Thursday, August 14, 2008

Rude Awakening

Hugh and I were awakened at six o'clock yesterday morning by someone pounding on our front door. When we didn’t jet out of bed fast enough, the doorbell started ringing like crazy. Hugh jumped out of bed, threw on some clothes and ran to answer the door while I crouched at the top of the stairs, listening to the commotion below.

The cause of said commotion was a man who was staying in the shack house across the street; apparently, he and his wife had been recruited late the night before to watch the occupant’s children while the mother was taken to the hospital with some emergency illness. Sometime during the night, the children ages 12, 7 and 5, simply up and left the house and, the man was, understandably, frantic.

Since there was no phone at the shack house, and since there is always a police car parked in our driveway, he made the logical decision to come to our house. Hugh called the police chief who arrived within minutes and I went about the business of getting ready for my day.

At 8:30, I took The Girl to the Middle School for registration and the story of the missing kids (who were found within moments of the police chief starting the search) was already THE hot topic around town; of course, now the story went that the kids were 1, 3 and 5 (um, no) and that they were found on the highway, walking to the hospital (once again, no; they were found sleeping in the camper/trailer parked outside of the home). What can I say? It’s like any small town; the gossip is rapid, but lacks accuracy.

Anyway, it was a rude awakening to a new day.

While we are on the topic of rude awakenings, I should tell you that I am starting to fear for my health and sanity once school starts; these children of mine have not gotten out of bed in the morning before nine or ten o’cklock since summer began. The period of time between them hating me for dragging their ungrateful asses out of bed for school and the time when they actually wake automatically on their own is going to be rough.

In addition, I don’t think the Man-Cub has spent more than two or three nights in his own bed this summer, instead choosing to sleep in random places scattered throughout the house, including but not limited to: his sister’s bed, the living room couch, the floor in the play area upstairs, the trampoline, the floor in his own room and the floor in the kitchen (which was the weirdest place of all but, his sister and Kaz were with him so, he shares his weirdness with them). It will be interesting to note how long it takes the child to become accustomed to his own mattress once again.

No matter, the new schedule of going to bed at a decent hour, rising early in the morning and sleeping in appropriate places begins next week, whether the children are ready for it or not. School starts on Wednesday but I might as well start conditioning them to the changes on Monday which means we can all expect a bloody Tuesday in my household.

Speaking of school, the children are officially registered, The Girl has her class schedule (although, it will require some corrections since the counselor neglected to schedule her band class; it’s a minor issue and we have been assured that it will be corrected before the Open House next Monday night) and the Man-Cub knows who his teacher is going to be.

The Cub wasn’t exactly thrilled with his assigned teacher as he is under the impression that the man is “mean” and that he throws chalkboard erasers at kids; I’m relatively certain that is an urban legend, not unlike the legend of Mrs. Wilson’s hidden flask o’ whiskey that my classmates and I heard all about in the eighth grade (although, come to think of it, Mrs. Wilson did spend an awful lot of time with her head stuck inside the top drawer of her filing cabinet, hmmm…suspicious). Anyway, I’m sure the Cub will do just fine even if he does get pegged in the head on occasion.

In other news, we are getting packed and ready to go to Salt Lake tomorrow. Jana and I have engaged in numerous whispered phone calls and we think we have everything ready to go. Luckily, we will see each other tonight, at the end-of-season BBQ for Hugh’s softball team; if we have any last minute planning to do, we can do it then.

In the meantime, I need to head into the store to finish some work. I should mention that, as I write this, the children are still sleeping.

The count-down to Rude Awakening Day Number One has begun.

4 comments:

  1. How old do children have to be before they start sleeping late? I don't think my son has EVER slept later than 7:30am in all of his 8 years, and of course if he is awake, I'm awake. It would be nice to sleep until 8 just once!

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  2. I don't ever remember waking voluntarily during my entire high school career. My poor mom. SHE was our alarm clock. And I was not a morning person. Still not.

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  3. Yeah, I don't think I used an alarm clock until I was in college, and you want to talk about Rude Awakenings...

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  4. I absolutely DREAD next Monday. For me and the children!

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