It all started at 5:30 in the morning with the alarm clock going off. Where I live, you might have expected me to say that the rooster was crowing; but no, instead it was the incessant jabber of a talk show host ranting about something to do with the price of rice in China. Really, at this time, I could have cared less. All that I could hear was the fact that she had obviously had her coffee, probably Starbucks and most likely made by a barista that I would never see in my kitchen.
Five thirty was also when the guys from the fertilizer company drove up the driveway and my husband popped out of bed like a jack-in-the-box. Therefore, I guess that I was up too, barista that I must be.
I climbed over the six-year-old who had crawled in at some odd hour of the night, threw on my sweats and headed for the kitchen. By the time my husband had his clothes on, I had already started a pot of coffee, unloaded the dishwasher, located a piece of paper and started my list for the day. Number one, make four lunches, move the tractor, make the tea, chicken for dinner, bread, start the burn pile, trim the raspberries, rodotill the garden, move the other tractor, piano lessons at 3:00, and pee. I always put that in there as my own little joke to myself, because I know full well that this list will be a page long by the time the morning is over and I will need a break. I also know that I won’t get half of it accomplished.
I was just on my way to the shower, knowing that it was that or a cup of coffee, when my husband said something about needing a ride to the field.
“No problem,” I smile. “When?”
My husband looked out the window. Here, I must digress. If any of you have read my blogs on Spring Work, you must know by now that a farmer looking out the window causes warning bells to ring in his wife’s head. Frankly, it means, “I don’t know. I’m not sure. What do you think dear?”
However, with Spring Work being so super late this year and farmers all over the Palouse in danger of not getting their crops in on time, my farmer quickly recovered.
“Now?” he asks.
“Sure,” I say. “Let me write a note to the kids.”
Already I am doing the math in my head. It’s almost 5:45. My son, who is the early riser, will be up to shower at 6:00. Another at 6:15. If the first one isn’t out of the stall on time, there could be a fight. Oh well, I can’t worry about that now. The others won’t see the light until after 7:00, so if we get after it, I can make it back in time to start breakfast and head off any brewing fights. The drive out and back would take a half hour.
Now, in favor of this blog not being as long a read for you as it was a day for me, let me just speed this up for you – because frankly that is how I experienced it.
So, on the way out, I’m informed that we need to stop by the fertilizer plant, it’s only five miles out of the way. It’ll only be a second. Just have to tell someone something. Fifteen minutes later, now almost time for the second child to rise and find the note that I am MIA, we just start heading for the field.
“Think you have time to move a truck,” he asks.
“What truck?” I say.
Yep, I’m gritting my teeth. He’s been in the house for the morning routine all blooming winter. He knows full well that four hungry boys can get chaotic without the mommy buffer.
“It’s at the other field.”
Now, dear reader, the “other” field in question is almost ten miles the other direction, and moving a truck isn’t like helping your friend move his car down the road. You have to wait a generation for it to warm up, for the farmer to pee, and then it rumbles, slowly, ever so slowly, through the field and onto the road like a very, very old man. And then, as I know all too well, there is always a chance that we may have to stop by the fertilizer plant again.
“Where is it going?”
“To my dad’s.”
Another seven miles the other way.
“No way,” I say. “Kids need to get up.”
“Well, that truck needs to be in the field in an hour,” he states, as if I’m delaying the work that must get done.
“Fine,” I say. “I’ll go home, get the kids up, ask the eldest can take care of the youngest and I’ll get it done.”
I race out to the field, practically kicking him out the door and then race back home, hoping like hell that I don’t see a cop and that I’m awake enough to drive because this barista has yet to see a cup of joe! If you think this is tedious, wait till you hear about the tequila!
When I arrive home the fertilizer team is still there and they are unable to get a much needed nozzle working. I radio the farmer who gives me instructions in some form of farmer-speak over a jumble of other voices on the radio. I race back and forth playing the telephone game between the two of them until finally the damn nozzle magically works. Great, good. One success.
I race in the house, now hollering for the kids to get up. I give my eldest instructions, thankful that he is willing to help and not in a bad mood. I call the father-in-law to help me move the darn truck, ask the middle child to make the youngest a lunch, and am just about to run out the door when one of the kids reminds me he needs to go to school early. Let me tell you, I flunked math, so by this time, my numbers are starting to get a little jumbled on who needs what by when.
“Okay,” I smile. “Get your stuff.”
Stuff attained, out the door, to the school, out to the field to meet the father-in-law, texting the eldest to inform him that I just passed the bus on our dirt road heading straight for the house. I pick up the father-in-law to help get the slow lumbering truck, get a text back from the eldest that one of the younger children has hidden his backpack and that he will “FAIL” school if I don’t find it and bring it to the school RIGHT NOW. I want to tell him that I’m not a fan of capital texting, but I’m driving so I keep it brief. OK.
About here, I’m wishing for my list to write all this down. I move the truck, all the while have a civil political discourse with my father-in-law, race back to the house, make four lunches, find the backpack which my eldest simply left by the dryer when he got his clothes out, discover a wayward suitcase that had been left her by another kid who had stayed the night a couple of days before, a coat from yet another visiting boy, and some books I need to deliver to the school. You getting all that?
I am just in the car when my dear husband texts that he needs his tractor moved. He’s waiting. Like time waits for no man, farmers do not wait for busy wives. Around here, excuses can get unpaid helpers such as myself fired. Right now I’m thinking that sounds damn good!
“No problem,” I state. “No problem at all.”
I deliver everything, realizing that I still have not had a cup of coffee, but being a woman, I have to pee anyway. That will have to wait!
I deliver the goods to the school, only to find my youngest upset because he forgot his lunch. I console him and magically produce the lunchbox that I found left on the counter at the house. Then I race to the field, flag the tractor, only to get a call from the hired man. He’s ready too.
Done! I get back home, turn OFF the radio, walk straight past the list and into the office to try and edit my book for the upcoming writer’s conference. I got an hour in on my project before I got another text from the farmer.
In favor of getting you through this, I will give you the final straw. Wish I could say it was stuffed in a blended margarita, but it wasn’t. No.
After taking the middle child to piano in a neighboring town, helping the youngest with his homework, washing and folding laundry, and just pulling the chicken out to start dinner, I get the call from my two eldest boys that they need picked up from track. Fine, I say. We can eat leftovers tonight.
I get back in the car, start to drive to the school and I literally have to stop at the only stop sign in town and contemplate who in the heck I am headed for; the hired man, my husband, or the kids. I laugh and sit there for minute. I’m taking a break, I laugh. Right here in the middle of town. I had almost regained my bearings again when my cell phone vibrates. I pick it up and read the text.
“Hey,” my husband types. “It’s Cinco de Mayo. Did you remember to get the tequila?”
Needless to say, that man did not get an answer this time.
Now, for all of you waiting patiently – and of course on pins and needles for me to write “Why Am I a Liberal Part 2,” I will just point out that I haven’t had much time of late. However, I will get on it…after I pee.
