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Tuesday, March 29, 2005
frazzly
Today we (the kids and I) had to go to the valley to go shopping. On the drive home, LT (who's far less anxious than he used to be, but who still always worries if one of his parents seems unhappy or sick) asked me if I'd had an OK day, because I seemed a little frazzly. He was certainly right. Here's why.
First, picture a Chatty Cathy-type doll. Very cute, about 45 inches tall, goldeny kind of hair and eyes, freckles. Are you picturing?
OK, now her "chatty" switch is stuck ON, got it?
And she is being SO contrary and confrontational, and she never stops asking for things she wants or arguing when you tell her no until you either punish her or blow your top a bit and yell at her, and even when she's not doing this she is JUST. CONSTANTLY. TALKING.
Now picture spending hours teaching this doll school, or riding with her in the car, or taking her through a series of stores, or cooking her dinner, or reading her a bedtime story, or all of the above, and you have my day.
The worst part is that, in the midst of my frustration, there's a lot of guilt. First, there's guilt that I could ever be annoyed with someone whom I love so wholeheartedly. And then I feel guilty that I don't pay better attention to her -- you know how you swore you would never EVER tune out ANYTHING your kids said, you would hang on every word, until they learned to talk fluently, that is? yeah -- until the annoyance threshold is breached and then I act irritated with her. It's not that we have no pleasant interactions. It's not that I don't completely and totally adore her, because I do. It's just that instead of stopping her demands/arguments right away and being consistent, I start tuning her out and wait until I am seriously irritated before I deal with the situation. It's something I need to work on, and it's a recipe for disaster on a day like today. Or at least, it's a recipe for being "frazzly".
In other news, I am finally working on a transcription job I've been waiting on for two weeks. The guy who hired me for it first gave me the audio files in the wrong format, and then couldn't find the CF card with the correct files, and then got the flu, so it's taken this long to actually have files I can work with. I started transcribing tonight and I'm taking a break right now so that I don't get a life-threatening case of carpal tunnel syndrome. (you are forbidden to notice that I am, um, typing right now. I've BEEN taking a break, I really have.) It's amazing to watch how the Lord provides; last week we got smacked with $320 in extra bills out of a blue sky, and some odds and ends of broken stuff needed fixing, and we had no idea how we'd pay for any of it. Then a guy bought a car part from T -- T had not advertised it for sale, it was just sitting in his garage unwanted -- and then I did a résumé for a guy (who was in my first-grade class) and he paid double my usual rate, and now this job finally came through, and we're going to have enough and to spare. God is truly "able to do exceeding abundantly beyond all we ask or think." yay. :)
