Back to Life, Back to Reality
Remember how I told you I was away at a conference last week, longing for my kids?
Yeah. If only I could have seen a YouTube video of the grocery store experience I would have on my first day home. The one that went something like this:
The moment Elise, Luke and I step through the automated doors both kids immediately decide they need to be on foot, as opposed to being nicely contained in the shopping cart proper— an ominous sign- but, at least we were spending quality time together!
I became the trailing goatherd, putting products back onto shelves, guiding my goats forward ho, and apologizing to other shoppers who nearly crashed their carts to avoid hitting my aimless meandering goats.
“No, we don’t need that.”
“Please put that back.”
“Don’t put that in your mouth!”
“Please apologize to that nice woman in the wheelchair.”
The people we passed looked at me with a look of amusement mixed with deep, dark pity. One woman may have made the sign of the cross.
We were making such slooooow progress! Maybe I shouldn’t have passed the Depends and Ben Gay-containing aisle so quickly. I was aging by the minute.
We finally made it to the last section before the checkouts: the Bakery. While trying to explain to Elise why we did not need cookies with frosting smiley faces, I discovered Luke was hungry.
I knew this because I turned my head just in time to catch him sinking his teeth into a plastic bag of rolls.
NOOOOOOO!!!!
I ran over, confiscated the bag, and examined the bag’s integrity. That’s when I spied the tell-tale sign of compromise: a roll with a perforated ring the shape of Luke’s mouth.
*whistling and looking around*
No, I couldn’t in good conscience return the bag to the other bags of rolls. No. Really.
*Sigh* I did buy those rolls. But quickly found myself longing for those quiet moments in my hotel room, where my thoughts weren’t always focused on just surviving until bedtime.
