Not IT

"Bubble gum, bubble gum in a dish, how many pieces do you wish?" the kids chanted to see who was IT in their game of Hide n' Seek this past weekend.  I remember singing/chanting this so many times when I was a kid, especially running around playing outside in the summer.


We got a taste of summer this past weekend and it was, um, amazing.


There was so much sunscreen at the baseball game it smelled like the beach.  

The kids were outside more than inside this weekend.  They fell into their beds beyond exhausted each night.


We even took out the pool. The kids seemed unfazed by the freezing cold hose water.  

I mean it was a warm 85 degrees, but that water was damn cold.


That taste of summer was good and needed. Last week was intense.  


It all started with Mother's Day, which is a great holiday, really.  But I am so not a holiday kind of gal.  I mean I like the whole idea behind holidays, but I get so uncomfortable, so uneasy.  Maybe it's having expectations, possibly being let down, possibly not doing enough--it's just too much.  


Then the week involved a horrible, god damn awful stomach flu.  


Lying down without the energy to stop my two-year-old from spraying the couch with his Gogurt or to break up the WWF re-enactment my boys were doing in my living room, was making me crazy.  With Gogurt dripping from my already dirty couch and two of my three boys crying, I lost it.  I was in charge, I was IT and I so didn't want to be IT.


Nothing was good.  I was going to the dark side.  No joke.


I couldn't see past the darkness that was the moment--my dark Gogurt moment.  It was more than the silly yogurt kids like to slurp out of a plastic tube of course.  It was stress.  Stress of life not going exactly how you wanted or planned or both.  It was disappointment.  Disappointment of mistakes made over and over.  The pace of life.  The unfairness of it all.  The lack of sleep.  The utter exhaustion of making it all work and then it doesn't work.  


But then, the sun came out.  I had a long, amazing talk with my brother who helped me see past the darkness and get out of my funk.  The sun came out and I watched the kids play games and be silly and have fun.  And it felt like everything was going to be okay.


Just as I was starting to sing "I can see clearly now the rain is gone..." Tim, my husband, started to go dark.  Not only with the stomach flu, but also the negative doom and gloom.  The whole "why do we work so hard and have it not work out?" feeling.  The feeling that makes you wonder what the hell the whole point is anyway.


Me going dark?  Normal.  Tim going dark?  The world just might indeed be ending.


Luckily, we hardly ever go dark at the same time and we are usually pretty good about lifting each other up.  So, when he needed it, I was ready.  When he needed a what's the point, what's next, why are we doing it all answer here is what I texted him:


Buying a house and renovating it, backyard parties with he neighborhood, being the backyard all the kids want to go to, watching our kids grow up safe and smart and kind with good values, coaching more and stressing less, traveling a little, getting away alone for a weekend or two the next 15 years, being in love and feeling lucky that we get to share all of this together and not alone.  Together because we are soul mates and the great loves of our lives.


We can get through our tough moments.  And the thing is, we just might be stronger because of the tough, dark moments, even those scary dark Gogurt moments.

And the the little taste of summer was indeed just what we needed.  Sunshine, playing outside for hours, bike rides, baseball, ice cream on the porch, running through sprinklers...oh man, it's going to be good.

Here is something else that is good.  I love Fresh Prince and I love Will Smith (even with all that slapping business going down right now) for honoring his roots. Ch-ch-check it out. I especially love how EVERYONE knows all the words to the Fresh Prince theme song/rap.  Life is indeed good again.