My Relief

There is a certain time each day when I have a silent mental breakdown. It happens like clockwork, and usually between the hours of 5:00 and 6:30 in the evening. I can usually be found standing at the kitchen island trying to concoct something edible for dinner. My attention is needed in at least ten different places. One child is yelling at me from the potty that she "needs help". What I don't know is that she has smeared her own feces all over the bathroom in an effort to clean herself up. Another child is climbing on something extremely dangerous and is about to commit accidental suicide. Two other children are screaming and fighting and just might kill themselves as well. "MOM!! MOM!! MOM!!" Everyone is needing something from me.

In the meantime, the phone is ringing. I do my absolute best to NEVER call someone with small children between the hours of 5:00 and 8:00 for the exact same reasons, but obviously other people missed that memo and so my phone still rings. The machine gets it and I sigh because it's one more person I need to call back, one more reason to feel guilty about something I have not had a chance to see to yet. I hate the machine.

The doorbell rings. Same hate for the doorbell as the machine. Oh and the somewhat edible thing that is cooking on the stove? It's now burning. And the smallest person in the house is hanging from the oven handle and I pull him away from it just as the burning hot oven creeks open as a result of the 25 pounds that was hanging from it. That was a close one.

Still, everyone is screaming at me. Some are crying, some are yelling, some are throwing things, some are running circles around the kitchen island while I stand there and try desperately to collect myself. Inside I am screaming and crying and kicking things. But I won't do that on the outside because it would scare the little people in my house. Instead, I start to shake and I look at the clock. 90 minutes until relief comes. 90 minutes. And I don't know if I can make it even that long.

But like always, relief does eventually walk through the door. He is cute and is about 5 foot 10 inches. He carries a black work bag slung over his shoulder. He has the mail in one hand and he still sports his office ID badge around his neck. He has distinguished grey hair right around his ears and right now, he's never looked better to me. I breathe a huge sigh of relief. "Daddy!!!" They all yell it in unison.

Relief came at last.