Taking the Day Off

It is 1:00.  Two of the monkeys have yet to eat lunch.  None of them is dressed.

I’m taking the day off.

Technically, as a mother, there is no such thing as a day off.  Even if Katharine the Wonder Sitter is watching them, you are still ultimately the one that has to make the decisions at the ER.

But today, I don’t feel like going through all the contortions of usual Momness.  So I am officially taking a mini vacation.  Hey, if the Pope gets to take a Holiday, so do I.

They are playing video games.  They are watching too much TV.  They are doing all the things that I never let them do on weekdays because…well just because there have to be SOME rules in this house.

Now one might think this lack of direct parental involvement would give me plenty of time to get useful work done around the house.

(Sounds of hysterical laughter)

Sorry, so sorry.

(wiping tears off face)

I crack myself up sometimes.

No, the photos will not get organized.  I will not go through the mess in the bathroom cabinet.  I might put the folded laundry away, but that’s as far as I’m going.  Hell, I baked a frozen pizza for lunch, what more do you want from me?

I have found the time to clear out my email inbox, watch a few movie trailers on Yahoo! movies (okay, the New Moon trailer  a few times) and just piss the day away in general.  It’s bliss.

But I can’t stop the voice in the back of my head that keeps saying…”It’s summer vacation.  You should DO something.”

And then I think back to my summer vacations.  We did shit.  We would play outside, watch the odd Tom and Jerry cartoon, go to the pool, run through the sprinkler, walk to town.  Maybe there was day camp in there for a week or two.  But mostly we were left to entertain ourselves.

And I loved summers as a kid.  I don’t look back now and think I should have done more.  They are blissful memories of having nothing to do, which most of us would trade one of the children for now.

Tomorrow we have plans, and the day after that, and the day after that.

But for now, we are taking the day off.