sisyphus in my own back yard

Yesterday, the angst that has been building all week came to a head. When I get angsty, I need to get outside and dig in the dirt, plant flowers, turn compost, whatever. The day showed promise early on; you know, sun breaking through the clouds and all that. I lingered over coffee, finished a book, headed out to the garage for my gardening tools. As soon as I unlocked the garage door, thunder crashed and a wall of rain hit the pavement.

Okay, it wasn't quite that dramatic, but it might as well have been. So I sighed one of those long-suffering sighs and headed back in. I decided to be optimistic about the whole thing, and poured another cup of coffee. The sun came out. I headed outside. See above. Rinse. Repeat.

Back to the whole angst thing. Like I said, it's been building all week. The kids and I have been working in the back yard, building raised beds for an herb garden, digging into the hill to lay a patio. The wheelbarrow perched precariously on the hill no matter which way I tilted it, and so for every successful load of dirt carted to the compost pile, another tiiiiiiiiips back into the hole with a boomcrash. Just like Sisyphus, only my rock is a flippin' wheelbarrow. Anyway, that's what I'm working on, shovel in hand, sweat pouring off me, when I hear the sound of 4 boys, all around 12 years old, giggling and saying, "heeeeeere, kitty kitty." I look up and see them crouched around a car, rocks and very large sticks in hand. I should mention that I don't lose my temper often. But the few things that make me see red involve bullying and cruelty to animals and children. I charged up the hill with shovel in hand, screaming at the top of my lungs, red faced and, quite likely, frightening to look at. MixMan and Miss Diva paused briefly in their playing and stared, gape mouthed. The boys and cat scattered in opposite directions. There was a brief moment of silence, and then Miss Diva said, "Mama. You said the f-word."

Whoopsie.

So when I found the pet rat dead on my front porch yesterday morning, I just assumed the little 12 year old punks had left it there, even after the neighbor who disposed of it declared the predator must have been a hawk. Miss Diva and I headed to the garden center to buy some flowers to cheer us up, and came away successful. The day was brightening, at least until I bent to get into the car and smacked my head on the roof. My immediate reaction was to jerk away, and I bonked the other temple on the door. I showed great restraint in the language I spewed at full volume there in the parking lot, you'll be happy to know. I double checked with Miss Diva, and she confirmed I hadn't cursed once. Good thing I've been practicing with make-up, because I have a positively stellar bruise on the side of my forehead.

Firefighter Girl, thy middle name is Grace.

Miss Diva is adept at conversation. So much so that I forget sometimes she's only 4. She sang in the shower this morning, some made up song with the refrain, "I'm a grumpy old soul, yeah, yeah!!" I shake my head in wonder. She is so demonstrative, too- huge hugs, sloppy lip-gloss kisses. Sometimes, she comes up behind me, pats my tuckus rather hard, and says affectionately, "I love your great big butt!"

Ohh. Thank you.

So we wait for the rain to pass. The kids play Plinko behind the futon with the round wooden coasters; MixMan builds impossible block towers and reads Dr. Seuss out loud, vrooms his cars and trains on the floors and up the walls. Miss Diva flounces around in her princess dresses and crooked crowns. She declares today a blue day, and will wear only clothing items in shades of blue. I write poetry, listen to music, clean muddy footprints and puddles of water from the doorways, sneak bites of chocolate from my hidden stash while the kids aren't looking.

On the Meth Central Med Center front- my IV skills are getting better, and I've managed a couple of tough ones on the maternity and surgical wards. I was congratulating myself on a tough foot stick in the ER- this guy had one, and I mean only one, vein, and it was sitting there on his foot, and I stuck it with no hesitation with a 22g, got a great flash, advanced, it was in, I was ready to tape it down, and he started screaming. Whoa. I wasn't even touching the damn thing at that point. There was a reason he didn't have any other veins, and I'm pretty sure he was hoping for some pain drugs, and I let him know that this was his one chance for IV meds, and he told me to f--- off and get it out. So I calmly removed the catheter, smiled politely, and left him there.

My new car is finally growing on me. Well, not really, because that would be kind of bumpy and make jeans even harder to wear. But I'm learning its moods, when it doesn't like starting, what makes it happy.

Going really, really fast makes my car happy.

Itemized list of things found behind the futon while vacuuming today:

2 slightly battered wooden coasters
1 catnip mouse
feather collection (I thought the pillows were feeling a bit less plump)
1 gameboy game (Yoshi's Egg, I believe, and it found its way behind the couch rather forcibly when MixMan got frustrated with it)
2 markers in colors very similar to the fresh markings on the wall of the stairwell
1 very frightened cat
2 hairballs

Guess what? The sun just came out. I think I'll sneak up on the garage, see if I can get some digging done in the back yard.

Firefighter Girl. Digger of hills, champion of stray cats and snails.