From the Mom Who Doesn’t Have It All Together

Dear Diary (early September edition),

It is approximately day 184 of quarantine. I think we are holding it together. In fact, I was so full of thinking I “had it all together” that I completed two Zoom calls and recorded a birthday message for a good friend’s upcoming birthday last week. As I tucked my kids into bed, I gave myself a pat on the back, and I thought to myself, “look at you…. you have it all together.” I worked my day job, exercised, made three square meals a day for my family of four, scheduled my daughter’s math tutor, and facilitated “virtual learning” for my two school-aged kids.

Then I got ready for bed. I realized that, during my two Zoom calls and recorded birthday message, my shirt was on backward. Great! After deciding I should stick to my normal uniform of yoga pants or pajamas, I drifted off to sleep. We woke up two hours later to smelling smoke in our house, but we couldn’t determine where it was coming from. The fire department came and apparently our beloved, often ignored, turtle’s water filter was overheating and smoking. Even Donatello (ie beloved turtle) is looking for a way out of this house! Don’t worry, the turtle will end up in our will because he will live forever (footnote: we assume the turtle is a he. This has not been confirmed). Luckily, we caught the problem before it became an issue… kids didn’t even wake up with all the chaos. And turns out, I went to high school with one of the firefighters, who I haven’t seen in 20 plus years.

So, that was Wednesday. Highlights from Thursday include talking to a reality TV show producer and patiently waiting on hold for almost two hours with our refrigerator manufacturer. It’s been 6 weeks, and apparently, they are really pleased with my patience, and they will get back to me as soon as they can. Don’t hold your breath. It’s a breezy 114 here, so any chance we had to keep food cold was averted because said refrigerator isn’t working.

In the meantime, we got a new fridge because we couldn’t handle or afford to constantly eat out. Still waiting to see if the other fridge will get fixed (they tried five times) or finally just give us a refund. Also, we found out that August was the hottest month ever recorded in Phoenix, and the second hottest month ever recorded was July.  My kids will be online learning for the foreseeable future, and we are adding to my list of things I am unqualified for:

• #1 not a 6th-grade teacher
• #2 not a third-grade teacher

We are grateful for our health and safety, and I hope when I look back at this post a year from now, I can laugh as hard as my neighbor did when I told her this story.