Monday, January 22, 2007

Mostly Miserable Day

Blah! Without going into details, yesterday we had a family party for my mother-in-law's 75th birthday. My MIL is an amazing, fantastic woman and we all wanted it to go beautifully. But, it was a recipe for disaster and as far as I am concerned that's what we got. Thankfully, most of the guests won't agree but for me and my family -- awful. I had to take Ruthie home sobbing uncontrollably early after an ugly scene with other family members. Just awful.

The cure: after calming her down and letting her vent about it all the way home, we changed into comfy clothes, ate some chocolate, and watched America's Funniest Pets and People on tv. It worked! As Greg said, I trained her! And, I'm good with that. I trained her that real women feel emotions, stand up for children, and then come home take off their panty hose and take care of themselves! I'm okay with that!

I still feel all singed by it but thankfully Ruthie is moving past it all quickly. There were so many things that went wrong and it felt pretty much like a train speeding toward a cliff that I could see but not stop effectively. Sigh.

One good thing was seeing this cute little bird. I did get a few minutes out by the hostess' bird feeders and that was nice.

Black Phoebe
Black Phoebe checking out the meadow for flies!

Definitely glad to be going back to work today. Maybe teaching kids division will be a good distraction for stupid family drama.

9 comments:

Mary said...

It's a shame families can't get along at parties and on holidays, isn't it? I'll never forget (during my childhood) the Christmas that was going so well until my Dad and his sisters got into a heated political argument and he threw them out. What a shame!

At least Ruthie is feeling better and you are back to teaching math!

Have a great day!

Anonymous said...

I have many days where I can't wait to get back to work!

Anonymous said...

I'm sorry to read about family issues - I understand all too well, unfortunately.

I hope you had a great day! And I love your little bird photo.

LauraHinNJ said...

Drama stinks!

Lynne at Hasty Brook said...

I'm sorry your family wing-ding went badly and especially that your Ruthie felt it. Sounds liky you handled things well for her. I really like your phoebe picture, a little bird surveying the big green field.

Susan Gets Native said...

Drama does stink...but around here we pronounce it
"DRAAAM-a".
Cute phoebe! A quiet interlude in the midst of family chaos.

My word verification: gaspx

Unknown said...

Thanks for the support, everyone! Ruthie is still feeling it but I get the feeling I've done something right (I almost typed write) when I found her tonight drawing pictures in her journal to get them out of her head of the DRAAAAM-a of yesterday.

For myself, I'm really sorry that I lost my temper and really sad that the whole situation happened. I can't fault myself for what I did in the situation -- just wish I could have rehearsed it ahead of time to be prepared with better lines! Ah well.

Prussian-Tea said...

Don't beat yourself up about the day. I mean, if you knew enough in advance what was going to happen so that you could "rehearse," you probably wouldn't have gone at all. And while it's still fresh and feels horrible now, I imagine it will become a story that Ruthie will giggle with you about when she's a young woman. Big hugs!

Unknown said...

Thanks, Tea! Good point on the "wouldn't have gone" -- that's for sure!

I suspect you are right about laughing about it someday. Or at any rate, she knows that I won't back down when something bad is happening -- and that's got to give her confidence!