my friend silent and puzzled for a moment before she laughed.

Well, that’s not true, of course. My husband is helpful. It is good to have a partner. I am thankful for him. And I’m saying that even though he never reads this blog.

So, the house will soon be full of kids again, but at least I had a mini-break in the middle of this day. Otherwise, I might be out of my mind. Or taking drugs. Or making jokes at my husband’s expense.

Well, I decided not to paint tonight. Why am I so surprised? I am a slothful excuse for a human being.

YoungestBoy had to go to school today, so I took the other kids with me to run a few errands. The twins did their lessons haphazardly before and after our excursion and while I was putting Babygirl to sleep (and falling asleep myself), TwinBoyA did TwinBoyB’s work–both math and vocabulary. I guess they didn’t think I’d be able to tell the difference between their handwriting. What’s a mom to do?

Tonight YoungestBoy went to his third (or fourth?) birthday party of the school year. My big boys went to that many birthday parties in their whole lives, just about. When I went to pick him up tonight from the party, I spotted him across the room, face flushed, his friend’s dad standing nearby. I said, “Is he all right?” and the dad told me that he’d fallen and hit his head while being wheeled around in a giant tire-thing. He was so sweaty his hair was drenched.

He seemed fine, though, but he cried some on the way home, mentioning to me that he couldn’t get his shoes off so he could jump in the bounce-house thing. (Yes, that’s the technical term for the inflatable jump-thing.) I said, “Why didn’t you ask for help?” and he said, “I did!” and I said, “And no one would help you?” and he said, “I’m just crying because my head hurts.”

Poor kid. He had fun, despite his last-minute injury. And once I gave him some Advil and a drink of water, he forgot his pain.

And now, thirty more minutes until the children are in bed. Not that I’m counting.

Remember this show that ran from 1977 to 1981? Well, me neither, because I wasn’t really watching much television in those days, but I did manage to see enough of that show to wonder why those kids all looked so dissimilar. And boy, I wished I had that long sheet of butt-length hair that one of the daughters had. In my youth, long hair was everything. I dreamed of long hair and then Farrah came along and I was all about wings. But Eight is Enough.

What brings this to mind today, you ask? This afternoon, I did a head-count and found that eight certainly is enough. DaycareKid didn’t even come today, yet I managed to spend an afternoon with eight children in my house. And eight is enough.

I feel like a terrible American citizen and schooling-at-home mother because not only did I not observe Veteran’s Day, I only gave it passing thought–once when I thought what a terrible American citizen I am and then again when I realized there would be no mail delivery today. It’s awfully strange not to have school on a Thursday and then send the kids back to school on Friday.

My twins were peeved that I expected them to do lessons today. But since we lost our internet connection earlier this week, they fell a little behind. I really had no choice but to make them do school. They’ll thank me when they are grown. Or not.

Despite the siren song of The Secret Life of Bees (which I heartily recommend and, yes, Beth, the library should have it), I rose above and beyond my usual standard of mediocrity (keeping the kids alive, basically) and cleaned up the backyard, even mowing the lawn and gathering trash and sweeping up giant piles of Douglas fir needles. The trees are in our neighbor’s yard and dump an endless, prickly supply of rusty needles. The visiting twins came outside and I said, “Hey, what are your plans?” and they blinked and said, “We’re going to work on the moat.” I said, “Fine, but no water, okay?”

So, they continued to dig near the back fence. They have quite a tributary system happening there.

I did not paint.
I did not do much laundry.

Tonight, I sat in Babygirl’s room and while she watched her Barney video, I read by the light of a small book-light. She sat on her knees right in front of the small television with its built-in VCR, mesmerized. She asked for a banana. Finished that and asked for an apple. Then, she turned around and said, “I dance?” I said, “Sure, you can dance.”

First, she held onto the wire television stand as if it were a ballet barre, and danced. Then she swung her arms and did a little step from side to side. The room was dark, lit only by the television and my book-light, so her silhouette glowed with the flickering light of Barney. I looked up from my book and saw her sparse blond hair forming a halo around her bobbing head and the image brought tears to my eyes and a smile to my face. She looked around to see if I were watching, then danced on.

I know she won’t dance to Barney forever, but I hope she’ll always have moments when she can only respond by jumping to her feet and swaying to the music. And I hope I won’t be too busy to notice.