Snowpocalypse, Part 9

...in which Mommy gets REALLY cranky when Arlington Public Schools CANCELS SCHOOL ON FRIDAY. Keep in mind that Monday is a "teacher grade prep day," so the earliest the kids will be back will be on Tuesday. Rachel's teacher merrily keeps sending us reminders that the second the kids get back, they'll be expected to present their big book projects that, presumably, they've been working on during all this time off. Well, Rachel's teacher, you've had a week off yourself, so...any chance you could forego that teacher prep day and actually, you know, give your students some education??

(Actually, as it turns out, there is still a lot of snow on the roads because there weren't enough plows, or enough working plows, anyway, to shovel all the snow, and the schools must use all of their 10 built-in snow days, then all the early dismissal days, before cutting into the teachers' grade prep/professional development days. All I can say is this: If I ever, ever, ever hear a teacher in Arlington complain about low pay, being unappreciated, etc. I will nail them to the wall. Portland schoolteachers can only dream of these kinds of perks).

Anyway...

The day started out kind of nice when a neighbor -- the elderly guy whose driveway Drew shoveled -- came by with a loaf of crusty dinner bread as a thank-you. He said that he has lived on the street for 50-something years and he has never seen a backhoe come in and plow snow before.

Rachel's Brownie-troop leader, in a stroke of genius, organized a "painting day" so the kids could get their "painting patch." When I brought Rachel over to the Masonic Lodge where it was being held, another stroke of genius -- after I insisted she do some work on her book project -- Kelly, one of the troop leaders, was making guacamole with the sorry-ass avocados she managed to scrabble up from Safeway. (Safeway has been decimated -- Drew had to go to about three of them Wednesday night before he got us milk, which we desperately needed, and there wasn't much other food to be had, either. Can't tell if people bought up everything before the blizzard, or the delivery trucks couldn't through this week. Probably a combination of both). Then, while the girls watched "Inside Out," I raced to Office Depot to pick up some office supplies that we really need, then to REI because I am totally out of sock liners, which I need because I'm wearing heavy winter wool socks these days, and then made it back just in time for the girls to be finished. I had hoped to help them paint the banner they'll be wielding when they march in a Presidents Day parade Feb. 15, but the traffic was heavy and  I had a hard time getting around.

I got back to see Rachel crying in a chair off by herself -- turns out she was running after Kelly told her not to, and Kelly told her to sit in a chair. Rachel insisted that she was running too fast to slow down, but I told her that the other kids managed to slow down and that she could have, too. Kelly apologized for sending me home with a sad kid, and I told her that Rachel is very sensitive to criticism but that she needs to learn to live with it, especially when she does something wrong.

THEN Rachel asked me for a playdate with Sydney, and I said sure, and they both came over. The condition was that she couldn't have any more playdates UNTIL she finishes her book project -- even if that spills into Saturday morning, when I told her she could have a long playdate with Sydney. She agreed. The girls played well together and didn't fight, and when Nicole, Sydney's mom, came to pick her up at 6 we had a long talk about how awful this week has been, trying to get work done at home (we both hate working from home) with our kids around (very stressful) and how we're both unaccountably depressed because we are WAY out of whack with our routines. It was so nice to receive validation that way, because Drew's routine has largely been uninterrupted -- I've shouldered the lion's share of preparing meals, cleaning up, amusing Rachel, doing laundry and housework and trying to get my own stuff done in between -- while mine has been completely upended. And that has been more and more difficult as the days drag on.

I'm looking at this time as a gift, a reminder from God that Mom did this for years and years with Daniella and me, and I can't imagine how frustrated, angry, cranky and bored out of her mind she was sometimes. Mom, I salute you. Truly.