Thank You for Not Sighing

Yes, I know we're behind schedule.

Again.

I knew we were behind schedule even before you started following me from room to room, only to stand there. Waiting. Silently.

And P.S.? Thank you for that. The silently waiting. Because if you were to audibly sigh, giving voice to your frustration, I would have to have to throat punch you. And then I'd probably feel bad and I'd have to take you to the emergency room and we would be really behind schedule.

I'm ready to go, now. Sort of.

I've been ready to go, sort of, since before you started following me from room to room, etc. It's just that about the time I was ready to go (sort of) the first time, I realized no one had fed the cat or cleaned his litter box.

So I fed and watered him. And cleaned his litter box.

And then I put everyone's breakfast dishes in the dish washer. Because I emptied the dishwasher right before I finished getting ready to go (sort of) the first time. Before you all finished breakfast. But that's beside the point.

Before that I had to round up the charging cords, double check to make sure I had the tickets, turn off the lights, sweep the floor, paint the hallway, re-roof the house, fell the tree, bale the hay, build the barn and check again for the tickets.

I wish I could be more spontaneous. I wish I could just walk out the door without a second thought.

But I can't.

Because I'm the Mom.

And if I don't feed and water the cat and clear the dishes, I will spend all day wondering how long it will take before the cat throws a fit and tears the house apart, or he at least jumps up on the counter and knocks all the dishes off. Or how long it will take before those dishes start growing mold and attracting bugs.

Or how disgusted the burglar will be when he breaks in and smells the dirty litter box and sees the moldy, bug-infested dishes scattered on the floor, and finds the cat happily stretched out on the counter, playing with the papers that should have been put in the recycling bin before we left.

Or how we will explain to the police that this is the mess the burglar made when he/she broke in, but that is the mess the cat made because we forgot to feed/water/clean his litter box, and there is the mess that we left on the table because we didn't want to be late.

And then the policeman will probably sigh.

And we'll really be late.

Double (Stuf) or Nothin'

The Health Food Tyrants have gone too far.

Have you seen a Double Stuf Oreo lately? I mean, have you actually taken the time to examine the ratio of mystery cream to bland cookie before stuffing it in your face?

There is no way Double Stuf are doubly-stuffed. They are barely single-stuffed.

Double Stuf? I don't think so.

A math teacher (with too much time on his hands) actually weighed and compared Double, Single and Thins in 2013 and – indeed – found that Double Stuf do not contain twice as much Stuf as Single Stuf. But that's not my point. My point is that Double Stuf don't contain as much Stuf as Double Stuf used to. I'd go so far as to say you have to eat double the Double Stuf to get half as much Stuf as Double Stuf used to have.

(BTW: Don't even get me started on “Thins” which look like someone whispered “stuf” from the other side of the factory as the stacks of cardboard cookie shapes were packaged.)

(While we're off the subject: Yes. I did walk five miles, uphill – both ways – through snow, while being chased by velociraptors to get to school.)

I did not buy Double Stuf Oreos because I was being health conscious. I did not buy Double Stuf Oreos thinking they were a low-calorie food. I did not buy a family-sized (Pfft! Family of pigmy mice, maybe!) package of Double Stuf Oreos, sneak them into the house under cover of darkness, hide them in the back of the cupboard behind the expired canned goods, then quietly open them at 6:30 a.m. after my morning workout while everyone else was sleeping, because I thought they were good for me.

No. That's what the bananas, which are conveniently located on the counter – splotchy brown and drawing fruit flies – are for. That's what the shriveled up apples in the crisper drawer are for. That's what the bag of mushy, liquifying, slightly grey and fuzzy . . . well, I'm not sure what it is/was . . in the veggie drawer is for.

You do not need a PhD in nutrition to know that Double Stuf Oreos (or any Oreos) are not a type of health food. Nothing that creamy and delicious, nothing that melts so delightfully on your tongue, leaving that slightly buttery, vaguely nauseating film in your mouth could be good for you. Without even looking at the package I could tell you the ingredients for that mysterious but crave-able filling are, most likely: sugar, sugar, fat, soylent green, and more sugar.

And I'm OK with that. In moderation. On occasion.

I bought this particular package of so-called “Double Stuf” cookies because I was feeling a little down and needed some comfort food. I needed to do a little emotional eating. I needed a chance to wallow in a bad food choice and then regret it and vow never to eat them again. Or until I was feeling blue again.

What was I sad about when I bought them? I have no idea. See? It worked.

Why am I sad now?

I'm out of cookies.

There's No Nest, Like an Empty Nest

It is 9 a.m. and I am alone in the house.

I have forgotten what silence sounds like.

There is no chatter from the other room. No laughter, no muttering. No radios. No doors opening and closing.

My car is the only one in the driveway.

The nest is empty.

There is no pitter-patter of workboots on the stairs, no hiss-bang of an air compressor, no smack-smack-smack of nail guns, no whirrrrrrrring of a radial saw.

The contractors are gone.

After an intense three-month push – a daily parade of electricians, drywallers, woodworkers, painters, insulation-ers, flooring-ers, and multi-taskers – the kitchen is finished and the contractors are gone. Work continued right up to the last minute to finish and polish, clean and stage for a builders' “parade of homes” – a sort of graduation party without the cake.

And now it is done.

I sit alone in my office – my office, not a corner of the living room, not a corner of The Princess's room/overflow storage – my office, sipping coffee I made in the kitchen – the kitchen, not the craft room/temporary kitchen, not The Princess's room/overflow storage/temporary office – the kitchen, basking in the delicious silence, and trying to remember how to think in solitude.

The cat, who has spent the last three months hiding under the bed from noises and strangers and strange noises is . . . well, hiding under the bed, because he is a cat, after all, and who knows why cats do anything. But now his movements are languid as he oozes out from under the bed skirt, stretches lazily, and saunters to the hallway. Despite his sanguine manner, his half-lidded stare, his lackadaisical yawn, there is an attentiveness to his posture as his sits, ears erect, keeping watch down the hallway, ready to growl and retreat at a moments notice.

And he is right.

They will be back.

A year-and-a-half into this project – beset with setbacks as are all remodeling projects – we are about three-quarters of the way done. A large portion of the basement ceiling is MIA, a casualty of plumbing and heating repairs, replacement and upgrades. There will be more insulation, more flooring, more painting, more air compressors and saws and nail guns.

This empty nest, like most, is welcome but fleeting.