We were attempting to meet at a mall north of Boston that's in between where we both live--I live on the south side of the city and she lives a bit north. It was supposed to be an easy 20 minutes or so for both of us. I texted her when I left, so you can understand why she called me to check in about an hour later.
At that point, her son hadn't wanted to nap in the morning, so she was desperately pushing him around the mall in his stroller because he'd protest as soon as the motion stopped. I, on the other hand, was reluctantly still in motion in my car because I was so tired and braindead when I got into the car that I headed to the wrong mall. And I headed there without the GPS because Anil is working in Worcestor this month and has it in the other car. So I was navigating with Google maps on my iPhone, but only at red lights because Oprah's "no phone zone" series has made me too scared to even look at my phone while driving now that I have precious baby cargo in the back seat. I realized I was going the wrong way about half way there, then found myself driving through Harvard Square and taking a route through complete suburbs for the next hour, only to finally get onto I-95 for literally one minute until I took the exit for the mall. Then, of course, it was right in front of me, and I could see how ridiculously easy it would have been to get there if I'd had my brain locked in from the start. The saving grace was that Maya slept on and off for most of that fiasco.
I'd refused to call my poor friend who was circling the mall waiting for me, because I couldn't acknowledge that this was all happening. I was afraid that if I admitted that I was turning around in a suburban dog park when I was supposed to get to the mall an hour ago, and that I was about to pee in my pants but couldn't just run into a gas station anymore (more like hobbling in carrying Maya's car seat--I kind of shuffle like Igor in "Young Frankenstein"), I'd lose whatever semblance of determination and sanity I was pretending I still had.
But seriously, why is it always such a disaster? It seems like I can't do anything simply anymore. Any time I try to "wing it," pandemonium strikes. Then when I try to plan it, everything still blows up. When I finally got to the mall, it felt like it was 105 degrees in there (post on my abnormal temperature range to come... ooh something to look forward to, right?), which made Maya fussier than usual. I wore her in the Bjorn so that I could keep my friend's son in motion while she tried to find what she needed, and it worked for him, but Maya wasn't so content, and it didn't help either of them that I kept running us into racks of clothing and sides of dressing rooms. My friend didn't find what she needed, and we were both too frazzled to get to really talk.
After we called it quits, I took the interstate home, thinking it'd be an easy drive, but taking 95 bypassed where I live completely and I ended up like 20 minutes further south, so I still had to backtrack through a different suburb to get home. Oh, and even though I fed Maya before we left the mall, she screamed the whole way. You know how they torture prisoners sometimes by blasting rock music? They should just put them in a car with a recording of my screaming baby.
I just thought I'd write a bit on an example of the complete disaster scenario that's now a normal part of life, lest you, Internet, think it's all cute hair styles and giggles for us. It's not bad. It's just normal new motherhood insanity. Anil and I try to do a lot with Maya, and I go nuts when I'm home too much, so I end up setting out on the town with little M a lot, and sometimes it goes great, and sometimes it all falls apart. Usually it's a combination of both.
No comments:
Post a Comment