A Week in the Life of the Single, Working Mother
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âItâs ok,â you think. âNothing to worry about, really!â Â I mean who doesnât occasionally put their panties on inside out? Â It can happen! The cottage is relatively dark in the morning and the bathroom has no light in it, so even if you went to the toilet you wouldnât have noticed. No problem there. But then you go to the bathroom at work for the umpteenth time in the morning (you suffer from a weak bladder) and only then do you notice, staring back at you from the mirror, Â a moron who is wearing two different types of earrings! Not two similar earrings, that may be understandable, but two totally different decorations. âAre those warning bells?â I think, listening intently. Â âOr is that just the sound of me losing my mindâ. I stride back into the office, laughing â you must do this in these situations -Â and tell everyone the story. Itâs funny, really, I mean, who doesnât occasionally put two different earrings in their lobes?
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All might have been well if I hadnât remembered the keys! âTry to forget the key story!â I tell myself. Â But no, a nagging imp-like, pest of a voice insists that I remember the keys. So, warily I cast my mind back to this morningâs debacle. Â On leaving the cottage this morning, I absolutely know, without a shadow of a doubt, that I looked at the keys on their hook. I removed them from said hook and walked up to my car with three of my four children. Imagine my frustration and absolute impatience (Iâm very impatient with ineptitude), when I couldnât find the keys. This followed having to squeeze into my car (it was parked too close to my brotherâs car), loaded with bags, trying to balance on my high heels that kept sinking into the soft earth. The keys! I just couldânt find the blasted things! We all looked, all four of us, while I muttered all the while that I definitely took them off the hook. Jarred, my nineteen year old, decided, very quietly, not to believe me, and wandered off to the cottage. He reappeared shortly after, keys in hand. Had I dropped them on the way? Did I put them down after picking them up? No, nothing that simple. I was flabbergasted to discover that they were still, in fact, hanging on the hook. Those damned fairies. Jarred knew better than to comment.
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 My doctor says Iâm stressed. My therapist says âDuhâ! So, I decided that I would look at a week in my life and try to discover if I am indeed stressed, tired, overworked and hence abnormally distracted!
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A week! How do you determine a week? My life seems to run from one chaotic moment to the next, forming hours, days, weeks and years. My absent-mindedness began on a Friday so I decided to capture my week beginning with the previous Sunday.
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This week began relatively normally on Sunday evening when my eleven year old realized that he hadnât completed his project that had been due for the previous Thursday. Nothing too complicated, just a moving greeting card! No need to panic, especially as he also had to look for every letter of the alphabet (in differing fonts and sizes), and stick them onto a piece of paper. Ok, so I panic a little! Who wouldnât? Try finding a âQâ or a âJâ. The card is cut out, his cricket players look like aliens and the family is in fits of laughter while my seven year old daughter draws something of a Rembrandt version of his picture (she is very bright). He doesnât mind, just shrugs and continues to be glued to the TV, while I bellow, âHomework! Vincent, your homework!â
This situation could, in itself, be bearable but for that fact that it is happening at 6.30pm. This is the beginning of hell night. It is bath time accompanied by more bellows, âGet in the bath! Vincent, bath water! Katie, GET IN THE BATH!â It is school lunch time, but more on that later. It is uniform preparation time and goodness knows what else. There is always something of great significance that pops up out of nowhere to cause chaos and disorder. There is also supper. After a huge lunch of prawns and rice the little angels are hungry. Iâm not hungry! So I throw chicken pieces, covered with tinned tomatoes into the oven and put on a pot of rice. I am functioning on three planes. My friend is there for a visit with biscuits, dips and wine â very sophisticated, my kids are between nakedness and pyjamas â very bohemian, my food is slowly overcooking and I am trying to engineer a moving cricket bat that will hit a ball across a card. As Iâm sure Iâve mentioned, there is absolutely no need to panic â much! The kids end up going to bed halfway through the E-TV movie which, of course, is too late! I am a failure of a mother!
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By 9.30pm, school uniforms are ready, hanging over chairs but sandwiches must be made. I usually make amazing lunches but tonight there is no bread. If there was bread there would be no filling. I am, however, supermom, and I have a plan! Tuckshop! Godsend! Tomorrow I will make that new sandwich filling : sweet corn, tuna and mayonnaise. The kids are already moaning about that one. I tell them that they have to broaden their horizons! Then I get âmake us an extra sandwich, in case we donât like that oneâ. My kids, the connoisseurs! Tuna – not good enough. Ham â only fine alone, no mayonnaise or, for Katie and Jarred, with mustard. Vince wants salami, no mayonnaise. I tried pilchards and cucumber. My little ones tried to be kind saying, âMom, we didnât really like the lunch todayâ. Jarred said it was wonderful but he that he couldnât take it to Varsity anymore because : âIt STINKS!â How subtle! One day they love chocolate spread, the next they donât. One of them, canât remember which, hates cheese spread but my twenty-two year old could live on it. One loves peanut butter, the other shudders at the thought. The only thing I seem to get spot on are the chocolates and sweets that I provide. Jarred wonât eat those though! Heâs trying to diet!
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Monday morning dawns and I have to drag myself out of bed at 6.30 after Iâve changed the alarm setting twice. I realize that Iâm playing with fire as Jarred must be at University by eight and we have to drop the little ones off first. He will be furious if he realizes how late we got up. Little ones don uniforms (this takes about half an hour â no idea why), with me shouting about how they should stop dawdling and have breakfast. Needless to say, they suck down their cocoa pops while big brother rants about how late heâs going to be. I decide that I canât possible make it to work. My neck is in agony, I am exhausted and constipated and signs of haemorrhoids are beginning to emerge. My boss will spontaneously combust as she has told me that today I am getting a written warning for a mistake made on Friday. Could my physical symptoms be psychosomatic or am I merely skirting the threshold of severe and irreversible stress? I phone the office, make excuses to my colleague (itâs easier) and go to bed, after telephoning the doctor to make an appointment for my daughter and myself. Katie has been getting waves of extreme tiredness and Iâm really worried. Itâs never anything curable, when itâs your child, is it? The mind of a mother is a very frightening place sometimes.
Monday wears on. I fetch Katie and her friend from school at 1.00pm. We go home, relax a bit, read and I smoke hubbly bubbly, (it relaxes me, ok!). She has raided my purse because she wants a pie for lunch. I have no money save R40 in the car for petrol! Jarred has my card. Three fifteen p.m. and itâs time to fetch Vincent from cricket (back to the school I left two hours previously). I give in and buy two pies and put twenty rand petrol into my car. We pick up Vincent, nearly get hit by a stray cricket ball and head off to the doctor for our 4.00pm appointment. The fun has just begun! Kaitlyn must have a blood test. Have you ever tried to hold down a ten foot, rabid, thrashing and peculiarly terrified Anaconda? Iâm sure not but I think it would be a breeze! It would certainly be easier than holding down a terrified, stubborn, bucking bronco of a seven year old. I wonât go into detail â itâs far too traumatic â but it played out like a scene from a Tarantino movie. Three adults (all in various phases of shock) holding down a tiny child whilst one of the adults sticks a 10cm thick, 1 metre long needle into her arm and proceeds to suck all the blood from her body. She, all the while, screaming âMommy! Mommy! Please!â. I tell you, if you have never felt like a heel before and have an odd desire to do so, I fully recommend this as the way to go about it.
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In the midst of the screaming chaos, Jarred phones. âYou can fetch me nowâ, he says nonchalantly. The little pulsing blood vessel in my temple seems to explode as I explain as calmly as possible, why he has to wait. Meanwhile, Vincent has disappeared to the toilet in the front of the doctorâs rooms. He does not emerge until the screaming, from the far end of the building has subsided! Once the torture is over, she is shaken but laughs as I joke about how strong she is and how hard she can kick. She is not the only one trembling. The doctor grins nervously at me saying that he knows it seems barbaric, but honestly, it has to be done. Then he rushes from the room. The nurse just fumbles for words and I sit there hugging my daughter until my heart decides to return to my chest.
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It is now five oâclock and Jarred is waiting at the University in Parktown. I rush off, still shaken but trying to play it down and make jokes. Katie sits unusually quietly on the back seat. I hardly notice the hellish traffic, I can handle anything after the past hour. We get to Jarred and he, very foolishly, says : âWhy do you make appointments at five when you know youâre fetching me?â Is it really necessary to explain or will my feral death stare suffice. It does! Katie revives and excitedly tells Jarred about her nightmare experience. In record time it becomes an adventure and by Wednesday I will be relieved to know that my baby is doing well and that she probably just has worms.
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In the blur that is my life I make supper, get the children bathed, eat, sort out homework, uniforms and sandwiches. The ex-husband telephones the children and says something inane to Katie like : âIf you go to bed early you wonât be so tired and need blood tests.â Although I contemplate smashing the cell phone against the wall, I realize that it is mine and so I pour myself another glass of wine! The quiet breathing of my sleeping children, the studious attitude of my middle son, and the comings and goings of my eldest make it all worthwhile â most of the time! Thank God Monday is over.
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Tuesday begins much the same way with me pulling my comatose body from the sleeper couch (donât ask). Today there is a cricket match for Vincent (he finishes at about 5.00), and netball and P.E. for Katie. I am organized. All is well. The usual shouting routine ensues in a fast-forward blur and I appear, miraculously, at work. I am angry and defensive due to the fact that when my friend called for me at work on Monday, my boss told him that I was scared to come to work. Scared? Of work? Iâm waiting for blood test results, if you really want to know what fear is! I am called into the âbig bossâsâ office. I am given the poor work performance lecture and am prepared to receive my letter of warning. I decide to completely ignore my boss – dislike her right now – pull myself together and try even harder at work. I am so happy when my friend calls and says that I donât have to do lift scheme and that Kate can play with âScarlieâ today. A breather!  Jarred, however, finishes early so I have to take him home and come back to work. What is it they say about no rest?
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After work I fetch Katie from Scarlet (where she did her homework â whoopee) and Vincent from cricket. I finally get the kids into the bath while I cook supper in the house (again, donât ask). Itâs a rather difficult task as I have to keep running back to the cottage for the ingredients that I have forgotten. I try to do this really quietly because if the bathing darlings hear me, I am yelled for. This usually happens when Iâve made it into the cottage undetected and am halfway back to the house, thinking how cleverly I have eluded them. The word, âMOMâ, uttered very loudly, causes me to stop dead in my tracks. Like a secret agent I attempt to melt into my surroundings. I become very quiet, I tip-toe up the stairs and into the kitchen. Made it! They soon forget that they have called me and I am congratulating myself when a raucous cacophony emerges from the bathroom and the air is filled with shouting and wailing.
âJarred!â I scream, âFor goodness sake, sort them out!âÂ
They are fearful of him until he turns his back and then Katie begins to sob and gesticulate hysterically. It appears that Vincent has âaccidentallyâ weeâd in the bath and then, just as âaccidentallyâ, has splashed all the wee-filled water all over her. All fear of terminal illnesses vacate my mind as I threaten to drown the children in the bath. My yells of âGET OUT! PUT NEW WATER IN,â to Vincent are heard blocks away while Katie adamantly refuses to get back in the bath with him and wanders around sopping wet and wrapped in a towel.
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I somehow make it through the evening, tidying my cottage, packing my momâs dishwasher with my dishes and watching that Vincent completes his homework. All memory of long division has long since been erased and I battle to help him with his maths homework.  I quickly pack Katieâs ballet clothes â where the hell are those character shoes â and convince her that, because the shoes are too small, I will get her new ones.
âFeel where my toe is,â she says convincingly to me.
Vincent has P.E tomorrow, so does Katie, but he refuses to wear a Speedo and so I must pack him some long shorts. While I fully applaud his fashion sense, I doubt that the school will believe his excuses for much longer. I sigh when, miraculously, the atmosphere is infused with the even breathing of sleeping cherubs. I am just relaxing into a wine-induced oblivion (of course Iâm exaggerating) when Gary, my eldest grabs on to my security gate from outside shouting, âMom, Mom, hurry, open up! Quickly! Hurry!â My heart leaps into my throat. Someone is dead? Someone is chasing him? Itâs obvious that something truly horrible has happenedâ.
âWhat is it? I somehow blurt out.
âHurry! Open up! Itâs Prison Breakâ.
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How Iâve actually made it to Wednesday is beyond me. Perhaps itâs those âhappy pillsâ, maybe the fact that Iâm eating better, or more likely, I am simply functioning on auto-pilot. Things go relatively smoothly this morning. I think Iâm used to the chaos and I arrive at work only to realize that I must go shopping to cater for the afternoon meeting. My boss is subjected to grunts, nods and head shakes from me as I refuse to be civil to her. I do a few things in the office and then head off to the shop to buy the eats. Today is not my lift scheme day and I look forward to a nice quiet lunch with my colleague from my previous job. Itâs really nice and I get back to work relaxed after a glass of wine and a tramezini.  I have a few invitations for the evening (kids are out Wednesday evening with their dad), but I decide to stay home and do my ironing that has been building up for weeks.  I buy myself a bottle of wine, make no supper because Iâve eaten and sit down with a magazine on a chair that I hardly move from for the entire evening. Jarred sits with me doing his homework. I help him because itâs English and Iâm not bad at it. When I look for the wine I realize that I left it in my car, which Gary has taken. I sigh! I will have it at 7.30 when he gets home and hubbly will do in the meantime. I make sandwiches at the table and sort out school clothes. Needless to say, I do absolutely no ironing and have a glass of wine at 7.30. I continue to do the Sudoku that I have been doing the whole evening. Vincent and Katie get home at 8.00 and I have to rush them through a bath and then homework. In bed late again! Jarred then begins to play guitar and make up a song about the politics of the country. I am excited and write down the words. Katie and Vincent listen from their beds. By bed-time Iâve had about three glass of wine and am sleepy. Uncharacterisically, as I lie down the room begins to spin, and spin, and spin! I end up sick in the bathroom and fall asleep almost immediately.  What an end to my night of semi-solitude. They say, those very wise âtheyâ people, that alcohol affects you more when youâre stressed. I wonderâ¦.! Itâs a damn good excuse though.
I am pretty sure that I donât have to mention that the vacating of my bed on Thursday morning is no easy task. I do, however, succeed! Today we leave with only school bags. No tog bags, no cricket bats, no tackies, no ballet things, no extras at all. I feel free, wild â nothing to forget. The euphoria is intoxicating. This must be Heaven. I am even energized to go grocery shopping this evening. My friend says that she is free this evening. She asks if we should get together. Frankly the idea of wine or any other alcoholic drink, after last night, induces fear and trembling. I decline. Work is quiet as I continue to ignore my boss and 2.00 pm brings about my usual lift scheme.  I drop the little ones off, practically begging them to tidy the cottage and go back to work. I donât recall this but they say that I told them they could go shopping with me if they tidied up. At about 4.00pm Jarred arrives at the office and I take him home. I have since decided that I should shop alone, leaving the little ones at home with Jarred to bath and do homework. The outcry that results from this suggestion to Vin and Kate is something I am not qualified to deal with. I deflate and collapse into my car seat and meekly say, âget inâ. They inform me that they âeven cleaned the cottageâ, in order to be able to go.
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Shopping to me is a sadistic ritual. I cannot comprehend those perverse individuals who actually enjoy the dreaded ordeal. Add on two children who want everything in sight and who, after pleading to accompany me, want to go home after half an hour. Include fist-fights, sibling verbal abuse and disappearances every five minutes for free samples, and the whole thing intensifies ten-fold. I arrive at the shop at about 5.00 pm and get home by 7.30.  I am comforted by a well-meaning woman who tells me that my two fighting little maniacs are completely normal. This is after she hears me yelling hysterically at them to âSTOP IT!â and âI TOLD YOU TO STAY AT HOMEâ, accompanied by several other expletives. I tell her that Iâve had to go through it twice, having two older sons as well, and that I must have done something particularly evil in a previous incarnation. She tells me that I look too young to have two older sons and I almost kiss her. I feel haggard and worn, but decide to preserve the tiny morsel of dignity that I have left. Â
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I arrive home in the dark with two tired children who have not as yet bathed or, horror of horrors, done homework. Supper is no problem. MacDonalds, I love you! The cottage is in a dismal condition and if they had indeed tidied it up, a hurricane has since swept through it. I try to tidy while Jarred brings a few shopping bags from the car. We eat and Katie takes ages to finish her food while I jump around uneasily trying not to think of bathing and homework. Vincent gets stomach ache and needs the toilet but canât find matches for the candle that has replaced the broken light bulb. He eventually decides he has to go in the dark but five minutes later is wandering around bare-bummed looking for a torch! Jarred is ranting about how unfair it is because no-one will help him unpack the car and I am cleaning, packing away groceries and emptying the garbage bin, while yelling at Vincent to get back into the pitch black bathroom and onto the toilet. Katie, meanwhile continues to eat at two chews per minute and Xena, my Doberman, runs in and eats Vincentâs burger! Thank goodness Katie has two burgers, having got the special in case Gary is home for supper. This extra one is given to Vincent. When I remind my daughter that she is taking an abnormally long time to eat she throws down her burger saying, âFine, I will starveâ. This results in me telling her what a âprincessâ she is!
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Add to this chaotic evening the fact that there is a really young and persistent man that I know who keeps phoning me at the most inconvenient times and you have the makings of a true farce. I kid you not, to the delight and bemusement of my children he phoned and let it ring for a full seven minutes. They, and I, were absolutely amazed. My little ones know all the excuses in the book now when he calls, but this time we just let it ring â our amusement for the evening.
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Eventually, eventually, eventually clean, educated and well-fed children are lying in their beds. Unfortunately there is some good stuff on T.V. and the little darlings keep peeking at the screen. Death stare time! Eyes shut! And peace reigns supreme.
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Friday, FRIday, FriDAY! Happy days! Itâs Friday!!!! I have made it. We have made it. We are breathing and relatively sane. One more day to get through. Should be a breeze. And all appears to be fine but looks can be deceiving. I am organized! I am Supermom! Katieâs ballet clothes are ready, lunches are packed into cases and itâs time to go. But dizzyingly quickly we return to the Friday day I lost my mind!  The keys, the panties, the earrings â all effects lasting temporarily however. My initial horror gives way to amazement as I realize that my distractedness appears to have come along with a burst of genius. I have managed, quite extraordinarily, to work out how to put seven separate documents onto one document on Excel. This involves a lot of copying, pasting, (making small), renaming and finally coming out with a whole new document. I am so impressed with myself that I forget to sulk and run to my boss to tell her how wonderful I am. She agrees that I am very clever and I see no reason to continue the argument.
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After the initial shock of all my weird activities of the morning, I begin to feel relatively relaxed. Katie has ballet and so does her friend, so the other half of the lift scheme does the lifts today. I do, however, still have to take Jarred home. This changes when he telephones to say that the pub at Education Campus is opening today and he will come over later, probably around three. This all seems fine until my boss, whom I have just made friends with, decides that we can go home early â at three. I try to call Jarred. Surprise, surprise â his phone is off. I have to wait. I canât very well go storming into the pub to yank him out. In the meantime his older brother calls. I must meet him at home and then take him to Vodacom to sign for his new SIM card. The problem is we must do this by 5.00 as the shop will probably close. The other problem is that I have no idea what time Jarred will put in an appearance. Gary laughs hysterically when he hears the situation, telling me that Iâve got a long wait ahead of me. I little while later the little ones call me at work to ask if they can make me a surprise from their recipe book. I agree to this asking, as nicely as possible, that they clean up after themselves. At about 3.30 Gary phones, asking where I am and Jarred eventually arrives at four oâclock. At four fifteen Katie calls, asking how far I am from home because the surprise is waiting. I drop Jarred at home and Gary takes his place in the car. Katie runs out asking where Iâm going and saying that the surprise is ready. I assure her that I will not be long. We get to Vodacom, sign the papers and are told that it will cost R65.00. Gary and I look at each other incredulously. Neither of us has money on us. He decides to drop me at home, as Iâm really anxious to have my surprise before the babiesâ dad fetches them for the weekend. Gary will fetch my bank-card and go and pay the account. Miraculously we find the card in the car. At home I have a sosatie stick with strawberries, pineapple, banana and dates (because I have given up chocolate for lent) waiting for me on a plate with ice-cream and custard. Children have an amazing way of erasing a week of stress in an instant, by a simple gesture of love so pure that it melts your insides and touches you to the very core of your being!
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 Reality, however, has a nasty way of intruding on the most special of moments. My friend arrives to take me for dinner but my ex has not yet collected the children. The place is unbelievably noisy. There is a ridiculous modern musical blasting from the television and Jarred is showing everyone his political song. The atmosphere is mildly crazy but very enjoyable. The ex hoots at the gate for the little ones. Unfortunately at this precise moment my father and brother decide to have a very heated altercation. I do not want my childrenâs father to hear or see anything about the argument (long story) so I rush the children out as soon as possible. It is a scene from a black comedy. The more I tell them that they must leave quickly, the more times they return to fetch something that they have forgotten. It is unbelievable! Finally they leave and I breathe a sigh of relief. My eldest sonâs girlfriend has been ushered into the cottage to escape the argument inside.  My friend and I leave, I tell Jarred where to hide the keys and I, naively, believe that I am due for a quiet and peaceful weekend.
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Dinner is uneventful except for when I go to the bathroom, get confused with the doors and end up exiting the ladies and entering a sushi restaurant that I hadnât been eating at. After the initial confusion, I make a hasty retreat and find my friend outside, waiting for me. While on my way to the bathroom I discover that Jarred has called me twenty-two times and I have finally heard the phone on the twenty- third try. He tells me that there is trouble at home and on top of this he has dropped my cottage keys into the cottage and cannot get them out. My friend and I end up getting into the cottage by unscrewing one of the security gates, at the same time releasing my Doberman who has been prisoner in the cottage for goodness knows how long. In the meantime I go to find my brother who has passed out in the garden and attempt to help him. The rest is a long, involved and futile story and is best ignored and forgotten.
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My peaceful Friday ends and I fall into bed and into a deep sleep.
I have big plans for Saturday. I am going to get myself out of debt. I will get up relatively late, go to the bank and draw the money. I will then pay off my clothing accounts, my T.V. and buy my daughter and my friend their birthday presents. I have, however, discovered that in life that you should never plan anything. Go with the flow. That way you can never be irritated! This I have discovered but unfortunately I have never actually learnt from it.
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I arrive at the bank. None of the banks at the mall have electricity. I swear, various expletives, under my breath and head off to the other mall. I think that I am very clever but at the same time have a sense of foreboding about what I will find at that bank. I am astounded beyond my normal ability to be astounded! The queues begin at the tellers inside the bank (far, far inside the bank), out the door and all the way down to Woollworths, which is about half a city block away. All the other banks have the same problem. I mutter some more swear words, this time including some obscenities about the state of the country and decide on retail therapy, which I most certainly cannot afford.  I head home, make a hubbly (yes, again) and tidy my flat. I am busy with this when my brotherâs weird girlfriend starts yelling out my name. Jarred is amazed to see me hurl myself across the room, jump out of my shoes and fling myself onto Katieâs bed, at the same time begging him to tell her that Iâm asleep. I close my eyes tightly, praying that she wonât come in. Jarred, the horror, lets me lie like that for a few minutes, choosing not to tell me that she is gone. I continue to hide for awhile then poor myself a glass of wine (yes, again), put on a load of washing, set up the ironing board and complete all my outstanding ironing. I am Superwoman! I am Wonder Woman! I am Mother! I put washing on the line and it rains! I am Exceedingly Irritated Woman.
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I, being so damn popular, have three invitations for Saturday evening. My haemorrhoids are agonizing at this stage and I decide I cannot go to the braai. I also donât feel like visiting the young obsessive phone caller. I decide to surprise my friend and go to him to watch a DVD. The evening is uneventful except for the fact that my eldest son keeps phoning me to yell about how unfair it is that he has to lift my middle son to a party. He rants about how far it is and how itâs unfair to use his girlfriendâs car. At about ten oâclock I go home and sit with Gary in the cottage until he leaves to fetch his girlfriend. I bath and, exhausted, climb into bed. The cell rings at 12.30. That dreaded call that will inform me that Jarred cannot get a lift home and I must fetch him. I am half asleep and ask Jarred to call me back with directions. Gary calls and tells me where to go. I put my dog in the car â she is astounded (as astounded as a dog can be) and we head off into the unknown, with a set of directions on my lap. I am in some God-forsaken place in the middle of the night but I eventually  find the place after a few more phone calls to Gary. I find the street but not the number. There is no number eighteen. Fortunately I am not alone in my stupidity as the taxi driver who has just arrived is also driving up and down the road in search of number eighteen. I find it, eventually, around the corner – something that must have slipped the minds of both my sons. I then spend about ten minutes outside waiting for Jarred to appear, anger causing all my arteries to pulse unusually. I cannot call him because, surprise, surprise, his phone is off! I cannot go in because I am in my pyjamas. I am on the verge of an embolism when he appears at the gate, glass in hand. I am irritated. I am tired. I tell him to throw the drink out. His friend then proceeds to vomit next to my car. I am petrified. He cannot puke in my car. He sits in the front, window wound down and proceeds to tell me, in a very elevated tone, how much he loves me and what a good person I am. I am almost deaf when we reach home. I flop into bed at 1.30 in the morning.
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Sunday – wonderful Sunday. I get up late. I go to breakfast with my friends. Have a wonderful Pina Colada (spelling) and then head home. I must go shopping for my friendâs present, but decide to go with him so he can choose it. Then we see a movie. I am relaxed for the first time in a week! He drops me at home. I iron the load of washing on the line and put on another load. The older boys are home and have toast, biscuits and dips for supper. This is my day, this is my moment, this is my time! I am tired. I am relaxed and I must preserve the last iota of strength that I have to begin this routine all over again!
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The conclusion of this pitiful but ultimately fulfilling tale – : I am tired, I am stressed but hey I do these things for the people that I love. I love and am loved and nothing is too much – although it sometimes seems that way.
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And Monday I want to start gym again! Wish me luck!
Karen Dosw
http://www.articlesbase.com/non-fiction-articles/a-week-in-the-life-of-the-single-working-mother-588052.html
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02 28th, 2009| 
