Screw balancing act. My life is like a seesaw. And it’s not like those spring mounted teeter totters our precious children have now that rock up and down ever so smoothly either. No, it’s more like the wooden kind that always gave you inner thigh splinters and would send you flying six inches into the air every time your big brother brought his side down as fast as he could and then crashed hard when he’d suddenly jump off.
I’ve been feeling like I’ve been riding high on the work side of the teeter totter while my poor, neglected children and house were left bumping up and down on the dirt ground. Their side has been weighted down with piles of tasks left undone and the ensuing chaos. What’s that? Enough with the see saw metaphor? Okay, fine.
I’m constantly brainstorming ideas to make multitasking more efficient. Of course the brainstorming then becomes just one more thing that I’m doing which probably defeats the purpose, but I cannot turn it off. My latest idea was to set the kids up with some outdoor play while I tended to our poor overgrown property. What could be easier or more obvious?
“Hey, guys. Why don’t I fill up the water table and you can play with those new squirters you got in your loot bags the other day?”
It was right after school and I figured I could spare some time before I need to think about dinner to tackle the jungle of weeds growing between our chain-link fence and the neighbour’s garage.
But Mary was already ahead of the program, elbow deep in the muddy rain water that had pooled in the sandbox side of the water table because the lid was left off. I scooted her aside and tipped the table in an effort to drain the excess water. You might say too little, too late, but I say that shirt looks better with mud splatters anyway.
I went around to the side of the house to turn the water on and by the time I returned Colum had already unraveled the hose by which I mean he had yanked it off the hanger so it lay in a tangled heap on the ground. He was holding the nozzle, arms straight out and moving from side to side and water was spraying everywhere.
“What are doing?” I was verging on screeching. “Stop squeezing it!”
“I’m not squeezing it,” he said. “The water just keeps shooting out.”
I took the hose from him and, yep. We had a water shooting out situation all right. Finally, after much adjusting, I managed to slow it down to an aggressive trickle when we weren’t squeezing the nozzle. I washed out the water table that is supposed to adjoin the sandbox and, having learned my lesson from last year, propped it up on the wagon instead. (Keep the water supply away from your sandbox. Trust me.)
Then I got out the giant jug of bubble solution I bought in a moment of amnesia and poured some into a plastic bowl because I still knew the odds of it not spilling were nil. I fished out various bubble wands and sand and water toys. I set it all up in the backyard.
Then I took Mary down to the basement and found the needle-nose pliers that double as wire cutters and returned to do one medium-sized task I’ve been meaning to take care of for years. I needed to cut away and remove the useless chain-link fencing that ran right up against our neighbour’s garage so we could get at the weeds and possibly find a way to prevent them from growing.
I spent 20 minutes setting the children up with outdoor activities and they spent exactly five minutes playing before declaring themselves “bored” and going inside. Without any older sibs to entertain her, Mary came toddling out to the back lane to see if she could get hit by a car.
I scooped up Mary and brought her inside to watch TV for five minutes so I could just finish this one bloody thing please and thank you. I returned to the fence and looked for my pliers. They weren’t there. I looked on the patio table. No. The stroller? The sandbox? The wagon? The steps? The back porch? No, no, no, nope and no way. I went inside and scoured the back entryway/mud room/laundry room. No dice. I searched the kitchen and the dining room. I went back outside and then back in. I became convinced someone had stolen them. Then I thought it was maybe unlikely that someone was lurking around the back lane waiting for just the perfect opportunity to steal my needle-nose pliers and nothing else.
I searched for five, ten, fifteen minutes and was just about to give up. Then I found them, balanced precariously and camouflaged on an iron railing.
Happy ending! I finished removing the fence! I have yet to pull up any weeds and there are still bubble wands littered around the yard, of course. But I don’t have the half hour of set-up time to do any more five minute jobs right now.