The Dawn dish soap is low again

The Seabreaze Dawn dish soap bottle had a mere quarter of an inch remaining. It's enough to do one more days worth of dishes, but the next shopping trip isn't scheduled until Friday. For some reason, Tuesdays always seemed like Wednesdays to Annette. Perhaps it was because Sunday, Monday and Tuesday had enough excitement in them to last a week by themselves. Between Church, Katie's youth bowling, Chris's soccer, school and the baby play group, Annette was ready for a Sabbath before hump-day.

Today was the Tuesday from hell so Annette was once again deliberating on whether that play group was really a stress release, or a stress inducer. Most weeks, Annette struggles to get the oldest three out the door in time for school while the toddler, Mike, and the baby, Lisa, cry and cling, and wail to be fed. Then when the three are successfully established at their post, waiting for the bus at the end of the driveway, the mad furry to dress the babies begins in order to make it to the play group at ten.

As the smell of the chemically created ocean fills the air, mixing with the smell of this morning's cereal and last night's flat coke, Annette wishes that maybe she could be whisked away to a real ocean, and then immediately feels guilty for thinking about being away from her babies. "But after this morning, who could blame me?" Annette laughed at herself for being so ridiculous. "Everyone dreams of flying away from their kids for a few minutes. Why do I take myself so seriously?"

While most Tuesday mornings are full of the usual five-children-mad-dash-stress, today ran the gamut from stubbed toes, to bloody nose. Katie took Chris's soccer jacket because it was raining and it was the only light jacket with a hood. For reason that Annette couldn't ever comprehend, her nine year old daughter was like an old woman about getting her hair wet. She'd wear a clear plastic cap if no other option were available to her. Because of the jacket-stealing, Chris ran, possessed by possession, screaming after his older sister. Katie had dodged and ducked into the hall closet. Chris turned suddenly to attack before Katie could manage to close the closet door all the way, but as he pounced upon his sister he kicked the door frame creating a crack so loud it was hard to determine whether the sound came from Chris's toe, or splitting wood.

Annette put the baby down quickly to run to see what had caused her tough little eight year old man to cry, and in her haste spilled Wendy's, her kindergartener, cereal from off the counter to the floor. Annette retrieved the stolen jacket, found the purple umbrella, and healed Chris's wounded toe and broken spirit with a bonafide Mommy-kiss. She had triumphed over the chaos. And she still had time to get the kids out the door.

Upon returning to the kitchen she discovered Wendy in tears, Mike eating her Cherios off the floor, and Lisa bleeding from the nose because Annette had accidentally knocked Lisa's face against the linoleum while setting her down.

At that moment Annette began to cry. She envisioned the Children's Services Bureau knocking on the door to take her babies away.

The morning eventually passed, and somehow everyone was miraculously on time. Lisa even forgave her mother for the grave offense of bashing her nose by not crying at all, and grinning a three-toothed grin through the blood when Annette came back into the kitchen with a washcloth to clean up the mess.

Annette put the last dish on the drying rack. She said a prayer thanking God that her children all went to sleep easily, that her husband, Paul, had picked a decent movie at the rental store, and asking Him for a dishwasher.