Chagrined

So this is how today (the first day of summer vacation and husband out of town) went down:

The son rose at 12:43pm (I looked at the clock in the kitchen)... I was miffed because he'd left a mess in the kitchen sink last night but had assured me he was going to clean it up in the morning. Being certain to hold him to his word, I worked around his mess taking care of my own breakfast & lunch dishes. Sounds mean I know, not to just clean up his mess as I took care of mine, but in my continuing effort to promote responsibility, I left his mess.

So what does he do when he comes downstairs to greet me? He says, "Hi, any plans today?" I grit my teeth preparing for the inevitable assumed role of "Cruise Director", but simply reply to him, "No, not really." And then, and THEN do you know what he did??? He went into the kitchen and cleaned up his mess! Every bit of it! Without me having to say anything about it! And not just some half-hearted job but cleaned up the sink and everything? What the hell?

Eventually around 1:00pm, I pass my daughter in the upstairs hallway. She was headed for my shower (can't seem to use the same one her brother uses to bathe, ewww gross!)... Since she didn't come downstairs until after 1:30 I still believe I called the time correctly, though to be honest, I really thought it was the boy who wouldn't get up.

So I head down to my basement studio, where it's cool and I can release stress. Eventually my daughter shows up and asks me if I could come upstairs to help her with something. I begin to feel the tension in my neck, knowing full well she's going to ask me to 'help' her make lunch. On my way up the stairs I say to her, "I know EXACTLY what you're going to ask me to help you with." And she replies, "No you don't, you have NO idea." This went on, back and forth until I reached the top step and saw the basket full of laundry sitting in front of the washer. My daughter walked into the laundry room, turned to me and said, "What I wanted help with is I need to know how to set the washer for this load." ???????????????? Okay, who took my kids and where did these two come from... This was an episode straight out of the Twilight Zone. But wait, it gets even weirder... I walked into the kitchen where there were two utensils laying on the counter with a note on top. The note read: I'm not sure where these go and I love you Mom. (In retrospect I really should've taken a picture.) My daughter had not only gathered up a load of clothes but also emptied the dishwasher which my son had started after cleaning up his mess in the sink earlier! ??????????????? I KNOW!

Now I'm no fool, I can tell when I'm being played! So I looked at my daughter slyly and said, "Okay, I get it... What exactly do you want?" She looked at me lovingly with those big brown and eyes and with complete honesty said, "You said in your letter that if we saw something that needed to be done we should just do it." .....................*blink*............*blink*.............*huh?*..................

Are you kidding me? Was it really just that easy all along? All I needed to do was write a letter? Without saying a word I grabbed her in my arms, hugged her tightly, kissed her forehead and maybe shed a little tear.

Friends, I'm walking around this house as though the universe might tip at any moment. It's rather frightening really... I mean, this THIS is HUGE... Right? But what if it's all smoke and mirrors. What if Day 2 of summer vacation results in messes left behind and complete apathy towards mom? I can't go back, I'm telling you... I really can't go back!