things you cant make up....

First day home. I can feel my feet, and fingers for the first time in a week. numbness from cold has passed, and it appears there is no permanent damage. phew!...


But let me tell you what's really cool? What's really cool...is when you get a great nights sleep in your own bed. Ahhh bliss…or when you wake up to the smell of your favorite coffee, AND you open the fridge to find you still have some creamer…happiness…pure delight and happiness… and then (here's the really, really cool part...) you walk into your home office and water drips on your head. So you look up and see several water puddles throughout the office…running along beams and seams in the sheetrock…which is where your #2’s bathroom happens to be located. But she’s left for school.

Welcome home, Welcome home!

I race up the stairs and nothing. No water, no remnant of water, not even the slightest bit of humidity or dampness. Relief. momentary though, because I still have to find the leak.

My man and i survey the damage. (see pics) and call the insurance company. We make the claim; turn off all water to the house from the street. Concede that we will evidently not be having showers, or washing clothes (ah shucks!) and wait for plumber friend to show up.

I’m thinking, well…maybe we make lemonade outta these lemons and we fix it ourselves and have some extra money towards floors…or college…or groceries. Whatever.

My man, thinks this is ridiculous, and we will NOT be attempting my ,”home improvement, make some money off of this deal and ½ *ss it” plan. We will call a plumber, and we will wait on insurance adjuster. And then, and only then, we will discuss what the next step will be.

Ohhhh kayyyyy….DREAM CRUSHER!!!

So, plumber shows up. 2 of them…(sadly, 1 of them remembers me right away from another plumbing incidence a year and half ago when he came out to replace a toilet upstairs when our 8 year old niece dropped an old cell phone in the toilet, flushed it, and then “forgot” to tell us! That’s another story all together…) He cuts ceiling, sees dampness and water. Tests pipes, nothing. Other guy runs up stairs, turns on all water faucets, shower heads, flushes toilets…nothing. Guy 1, tells guy 2 I think we should cut a HOLE in the sheet rock behind bathroom (which is my guest room) and see if they are leaking on that side. Whooooooaaaaaaa….hold up there pilgrim. Let’s keep this project contained to the office ceiling…no need to cut holes in the wall! (unless of course I can get new flooring out of it? no?)

Next sound I hear is a saw. Like a real loud saw. I walk outside, and try and go to my happy place…only I can’t find it…and it’s not happy this place I find…it’s far more like my, “oh-mi-gosh-can-this-really-be-happening-today-because-this-really-sucks-i-think-i-need-a-margarita!” place. Um, hello God, I don’t even like lemonade, I was just trying to be positive in 2011. But I’m past that now. Way past! Like so far past that I can’t even remember why I wanted to be that person. Stupid positive people. Booyah – come and live this life!! That’s what I’m sayin’!!!

3 hours and 30 minutes later, the owner of the plumbing company is in my home, a roofer friend has driven by, and naturally, stops in to be a part of the commotion as well. (great! What’s next the local news?) Hell, why not? Throughout this day they have all asked several times…”any chance someone overflowed the toilet?” Me – “no, we’ve been gone for a week, and #2 didn’t mention anything. I can text her and ask.” So I do. And she says, “No.” end of story. Now, back off my girls! I'm starting to get a little mama bear-ish! Mess with the bull...you get the horns, ya know what I'm sayin'?

We (3 plumbers, 1 roofer, and me-Texas mom on verge of breakdown with bad hair and no Chi) decide to leave ceiling open, let it dry out, and just go from there. Gee, this is great news…I have holes in my ceiling and chunks of wall missing. Love the idea of rodents and other critters roaming in my home throughout the night. Total set up for a great night’s sleep. Can’t wait. You guys really know how to make a girls day! Shoot me now please!

As they leave, plumber guy #1 says, “Ya know, weird things happen with girls (be careful buddy....). You might just wanna check with them and make sure no-one did anything with water or something. Ya just never know.”

I smile and say, “Will do!” and then under my breath (weirdo!) like, seriously, I know my girls. If they had a “water incident” they would tell me, and they sure the heck wouldn’t get it cleaned up correctly, and they would definitely leave wet towels, etc…. I can generally track their movements like serial killers…they leave telling signs everywhere they go. It’s in their genes. (not my genes of course!! His genes-my man's!)

But…this guy, he's got me thinking...#2 is very concrete.  If you ask her a direct question she answers directly.  for instance: Did the toilet overflow? answer: no.  she doesn't think beyond that question, like, "hmm...i wonder why momma would ask me that?..."it's over for her.  i asked. she answered. the end.

Just to be able to say, “I did.” I text #2, (*now the following text is verbatim, it will help you appreciate what i live with...)

Me:“hey-#2, water leak in office, any chance you overflowed toilet? Or tub? We can’t figure it out?”


#2: “no to toilet, BUT, maybe the bathtub, cleaned it all up though! Didn’t think it’d be a big deal. See you when I get home. LOVE you! Sorry”


Me: tub overflowed? Define overflow? Water on carpet?


#2: yes (c'mon now...you have got to be kidding me..."yes". no explanation!?)


Me: hallway? Bathroom?


#2: Tile in bathroom, and at crease where carpet and tile meet


Me: an inch?


#2: height or on the carpet?


Me: BOTH!!! (it's OK, it's ooooohhh kaaayyyy, put the gun down...slowly...take deep breaths...)


#2: carpet went out into the hall like an inch and height was about 1 cm-1/2 cm


Then…


Between one and half and one cm, not one and half


Me: (sent picture of ceiling in current state) um, you’re gonna want to come home soon :), we’ve got some clean up to do!


#2: (she's seen the picture now...)Please tell me that wasn’t my fault…;(, I love you mom, so much! <3


Me: Come home, so I can show you how much I love you….:)


#2: ok, ...I’d like to live to see tomorrow:)



Ya know, I’d like to lead a normal life. Nothing too fancy, or nice. Just normal. I’d like some extra money, not a lot, just a little. I’d like it to rain chocolate for a week straight and for all bread products to be low fat and good for me in large quantities. I’d like a lot of things….but we don’t get what we like. We get what we get. I'm adjusting. I'm bitter, but I'm adjusting!!

But let me tell you what #2 is getting...an exciting lesson in painting…and sheetrocking…and texturizing…and loss of money for projects you don’t want to pay for, but get to in life because…well, that’s life!…and that’s how you get to see tomorrow if you are her and you live with me!

For the record, I’m not telling the plumber. I’m not lying, I’m just not offering any words on this subject...EVER! Don’t give me that lying by omission crap. I’m doing the best I can. How much more shame can a mother take? I'm only human ya know…

But I am mighty…and

I am strong…and

I will take her…

xoxo~

Pen

the night before (or kinda the morning of?) the journey...part 1

She's leaving me. It's here. the day has come. 
I'm totally freaking out here.
seriously.
Today is the day, (or the night before the day, which its actually the day, since it's 2:30 a.m.)its loading up to take #1 to college. in Colorado. tears for sure! - like they are on demand!!  but first let me give you some perspective..
At 2:40 am as I lay my head down to sleep, I hear giggling and squealing from upstairs.  I'm like, seriously? were leaving for Dallas in less than 10 hours. So i get out of my comfy bed  with my "mom face" on ready to deal...as I go upstairs I find #1 and #2 wide awake, packing, sorting and laughing. i do what any normal mom would do at 2:40 am...I take pictures.  #1 has become quite the packer.  She has packed everything you can possibly imagine.  There are bins. space saver bags (who even knew she had heard of these?), trunks, suitcases etc.   I gently remind her that the school she's heading to has allotted her all of 26 INCHES for hanging clothes and a small 3 drawer dresser/nightstand. 
She's got this. "Don't worry mom! And don't start freaking out!" (nice.) and follows this up with a deep sigh (as if I'm the over packer?! go figure!!)...and starts to tell me that she has a plan: under-the-bed roll away storage. (big cutesy grin) 3m hooks. (duh?!) trunks as foot boards. (she smiles that smile that says, "I'm brilliant! back off mom!")  You name it, she has a thought for it.  This is where mother/daughter words could erupt. I have many. Its 3:00 am. I weigh my options. give my own deep, guttural, slow sigh...and show maturity. and refrain.  20 points for ME! yay!
...but then i spot my CHI IRON.
This changes everything. It's on now. And I can take her. We do the whole "i know, that you know, that i just saw that, and you think you're taking this prized possession" look at each other, and end with both eyes on the CHI.
I'm holding steady.  pulled out my toughest, most pathetic, wounded mom look.
She holds tight. She's not a "caver-in-er"either.  Whips out her raised eyebrows, pouty lips, and tilts her head kinda funny to the side look.
I'm like, "NO way."Child,  you have lost your mind!!” (OMG, I’m turning into that angry black woman I read about in the paper the other day…)


She’s like, “mom, it’s my hair!”

“What about my hair?” (Am I arguing over my hair? Really? This is what it’s come to? They’re trying to kill me by making me crazy. I swear it. You read it here first.)

“But you can share with #2!”

For the record…#2 does not share well! I feel this whole argument slipping from my grasp, and my CHI (for crying out loud!!)…I quickly avert my eyes from #1 to scan the room and determine if there are any other items that are about to leave my home. I need leverage. Bargaining power. Quick scan around her room yields hair bands, some “girl” razors, and… a box of tampons (which is a HUGE commodity in our home. If you have teenage girls you totally get this!) . Oh, no! Uh-uh. It’s on now. (think: I am mighty. I can do this. You own her.)
Now hear me out: I know this doesn’t seem like a big deal, but it is. It is not uncommon in my home to trade a tampon for a hair band-or vice versa . They are THE 3 things in our home, that on any given day, regardless of how many you have purchased (and trust me, we suck it up and go the Sam’s Warehouse route!!), you cannot find when you need them. Now don’t sigh, and say, “Why don’t you just buy everyone their own?”
WE DO!
We buy them in the jumbo quantity. In multiple packages. For every long haired, estrogen filled being who lives here, or stays for more than 24 hours. It’s like when you were buying diapers and formula. You buy them and just like that they are gone! Hair bands, tampons and “girl” razors are like a form of currency around here. But the CHI, well the CHI is like the $100 bill.
My man likes to say that when he realized he was having two girls, he should have just thrown every dime into Playtex stock. We went from Playtex bottles, to Playtex tampons. Neither is cheap. (Note to self – this could make for a good birthday gift for him! Duh, Playtex stock! Totally wish I would have thought of this before!!)…anyways, back to the story…
I am feeling a little "cold hearted." A wee bit guilty. I mean, we are from Texas. Good hair is like completely expected from a Texas girl. What kind of mature mother fights her daughter for a Chi? Like maybe, just maybe, I should just cave in and let her take it...and the “girl” razors, and the tampons, and the hair bands….and my money, and my heart…sigh…is there no end to this loss? This giving up? They just strip you down…piece by piece. Moment by moment. Tampon by tampon. Sad.

But… nonetheless, I cave. She wins. I tell myself this is just losing a battle to win the war. Right? I will win the war won’t I?

I tell her she can go on and take it, (just take it all I think to myself!) and she squeals (literally!), “thank you momma! Thank you! Thank you!”

I’m a sucker. I knew it the day she was born.

As I leave the room, (mourning the loss of my personal belongings, and thinking of how will I EVER negotiate with #2 to gain CHI access on a regular basis…sigh…), #2 pipes up and gently throws out, “uhm, mom?”

“uhhh, yeeeessssss.”

“Just want to remind you that I’m ready for that car you promised me, anytime you and dad are ready to buy it for me….just sayin’.” Cutesy smile. Flips her head to the side.

I just keep on walking. Play deaf….and dumb. And sleepy.

Takers. They’re all takers. Start hiding your things now, and be crafty!! Kids these days are smart.

Xoxo~

Pen

P.S. – please refrain from any bad hair comments for the next 6 months. I thank you in advance.


(To be continued....)