Oh, I haven’t written anything in much too long. Nothing has happened that is so funny that I felt I had to share it. And I haven’t had the energy or desire or mojo or whatever it is that is necessary for me to take something mundane and try to make it funny.

But something made me laugh hard enough that here I am, off my duff and posting.

Byron is currently in England, on a business trip that actually seems to be mostly a golfing-and-going-to-pubs trip. This little jaunt (which is now extended at least an extra two days thanks to the volcano in Iceland. Gee, thanks, volcano.) coincided with the beginning of Spring Sports Hell here.

Every spring our family completely overextends itself. And around Memorial Day every year, as I lie in a puddle of my own overwhelming stress and despair, I raise my hand to the sky and swear that I will never put myself through this again. Then, every February, relaxed from the winter down time, I suffer a case of memory loss so extreme that it rivals Mommy Amnesia – you know, the way nature forces you to forget how terrible labor and delivery really are, so you’ll actually have more kids. I go ahead and sign my kids up for every little activity their tiny, greedy hearts desire.

I rationalize, and I say, “We’ll have to see if we have time for all this. We may have to drop a few things.” But they know and I know that it is all a charade. I will kill myself, almost literally, so they can do everything.

This spring Mack is competing on soccer and flag football teams, swimming once a week, running at least six races, taking piano lessons, and participating in a weekly school Chess Club. (Nerd!) Aidan is on teams for flag football and tee ball, also swimming once a week and running some races, taking piano, and going to Creativity Club once a week after school. Reid only plays soccer (slacker!) but next week he starts swim lessons and tee ball class.

It is too much. I know it is too much. But you try getting them to agree to drop any of this. The only thing they are willing to give up, oh so sorrowfully, if-you-insist-Mommy, is piano lessons. Which is the one thing I want them to do!

Many days in the spring, around 4:00pm, you can find me curled up in a fetal position on my bed, trying to figure out how I can be three different places at 6:30 that evening. And most of the time I actually get them almost everywhere they need to be, almost on time. I get a lot of help from Byron, and when things get really desperate I cry to my sister or my mom for back up.

But when Byron is out of town (for eight days in a row this time, not that I’m counting) it gets really hard. And when it gets really hard, I get really stressed. The children, smelling my vulnerability like a dog smells fear, will then gleefully band together to try to break me. I think they must theorize that if they put me into a mental hospital, and their daddy is still off “working,” they will have free reign over the house and can skip school and watch Cartoon Network and rated R movies all day.

Last Saturday after the soccer games, I think my mom could tell that I was at the end of my rope with the Gruesome Threesome. So she took all three boys home with her overnight. It was a wonderful, spontaneous thing for her to do. I had a whole evening to myself, and I spent most of it watching TiVo and eating ice cream, and only a small part of it creating a spreadsheet listing the coming week’s scheduling conflicts.

The next day I picked the boys up and we raced off to a swimming party. As we drove, I asked whether they had fun at Grammy’s house. They all clamored about what a great time they had, and Aidan told me “We had so many treats! We even had treats for breakfast!” I laughed. “What did you have?” “We had cookie dough. Dipped in chocolate pudding.”

Okay, full stop. What? Cookie dough dipped in chocolate pudding. That sounds…delicious…and disgusting. (I can’t decide which.) Anyway, what? This is my mother? Where was this woman when I lived with her?

I couldn’t resist giving my mom a hard time, jokingly, when I next called her. “So, cookie dough dipped in pudding. And for breakfast, no less.” She replied, “Well it wasn’t really breakfast. It was breakfast dessert.”

So there you go. My mother takes the kids for a night to keep me from having a nervous breakdown, and ends up introducing them to the concept that their days should begin with breakfast followed by breakfast dessert. That is really not the way to make my life easier.