Reality Revealed

Here I sit at 9:28PM on Sunday Night, looking at my "to-do" list and the 18 items left to be completed before sunrise. I am half-watching "Desperate Housewives" and flipping back and forth to FoxSouth in hopes that the Blue Devils are losing to the Terrapins. I know, some days I HATE DOOK more than I actually LOVE CAROLINA. This isn't one of those days, I am just hopeful.

I have been such a Bitch today. I took the boys to see the "Bodies Revealed" exhibit at the Greensboro Natural Science Center and it was truly astounding. A series of encased bones, brains, muscles and organs preserved from actual humans by a polymer process. Cross-sections of blood vessels and arteries so intricate that getting out of bed in the morning seems miraculous. (Duke 51, Maryland 49). Did you know that your heart beats 100,000 times a day and 36 million times a year? And that if you lived to be 70 your heart will have pumped 1,000,000 barrels of blood, enough to fill three supertankers? Well, you do now.

Of course, my boys were more interested in why the male pelvis bones were connected at "the privates" and the female pelvic bones were not. For the life of me I could not find a scientific way to tell them that, twice upon a time, that opening had allowed me to push out their ten-pound heads! The tour guide in the spiffy white lab coat told us that all of the human specimens on exhibit came from China, originally. Given that all of the bladders on display were at least twice the size of the stomachs under glass, it was obvious that these specimens had not come from the Deep South!

The boys handled the "Bodies" exhibit pretty well; it wasn't nearly as gross as we had feared. But during the other 9 hours they were awake today, I could have cut them into scientific specimens myself. When they were not bickering, they were belching and farting...out loud...in public...and laughing hilariously. And every time I asked them to do something, they either snorted or told me, "No!"....out loud....in public...and then smirked at each other. Which, if continued, will definitely make them gaseous, because I am going to staple their mouths shut and they will both be breathing out of their respective asses!

Actually, part of the problem could have been me. Some days I wake up like Ghandi, peaceful and full of gratitude, and some days I wake up like the UnaBomber, crazy, unpredictable and explosive. In the interest of full disclosure I can't take credit for this analogy; I swear to the Universal Being of Your Choice that I once paid a therapist $90 per hour to describe me in those exact terms. (Shit! Duke 71, Maryland 64....final score...it's been that kind of day.) If you read this blog, then you know that the term "elusive balance" follows my name in the address and that is not by happenstance. For me, balance is akin to planting your tail on a flagpole. There will not be many days that you are at one with the pole, sitting up pretty and straight, and there will not be many days that you are facedown in the grass. Which means you had best get accustomed to the adjusting...and today my ass muscles (a total of 26 in both cheeks) were hurting.

Oh well, tomorrow is Monday and I have just been informed via phone message from Dr. Rodney Shotwell, Superintendent of the Rockingham County Schools, that my hellions will be coming home tomorrow at 11:00 AM. And given that the almighty meteorologists are predicting an 80% chance of snow and ice for at least twenty-four hours, we are going to have a tremendous amount of quality time together this week. Stay tuned to see how we all adjust!