Summer, It Turns Me Upside Down. Or, I’m in a Bad Mood and My Kids Are Growing Up and Nothing is the Way I Thought It Would Be

I woke up in a bad mood the other morning. Really, I woke up about 3:30 a.m. with thoughts swirling about the registration paperwork I needed to complete for my kids’ to go back to school in a couple of weeks. Did I need to get copies of their immunizations or did the school already have those? How much is the check for the sports pass and who do I need to make that out to, again? Is the whole process online for parents or do I need to do that at school?

And I willed myself to drift back into a restless sleep for about another 40 minutes.

I got up at about 5 a.m. and started my attack on the paperwork and organization. Which, irritatingly, took me until about 6:30. At which point I needed to walk the dog. At which point, my day, such that it was, got under way.

This included my son locking his keys in his car at cross country practice just as the delivery guys arrived with a new kitchen table. I had two calls from people with geriatric parents who needed mental health assistance. A teenage daughter who’d spent the night at a friend’s house and was in a terrible mood (just like her mom) because she only slept about 5 hours. After dropping spare keys to my son, I got myself to work…