Mother's Day

Hubby has been out of town on business trips basically all of May. I don't say this as a "poor me" kind of thing - because basically life has gone relatively smooth (knock on wood) during his travels and because I genuinely just feel bad for him this time. I miss him, the kids miss him, I know he misses us - it just sucks and we're all just doing the best we can.

Partially because of this, I have now taken the kids TWICE in two weekends to the Mall of America. Clearly, I am not following our normal routine, because, well, it's disrupted with Daddy gone. And so I am overcompensating in some sort of giddy "we must do extra fun stuff!" and in a terribly materialistic way. Or, maybe I'm just craving China Island Chicken Salad from the Rain Forest Cafe. Not sure. Could be some of both.

Either way, here is a story for Mother's Day.

The Mall THIS weekend was far busier than it was last weekend when we went - probably by a factor of 5. Part of it is the annual Mother's Day Komen Race for the Cure hoopla at the mall. And no doubt, the chilly rainy weather. Even so because I'd promised and because we needed to buy things for Grandma and my stepdaughter's bio mom (Yes, we buy her presents for Mother's Day, her birthday and Christmas. That's just how it is.) we soldiered on into the busy mall.

The kids were very patient with the long lines to ride rides. We did our shopping with precision strikes: I knew just what I planned to get and we were in and out of Bath & Body pretty quickly despite long lines. No one fidgeted and no one complained. It went well, I thought.

It was all pretty smooth until I tried shopping for kid clothes at H & M. In case you don't have one in your town, it's this trendy Euro-style (well, it's a Dutch retailer) cheaply made stuff. It's Target prices (and less!) for trendy cute clothes. It's especially good for kids stuff. Super cute, super inexpensive. And, it's NEVER been busy in the kid's section when I've shopped there. It's mainly twenty-something waif like types that are lining up for the dressing room with a stack of size 0 white jeans, y'know?

In any case, after loading up with a couple of outfits each for the two older girls, we went to line up to pay. The line was longer than I've ever seen it - almost to the entry to the store. Just as we got in line and were talking to the woman just ahead of us: "Wow, long line.." a woman tapped me on the shoulder and said: "Actually I was in line before you." I noticed the woman I'd been talking to shook her head and shot me a dubious look, but I didn't get it. So, I backed my stroller up, let her in front of me and then she tried the same story on the next woman! Who then said: "Yeah right. Too bad. You can wait." So, instantly I knew I'd been had. Oh well, she had a big double wide Mall rental stroller, maybe she had fidgety kids that were younger than my 3, right? Uh, no. I finally noticed that she had no kids, no kid clothes, and the free mall stroller was stacked with shopping bags from several stores. She had no kids' store bags, just places like: Express, Bloomingdales, American Eagle, etc. Again, I just figured: "Oh well. Maybe her husband is off with the kids." But then I noticed (after all, we were in a LONG line, for like 15 minutes+) no wedding ring. Oh well. Whatever.

Then, as we got right up to cash registers another pretty 20-something type came up to her and they started chatting in a foreign language. Lady #2 had arms full of clothes she planned to buy, too - and a latte, which she was slowly dumping on the floor of the store in a lovely arc that splashed the front of my son's legs (until I rapidly backed up). An H & M employee ran over and started mopping it up, and that's when Lady #2 hopped right in line ahead of me. I said to the woman mopping up her spill: "I don't believe that. She just cut in line ahead of me. I've been behind the lady with the red stroller for over 15 minutes and her friend cut ahead!" The H & M woman looked at me sympathetically, but didn't say anything. And sure enough, when I finally got called to a register it was next to lady #2. And guess who was ringing her up? The poor woman who'd had to mop up her latte spill. The woman (the cashier) looked at me and said: "Some people are just like this. "
Sure enough moments later Lady #2 is yakking loudly into a cell phone in a foreign language and the cashier is saying: "Excuse me, Excuse me.. it says your card is being declined.." They tried 2 cards while I was there, and the whole time she's blabbing into her cell phone and paying no attention to the cashier. At last the cashier tells her the second card is also declined so she tries to rummage in her purse for cash to cover the amount. She starts telling the cashier: "Take this off. Oh, I only wanted that shirt. I think you charged me too much - that one was on a sale rack.." The poor cashier is left re-ringing up the sale and taking off merchandise. She looked over at me and met my eyes, then walked over momentarily under the guise of helping the young man bagging up our purchases and sighed very heavily.

Some people's children, eh? I left there feeling fortunate that I don't work at H & M.

And then, a quote from Lucy on the Eve of Mother's Day.

I was baking cookies for tomorrow's dessert at my SIL's house. One fell off the baking sheet as I was trying to get the sheet out of the hot oven. It was stuck in a way that if I closed the oven door, it would squish cookie and M & M pieces in between the door in a hard to reach place. So, I tried to use tongs and chopsticks to get the bits out to prevent a messier clean up. Lucy watched me and shook her head and said:

"Man, I am SO glad I am not a Mommy. I wouldn't want to do THAT job!"

Oh Lucy-loo, if only you knew. Cleaning up cookie crumbs from the oven isn't so bad. In fact, it beats a million other mommy jobs I've done: like holding you when the nurse takes blood from your arm, or coaching you through painful constipation, or cleaning up your puke in the (then) brand new minivan. And still, I'd gladly do it all again and then some to snuggle next to you tonight and have you whisper: "I love you Mommy".