I Survived the Past Week, and Here's Why That Amazes Me

I begin with a classic Morton Salt ad because last week was definitely a When it rains, it pours kind of week.  Also because I love driving by the old Morton Salt factory in Chicago, which has this little girl and her umbrella painted on the roof.  Reminds me of a time when Chicago was actually a major hub of food production.

But mostly I include this picture for the slogan: When it rains, it pours.

We've all had weeks like this, where it just feels like everything is scheduled at once.  Where you just wonder how it is that everyone in the world forgot that any other day existed besides that one day they decided to schedule their events.

Here's what we had going on last week:

• Tech Week for my community theater show, Jack and the Beanstalk.  Tech Week refers to the last week before the show, when you have rehearsals every night, and everything is being figured out in terms of the sets, costumes, sound, lighting, and so on.  We had rehearsals Tuesday, Wednesday, and Thursday nights of last week, which just conveniently happened to be nights when Bill had to work late.  So I had to bring Nathan with me to all those rehearsals.  Additionally, I had to make my own costume.
• Baseball Opening Weekend.  Now, I know to some of you this doesn't sound like a big deal, but if you live in the same town as I do, you know little league is huge here.  Also I'm the team mom, so I had a lot to do in terms of making packets, collecting money, picking up treat tickets, and reminding everybody to be at pictures and the opening day parade on time with all the right stuff.  
• Some serious triathlon training workouts.  Like, workouts that were an hour and 15 minutes long and had to happen before Nathan woke up.  (To be fair, he does sleep until like 9:00 most days.)  
• Two paying work projects for my freelance work.  

Meanwhile, there was of course the usual with laundry, groceries, preschool, housework, and caring for my kid.  And caring for my kid, with all that other stuff to do, felt like ... well, I wouldn't say the last straw, because the last straw implies something minor and light that just happens to knock you over ... more like the last brick.  It was like, Seriously, I have to find a way to entertain you?  I have to come up with some way to wear you out, when I'm already so worn out myself? Honestly, if it were at all justifiable (monetarily or otherwise) to hire a full-time, live-in nanny just for a week when I'm frazzled with what essentially amounts to a bunch of hobbies (some of which are actually done for the benefit of the child I'd be pawning off on somebody else), I would have done it. 

It all came to a head Friday and Saturday. 

Friday I had to get up early for an hour and 15 minute bike ride, get Nathan to school, lift weights with Trainer Jill for half an hour, write a paid blog post that was due that day, work on my freelance stuff, pick up Nathan, get the house ready/groceries purchased for a babysitter to come, and then perform in the opening night show.  

Saturday we had t-ball pictures bright and early, followed by the opening day parade and ceremonies.  Then I had one play at 2:00 and another play at 7:00. 

I suddenly felt like I was in high school again, rushing from one extracurricular activity to another.  So on Friday morning I posted this Facebook status update:

It got 14 likes, which is a personal record. 

Anyway, we survived those two days, and here are the pictures to prove it. 

Here's a self-portrait cell phone photo of me on opening night of the show.  Everybody had really wacky hair, makeup, and costumes:

Here's Nathan at t-ball pictures:

Here are a few shots of the opening day parade, where the kids march down the street and throw candy:

And this is the opening ceremony, where they get everybody pumped for the season and talk about how wonderful baseball and America are:

Here are some shots from my Saturday show, taken by Bill:

 "If those three kids are too stupid to figure out that the way to get back home from climbing up is to climb back down, then they don't deserve accurate directions."

The play went ... okay.  As you can see from a couple of the pictures, I had to sing in this show.  I sang a version of "I Dreamed a Dream," but with new lyrics specific to the show, which I had written myself.  Now, singing isn't my strongest suit.  And while it was okay if my character was kind of a bad singer, I didn't want to embarrass myself.  At Show #1 I screwed up because I had practiced with a different version of the music than the one they played at the show.  I was so embarrassed and sad, even though it's only community theater and nobody cared besides me, that I just wanted to duck out and hide after the show.  I did better on the song at Show #2, and so-so at Show #3, although by #3 I was so exhausted I didn't care.  Which was fine because there were only like 20 people in the audience anyway.  Also by that point at least 4 kids were either sick and/or crying, so Show #3 was kind of ... whatever.  

So, all the excitement was over by Sunday.  All I had to do Sunday was go to the gym and swim for half an hour, because triathlon training waits for no one.  While it was refreshing to have so little to do for a change, and while I could never keep up last week's frenetic schedule on a long-term basis, I admit to feeling a bit of a letdown Sunday.  Because you know what you have to do on your first free day after a crazy week?  You have to catch up on all the chores you ignored during that crazy week.  Suddenly I had no excuse not to clean my kitchen and do a bunch of laundry.  Bah. 

Fortunately, this week is sort of medium-grade busy.  We had t-ball practice Monday night, and we have our first game tonight.  The triathlon training schedule has some hard workouts on it this week, and I'm meeting Trainer Jill for two sessions.  I have freelance work.  Nathan's school has a field trip Thursday.  I have some blogging gig irons in the fire. 

Which is good.  Now I have some excuses to get out of vacuuming.