The Terrible, Horrible, No Good, Very Bad Day

It was a terrible, horrible, no good, very bad day.

And I'm far from perfect. Especially when I'm as tired as I am right now. I really hope that it is just the beginning of a new school year and not enough sleep. And that it's been pretty emotional. Gabby has cried nearly every day that I've dropped her off for school. She gets in line before the bell rings and seems happy to be at school. Then the bell rings and her teacher comes out and she smiles and starts to walk toward the door...and then she stops, grabs onto my leg and cries softly and asks me to take her to my school and not to leave her. Every morning I have to drag her to her locker, put her backpack away and then remove her from my leg and hand her over to her teacher. It's painful. It wasn't like this with my other two at all. She ends up liking school and she says she has friends. She must be okay once I leave because her Spanish teacher selected her as the Student of the Week this week. But boy it's exhausting and emotionally draining for me...and it means that I only make it to my school 10 minutes before the bell rings each day. It makes for terrible, horrible, no good, very bad mornings. I think we should move to Australia.

This morning as I was driving, I was not paying as close attention as I should have and hit a curb and shredded my tire. I have never done anything like that before. It happened right as I was getting on the freeway...and I could tell pretty quickly that I wasn't going to make it far...so had to pull over and sure enough my tire was ruined. My kids began to cry because they were going to be late for school. I was shaking. I called Alfredo and he came and gave me his car and changed the tire and took my car... this wasn't an easy feat because the spare tire is stored under the van, not in the trunk, and even with help from a wonderful incident management guy it took them nearly an hour to get it all taken care of. My kids were late. I was late. It was a terrible, horrible, no good, very bad way to start the morning. It wouldn't have happened if I were vacationining in Australia.

There was more bad news after school. A faculty meeting with bad news. Terrible, horrible, no good, very bad news (okay so not that terrible. No one died or lost their jobs. But I'm sticking with my theme here. :))

Then this evening, I came home and began cleaning and cooking and I watched my friend's kids. I mowed the lawn. I seriously must be stressed because I come home from work and look forward to mowing the lawn...I mowed the front lawn on Wednesday and the back lawn tonight. Alfredo said he'd do it tomorrow, but I begged him to let me. Not only that but I can hardly stand the thought of cooking dinner, but I have baked cookies and have been dying to make zuchini bread. I rarely come home from work and bake.

Then at 9 PM tonight, I glanced at my caller ID and saw that the missionaries had called. And then it hit me. Not only did I ruin my tire and cause my whole family stress this morning...but I was supposed to take dinner to the missionaries tonight. Alfredo wasn't going to be home, so we couldn't have them over for dinner, but I was going to drop dinner off. And with everything that went on this week, I totally forgot. See. Far from perfect. Thank goodness tomorrow is a new day. Maybe with a little sleep and a 3 day weekend, I can get a grip and stop craving baked goods and lawn mowing. Maybe my brain will start to function properly again. I sure hope so. I can't handle many more terrible, horrible, no good, very bad days.

I love this quote I saw on Facebook..."On particularly rough days when I'm sure I can't possibly endure, I like to remind myself that my track record for getting through bad days so far is 100%. And that's pretty good." This too will pass. Tomorrow will be better. Tomorrow I will be better. (And if it's not, I'm definitely moving to Australia.)

But some days are like that. Even in Australia.

*Post is loosely based on the book Alexander and the Terrible, Horrible, No Good, Very Bad Day by Judith Viorst. However, it is not fictionalized. These events really ocurred. (But I recognize that really it wasn't that terrible or horrible...not a good day, but I know that I am still very blessed and should stop complaining.)