Juggling skunks

Sheesh. Sometimes you feel like you're juggling. Sometimes you feel like, when you're juggling, you've just got too many balls and bowling pins and jelly jars in the air. Sometimes, you feel like when you've got too many things in the air, someone throws a skunk into the mix.

And then there's the rare occasion that you've got three balls, a bowling pin, a loosely sealed jelly jar, and a skunk in the air, and then someone dumps a prize-winning watermelon in your lap and punches you in the face. THAT'S today, friends.

So, I'm going to backpedal a bit here...it really could've been worse. Someone could have died or been diagnosed with cancer or ended their marriage, but that didn't happen today. What did happen:

1. We got a late start to the day. I swear, no matter what I do.

2. William is obsessed with what goes on outside our living room window. He knows what vehicles pass by: three school buses, a street sweeper, two garbage trucks on Mondays, and various golf carts that carry lawn equipment for the city. If one of these is not where he thinks they should be, if one of them can be seen several blocks down and then makes a right turn before it passes our house; if our neighbors across the street park on the street instead of in their driveway, then you can expect a full-on nuclear meltdown, complete with legit sobbing, pulling the curtains, and kicking, biting, and head-butting. Oh by the way? This happens every morning when I say, "Okay, kids, time to go," because he might miss one of the aforementioned vehicles that has not yet granted him the courtesy of driving by today.

3. So, we were twenty minutes late.

4. There isn't a single meal in my fridge that takes fewer than two hours to turn into an edible meal. When there's the amount of food allergies in your house that we have, most meals require extensive prep on at least one ingredient. If everything's prepped, it's simple. If you're homeschooling, it's not.

5. So Nora and I had bow tie pasta and sauce for lunch, since we are not the ones with food allergies. No protein, no veggies. I feel like junk.

6. Nora had one of those mornings in which she didn't find it necessary to listen to me because I'm just going to explain it again anyway. And the tissues are right on the kitchen counter, but why should she have to look for them when Mom is totally right here? We spent so much time on tissues and not listening, we missed math, history, and art. And we have so much catching up to do in math.

7. Worst. Canker sore. EVER. It hurts to open my mouth.

8. I had a mouse skitter over my toes as I stood at the stove on Saturday. So far, the mouse traps aren't working, so I've spent the last few days tiptoeing around the house like I'm slowly turning the crank on a jack-in-the-box. The crank is getting tighter, dude.

9. William had another meltdown at school today and nobody knew why or what it meant. That never happens. So I cried for half the trip home because it's bad enough when your baby is hurting. It's infinitely worse when you know that you simply can't know what's wrong.

10. I'm five minutes from home, and the guy behind me slams into my rear bumper. Now my neck hurts and we've got, according to the police officer, approximately $1,000 worth of damage to the back of our van. Thankfully, insurance will pay it and no one was seriously injured. But sheeeeeeeesh.

This day buried me.

I learned a while back through a study on St. Innocent of Alaska that the bad stuff that happens--whether mildly annoying or catastrophic--has a common function for good: to direct us back to Christ and to humility, to remember other people, to rely on God and remember that he enters into even our deepest pain and grief with us. Since that, I have been challenged to try to allow a terrible, no good, very bad day like today remind me of two things: that God himself stands with me and holds my hand when I cannot possibly take any more of this nonsense, and that I am not the most important person on earth. I am forgotten and not heard sometimes. I am alone sometimes. That's painful, but that's humanity. Everyone feels those things, which makes me the same as William, as Nora, as the guy who hit me, and really, really, the same as that freaking mouse that scampered over my toes and has the rare talent of licking peanut butter off traps without getting caught. In fact, that mouse probably has it more together than I do.

So, if we look at it that way, I had a LOT of opportunities to be holy today.

How'd I do? Not really very holy. I didn't curse out the guy who hit me, I never yelled at Nora (major improvement for me, btw), and I didn't blubber "why US?!" about autism all the way home. But what I'm more wrapped up with is the inner turmoil that remains even after the monsters kids are long asleep, insurance claims have been filed, and I'm hidden safely in my bedroom away from scary mice.

Peace. Where is that?

I know it's with Him, in prayer. But oh, Lord, help me find it.