Not So Much

So we just get home from the girls' jazz and tap class from which I have been exactly one half hour late for two weeks in a row.

Such a long story, which ends up with me mortified when the teacher announces that they would practice jazz first next week because SOME people can't make it to class on time.

I apologized to the teacher and explained that I had the times mixed up, but I spent the next couple of hours wallowing in humiliation and self flagellation.

We get home and Brooke is screaming for milk, Emme is singing "Vinnie Valentine" at the top of her lungs and Celeste is desperately trying to do her homework in all of the noise and clatter while I try to make some dinner.

As fish sticks bake in the oven, I am trying to load the dishwasher when Brooke, who has abandoned her cup of freshly poured milk, decides to help me. I want to get this done, but she is insistent on helping. It's nice that she wants to help, but she is 21 months old and I am tired and my brain is fried and Emme is SO LOUD with her singing while Celeste is reciting her memory verse from school.

I can't take it anymore. The hackneyed saying "Calgon Take Me Away!" (really, when am I ever going to take a bath with Calgon no less?) is repeating itself over and over in my head. I snatch a cup away from Brooke who has put it in the dishwasher upside down and I yell at Emme to STOP SINGING! please.

It is silent for a blissful moment. Celeste grabs the opportunity to innocently recite her memory verse,
"Love is patient. Love is kind...."