Children and Sheep.

Sometimes being the mommy is the best thing in the whole, wide world.

Sometimes the kids are loving and snuggly and sweet and obedient with perfectly perfect manners, we laugh and hug all day long in between baking cookies and braiding each others’ hair, and the sky is full of rainbows and unicorns.

And sometimes I just want to rip my hair right out from the frustration of trying to be a single mom to these two ungrateful heathens.

I’ll give you one guess which one of those kinds of weeks we’ve had.

It started Sunday when we began getting ready for church. But first let me give you a little background on the situation…

As I’ve happened to notice throughout the last eight years of being a mom to my oldest, she exhibits a few ever-so-minor deficits in paying attention. I have no idea where she gets this trait. Honestly! I may have some idea of where she gets this trait.

Not at school, mind you, because in conferences with her teachers, I always ask: Does she have trouble paying attention? Following instructions?

And the answer is always, Heavens Noooooooo! Not at ALL! She is an awesome, excellent, fabulous student!! She ALWAYS listens and ALWAYS follows instructions.

And I know its true; the girl is brilliant. Her grades are excellent.

Which baffles me a little. Because at home, I have to tell her Every. Single. Morning:

Get yourself ready first before you play.

(Is that difficult to understand? Just wondering.)

Because she can’t remember it from one day to the next. So I repeat it every day:

Get yourself ready first.

Then play.

I’ve tried saying it more slowly:

Get….. Yourself….. Ready….. First…..

Then….. Play.

And still no luck.

I’ve tried screaming politely mentioning it a little bit louder:

GET. YOURSELF. READY. FIRST. THEN. PLAY.

Because as a mom who has some minor difficulties in arriving anywhere on time, the last thing I need is an 8-year-old playing Barbies in her pajamas, breakfast uneaten, when we have to walk out the door in five minutes…..when I already TOLD HER TO GET HER DADGUM SELF READY.

So Sunday, thinking my semi-bright child can handle this. I tell her, ever so sweetly, Go get yourself ready first, darling, then play.

I close my bedroom door and proceed to get my own self ready, and walk out of my room in time to holler at the kids to meet me at the back door because we’re leaving in one minute.

Because, of course, I had timed my own getting ready down to the last possible millisecond that we absolutely had to leave home to arrive at church on time ten minutes late. Because I’m punctual like that.

When who should come wandering around the corner with dripping wet hair and no shoes on, breakfast uneaten, playing a game on my dadgum iPhone?

Some lesser mommies might have gotten so agitated that they might have yelled and thrown a book across the room then forbidden the kid to eat any breakfast and made her go to church hungry. Just guessing; not that I would do such a thing.

Suddenly ~ and this is totally, completely off the subject ~ I’m reminded of a cute little story from a sermon Pastor David preached a few months ago about sheep. He said that sheep are so dumb that they will drown in the rain because they will stand there, looking up at the sky, and not have enough sense to look away as their lungs are filling with rain water. I don’t know what caused me to think of that all the sudden.

So Wednesday morning.

Running late. Which, I know, comes as a shock to all who know me.

I rushed the kids out the back door to the car, where they proceeded to stand at the car and stare at it.

I tell them, Get in the car. Get myself in. Start the car. And they stand around, slack-jawed, picking their noses, lungs filling with rain water.

And it dawns on me that every single morning, I tell my kids to get in the car. Why, I wonder to myself, do I have to tell them every single day to get in the car?

So I asked them (ever so sweetly and politely), WHY in the WORLD do I have to TELL YOU EVERY. SINGLE. DAY to GET in the CAR??

You KNOW what we do with the CAR.

We get IN the car. We RIDE IN the car.

We do NOT STARE AT the CAR. GET IN!! DANGIT!!

So I’ve decided I’m through telling them to do what should be obvious to anyone with an IQ higher than Forrest Gump’s. If they don’t get in the car, I’m putting it in reverse and backing out as they stand there staring. But I am for dang sure not telling them to get in the car.

Sometimes the most meaningful lessons are the hardest to learn.

I wonder what they’d do?

Stand there all day long, their little feet rooted to the driveway?

Would they still be standing there at 5:00 when I got home?

It will be interesting to find out.

I just hope it isn’t raining too much that day… I would hate for them to drown.