This was a HARD morning. With the rain, traffic moves slower. No matter where you live, or what decade it is, traffic moves slower, and traffic is heavier, whenever it rains. I learned this back in the 80s, when I was just starting in the working world, and have never found it not to be true.
And, so, as I woke the boys up this morning, during one of my, “going-back-upstairs-trips-to-tell-them-to-get-up-again” rounds, I told them, today, you have to get up earlier. It’s raining. My knee is sore from climbing the stairs. My ears are echoing with the yells I made while I was busy turning off a burner on the stove, and just trying one more try at getting them up, without climbing the stairs again.
By the time everyone was in the car, and hey, look who’s coming! Your brother, who goes to middle school and usually walks?! Of course he’s coming with us – it’s pouring down rain. This adds an extra five minutes to the trip — but what’s a mom to do, turn her child out onto the wet pavement? So, we’re off to a great start. Every single one of them was going to be late, if not already late. And those boys had the nerve to accuse me of yelling. Then, they accused me of not waking them up — they couldn’t remember ever hearing me come into their rooms.
So, I am done. They all have phones and alarms. Why am I wasting time, energy and sanity waking them up in the morning? They all sighed at this — as if it was the most torturous thing I could persecute them with. But, I explained, they wouldn’t be getting yelled at anymore… then there was silence.
(I did happen to mention, in the midst of this silence — this “traffic-is-slower-when-it-rains” thing happens even in the working world. I don’t want them going out into the real world unprepared for real life.)
I’m already playing this out in my head… how I will have to watch the clock tick, and bite my tongue and not say a word, and how the boys expect me to cave, so they won’t get up until they yell, and then, they’ll have a few tardies before all of this is said and done… oh dear, the battle ahead.
It felt kind of panicky, announcing this officially. Is this as if I am abandoning them? No… this must be done. The mornings are hell, and it’s not working. Besides, I could spend all of that time I spend coaxing them out of bed cleaning up the midnight snack fiasco that happened after I cleaned the kitchen and went to bed.
Of course, this comes on the heels of talking to my college son last night, who has a chance for a summer internship back home, but he simply said instead, “I don’t want to live there mom. I like my life here.”