Monday, June 7, 2010

CRAZY CATASTROPHE


A friend of ours once said it best, that “parenting is a lot like building a house of cards on a waterbed.” Think about it! Sooo true! You get one layer of cards down to stand steady, and then a wave of the foundation sets everything off kilter—even the smallest ripple can leave you playing 52 Pick-Up. That’s been my experience with parenting thus far. You get one age or stage down pact, and suddenly a ripple or a wave comes along and BOOM! You’re back at ground zero. We’ve now entered a new one of those stages—pet ownership. (A cat this time—yes, Miguel the Chihuahua is still alive; don’t be alarmed. But let’s face it—after 15 years, he doesn’t really cause a whole lot of waves in our lives anymore. He’s basically furniture that breathes. Sorry Migs.)


So last time I left you, I was off on a nightmare adventure to help the Hubster in his attempts to track down a wild barn-kitten for our girls. Pretty crazy! Felt like we were on a stakeout. Or in a horror movie. Maybe both. I was armed with the flashlight, holding it over the place we could see the kittens were nestled, while the Hubster was all decked out in extra thick work gloves and holding the pet taxi. Felt like we were up to something illegal! And the kittens thought so too. They HATED the flashlight, and all I could think about was what it must seem like from their perspective—some sort of alien abduction or something. You know—bright light glaring in their eyes, some giant, claw-proof/gnaw-proof hand reaching out for them. I kept laughing, thinking they must be thinking, “So help me, if I get probed—somebody’s getting their face clawed off!!!” I did feel bad for the kittens, not having a clue what was going on. But it truly was quite comical.


The procedure went something like this—Hubster would slowly, slowly reach his hand down behind the feeding trough where the kittens were hiding. One would dart out instantly, and run around back behind the barn, only to do a lap, and reappear a few minutes later back at home base. The 2nd kitten was the protector of the lot. When it saw Hubster’s hand approaching, the 3rd kitten, who appeared to be a tad slow, ducked down with those big Puss in Boots’ eyes, while 2nd kitten pounced on Hubster’s hand and chomped down with all its 6 oz. strength, hangin’ on and shakin’ Hubster’s gloved hand with all the rage its scorned kitten jaws could muster. We ended up, of course with Kitten #3. Which has ended up being a good choice thus far.


To be honest—I can’t stand cats. (Please—no offense to all my cat-loving Friends!) But I would never even have one in our house (especially our house!) if I did not have daughters. How we got to this place, I have no idea. The Hubster and I always SWORE we would never have cats in our home. The Hubster caved first. (Thanks, Babe.—Sucker.) But somewhere between, “Mommy can we plleeeaaasssee get a new kitty?” and the thought of mice (which I do not like even MORE than cats) invading our home—that’s all I know. We have a kitten. And I must admit—it’s kinda growing on me. Stupid big kitten eyes. Stupid cute little fuzzy thing. Stupid tiny purring. (Oh yeah. Tractor beam [imitates beam noise] sucked me right in.—Lloyd; Dumb and Dumber) Man!! Why they gotta be so darn cute when they’re little?! They do grow up to be cats, you know? And in my opinion, and my opinion only, if I need someone to warm up to me all lovey-dovey one minute, and the next minute be taking a massive hunk out of my arm like a scene from Zombieland or something…I’ll visit some of my menopausal relatives or something, thank you very much! …But for now…it’s a kitten. We own a kitten. And it is cute.


All of this is to say, this is what happens when I try to get organized. I began making my charts. I was creating a schedule. Our week was flowing smoothly. Life was moving forward! Progress was being made! And now we have a kitten. The house of cards has tumbled with the wave of a new responsibility being thrown into the mix. And children fighting over whose turn it is to hold said new responsibility. My day has become devoted to 5 minute increments of setting the timer for each Princess to take a turn holding kitten. Awesome! Let’s see what this week brings, my Friends. Next post, hopefully I will have good news on the progress of getting my crap together. Until then…I will be working on litter-training a kitten, potty-training a 2 ½ year-old, and slow-and-steady laying a new foundation for this house of cards again.
Keep shining, my Friends!
Xoxo--SHINY

2 comments:

  1. You are braver than I! I can use the old "I'm allergic!" excuse, but it's a good thing, because they are pretty cute, and the beam would pull me in too!

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  2. Wow! That is quite the sacrifice. I'm pretty sure that David could beg and beg for a kitten and I'd use that mean-mom answer "When you grow up and have your own house you can get a kitten or a cat!" This will always ring true, even though we too have a dog that is pretty much furniture that breathes as well. I always say that while my sister and I have some personality similarities you can pretty much sum up our differences this way: she's a cat person and I'm a dog person.

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