Mired

For the past few days, I have been completely wrapped up in the kids’ playroom-turned-office. This has been a Production. I’m still not where I want to be, but I’m working quickly. You know that stage of a project in which things look completely chaotic, far worse than they did before you started? Yeah, well, we were there, and I had to keep pushing as hard as I could, because that is nota place I want to be when my parents get here this weekend.

Oh, yes; I know how to schedule my time and energy.

Right now, the kids’ workroom is getting closer to where it’s going to be; there are still things in there that need to come out, and a few surfaces that need emptied, and we need to get the computer hooked up in there, but it’s at least mostly usable space. The living room, on the other hand, was collateral damage. Sam’s desk that was in here needed to be taken upstairs, and so it needed to be cleaned out first, and…let’s just get the mental image of the whole “Snakes in a Can” gag, or perhaps a clown car spouting out passenger after unlikely passenger, because good GRAVY, I don’t see how all this madness was contained in that little wooden desk. It’s not all fitting back in there, certainly – not that it needs to, after having filled almost two large garbage bags as I emptied it. And there are still large piles, even now that the trash has been removed and the pens, pencils, crayons, glue bottles (we had six!), and other items have been organized into the craft cart. Yikes.

(But let me take a moment to just stand in amazement that I am the mother of a kid who can actually help lift and carry a heavy wooden desk up two flights of stairs. Of course, the same son collaborated with another boy just older than him yesterday in maneuvering a few other mid-sized pieces of play furniture into the back of a car without so much as being asked to, so maybe it’s not so shocking, but it continues to be so to me.)

So, I press on. And Gabe is a little confused but game about the how and why of all this commotion; he knows that it’s related to his starting school, and he knows that he’ll be doing more Work in the near future, but he’s still trying to fill the emptied desk drawers with toys and to decide whether he’s willing to let Sam continue to work at the desk, now that it’s been declared community property.

Back to work!