i beg your pardon

This year for Lent I debated about what to give up. I thoughtfully considered giving up heroin. I've heard withdrawl is just awful, but figured since I've never used it might not be so bad for me. Hubby didn't think that fit the Lenten sacrifice model. Instead, I decided to spend the forty days of Lent striving to find joy in the everyday and live more patiently with my children. Let's face it. Three children (and one growing in my belly) make for some days full of exasperation, frustration, and NO patience.

Girlfriend, I am thankful Lent is almost over. In the words of my brilliant southern friend, Mama, I am about to drop my mother-fracking basket. That's the northern version. I doubt very much that a true southern lady would utter a phrase such as "mother-fracking."

In the past I-don't-know-how-many weeks, my children have had goo pouring from every orifice in their sweet little bodies. They each suffered a fever lasting 4-5 days. They have coughed and hacked more germs in my face than I can bear to think about and all I can imagine is the theater scene from Outbreak. Seriously. They are a colorful bunch with oozy green snot and lovely pink eyes. Somehow green and pink are no longer the cool preppy colors of my youth.

I have washed more loads of laundry: towels, sheets, quilts, blankets, towels, sheets, quilts, blankets. Lather, rinse, repeat. Times a kazillion.

And I'm exhausted. I have been waiting for the first trimester exhaustion to come to an end and to be filled with a huge burst of energy lasting longer than 52 seconds. But I'm tired. I am exhausted and my house needs to be scrubbed from top to bottom to send those pesky little germs packing. I am worn out and my washer just beeped a cruel reminder of more loads to follow. I'm spent and my children are not in school because for some reason schools don't like green goo pouring out of their noses. What's up with that?

And my basket? Oh, I am struggling to hang on to it. It is perilously close to spilling all over the floor as I cling to it with one last pinky knuckle. And next year, I am totally rethinking this Lenten sacrifice thing. I'm thinking I might sacrifice by spending forty days in thoughtful quiet reflection...on an exotic beach on a island far, far away.