Sleepy Heads

We had a very busy couple of weeks. The weekend before the last was of course Hanukkah, filled with all the joy that is Hanukkah as well as all the smelly-house latke-old-oil fun, too-many-pieces-of-Hanukkah-gelt and it's-time-for-the-kids-to-go-to-bed fun, spending-way-too-much-on-gifts-fun, and oy-what-a-mess fun. In the course of one weekend, I hosted a lunch for my in-laws for Adam's birthday, attended two Hanukkah parties, and threw a Hanukkah open house. The next night was Adam's work event. Two nights later was the aforementioned night of kindergarten information, a day which started with a 5:30 a.m. boot camp class and ended with me running from the kindergarten information night to my b'nai mitzvah class, meaning I fell into bed about eleven. Of course there are holiday cards to mail and school events to help organize (remind me again why I signed on as room parent?), and general mishegas to deal with. Adam has been working a bunch, and he's been just as exhausted as I am.

Enter last Thursday. I'm beat. Adam's beat. We're ready for a bit of relaxation. But Thursday was predicted a storm--a biggie--and I was determined to be ready. This was already our second snow storm of the season--the kids have already had one snow day already--so Pie and I ran a zillion errands in the morning (including one where I asked Adam, "What's that L.L. Bean bag sitting in your car?" and he replied, "Oh, that? Remember about a year ago I bought that sweater I wasn't sure I liked? It's been sitting there so I can return it. Here, wait, take a look at it. Do you think I'd ever wear it?" That sweater was returned). We got gas for the car. We rented DVDs for grown-ups and kids. We bought food for both nourishment and for festivity. We picked up things that we were low on at the drug store. "Bring it on!" I said. "We are prepared!"

I got Doodles home after preschool and sure enough, shortly after, the snow began to fall. And fall. And fall. Adam left his office at 1:42 p.m. for the 20-minute commute home... and he arrived at 4:50 p.m. Late in the day, I plopped the kids in front of a video, donned my snow gear, and began to shovel. I shoveled a nice path for Adam to get his car into, cleared the front walk. I'm feeling macho, as I toss that snow away. I shovel until Adam comes home at which point, Adam joins me for a bit of shoveling. All told, I shoveled for about an hour and a half, and by the time I fed the kids and put them to bed, the walks needed shoveling again.

Adam and I had a generally relaxing night. Finished watching The Sopranos. Had a nice dinner. I worked on holiday cards while Adam fell asleep in the chair. We stumbled into bed, both of us pretty exhausted.

In the middle of the night, Doodles, as he is wont to do, stumbled his way into our bed. The next morning, I could feel him stirring, and I looked up and saw it was 6:30. I looked out the window and could see lots and lots of white. Doodles hopped out of bed. Adam stirred for a moment, said, "I'll be up in a sec," and then passed out. Doodles and I got dressed as quickly and quietly as we could and we headed out into the snow. Shovels in hand, we began to dig. And dig. And dig. Doodles quickly bored of the task (remember the song from Free to Be You and Me, "Helping" by Tom Smothers? "Some kind of help is the kind of help, that helping's all about! And some kind of help is the kind of help, we all can do without. Want to guess what Doodles's shoveling was like? "No, Doodles, please! Don't put snow on the area I just took snow away from!"), so he played in the snow and then went inside.

I cleared so much damn snow. At one point, I stuck my head inside and asked Doodles to read me the numbers off the clock. He said, "Um, seven. Four. Three." The night before, on his mega-commute home, Adam's Check Engine light went on. So I told Doodles, "Go wake Daddy and tell him if he needs to bring his car in, he should get up now."

Doodles wakes Adam up and everyone quickly gets ready for school and work. Adam gets out the door by about 8:20. But he's in a mood! He's harrumphing and snipping. Nothing's going his way. Finally, I say to him, "Why the hell are you so grumpy?"

And what do you think my Dartmouth- and Harvard-educated brilliant husband answered? What did he dare to say to me? He replied, "I got too much sleep last night."

I don't think there's a jury in this country that would convict me for murdering him.