Angry Woman At Keyboard

Wednesday, May 21, 2008

Angry Woman At Keyboard

I have realized that I am an angry woman. But not just any angry woman. I am an angry woman armed with a keyboard. Not one of the musical kind which, I assure you, is much safer than one of the kinds that has letters and numbers on it.

Who wouldn't be angry when there is but one incident after the next, (before the word "incident," and after the word "one" enter the word "bad") which consumes your measly existence, one year rolling into another, like gray merging into black.

And what, just what would make an angry woman more angry than a three year old screaming her head off in the bathroom? A three year old with a tiny little paper cut on her petite little thumb. Screaming. Yes, screaming. This is the same 3 year old who, only a half hour before, just sunk three (at least I can see three marks) teeth through the middle of her tongue as she fell on the stairs. Blood came gushing from the wailing little mouth, dripping onto her already dirty pink shirt, trailing down the side of her little anguished face. But forget that incident, there is, after all, a paper cut less than half an inch long on the chipped nail-polished appendage called the thumb.

I like quiet. I need quiet. I like to be alone. I need to be alone. And yet, I constantly have children in my space; talking, eating, fighting, crying, talking, talking, talking, eating, fighting, screaming, eating some more, and constantly talking, talking, talking. And these are just my children. Then there's the neighborhood children, joining the brood that calls this 2600 square feet of space "home;" six children, seven, eight, running, laughing, arguing, plotting, planning, screaming, talking, talking, talking. Of course they can also be adorable, fun and a joy; but there is an angry woman typing this today, so there is nothing but doom and gloom and unabashed grumpiness.

I have no idea why my mouse icon is traveling crazily across the screen, where it stops I'm sure I won't know. By now, as an angry woman, I envy its freedom; completely unrestrained from the fingers that so often hold it hostage, tell it what to do; what to click on and where to go.

But me, the angry woman, has had a no-longer-screaming-three-year-old talk to her non-stop for the last three paragraphs. Mix finger nails on a chalk board with banging your forehead on a cement wall and you may start to understand just how I feel. Oh look, there goes my little mouse arrow again, running away to some private destination.

I was thinking about writing a book. Producing at blub.com, where I have my scrapbooks made. I'd like to write stories for my children, stories with great characters with matchless integrity. Stories with great morals and page-turning adventures. (The talking stopped for but a moment, now the running commentary has begun again. Now the doorbell has chimed it's much too cheery tune and the soon to be ex-neighbor boy stands with yet another load of food items from his home, as the movers are here today and the fridge must go.)

It is very interesting to find out what sorts of things one's neighbor's eat. I now own the largest flip-top bottle of catsup ever known to man. The question is, do I use said bottle, seeing how it is already open? And just where does such a large bottle of catsup fit inside one's fridge? Bologna. The processed, nitrate laden, not-a-real-food food now sits in my cheese drawer. I haven't bought bologna in.....10 years. But now I have a half eaten package of it accompanying my cheese. Why did I not just throw it away? Because I don't like to waste. And surely, the husband will come home, see the bologna (if indeed he ever opens the fridge for himself) and say, "Bologna? I love bologna! You haven't bought that in eight years!" And I'll say, "Ten. It's been ten years." And then we'll join in combat over the number of years it has been since I last purchased an 88 cent package of bologna, a battle to the death, which he will give up on after I beat him mercilessly with fact after fact of my grocery shopping history and how I stopped buying bologna, yes, ten years ago.

Anyway, a book. Or two, maybe some chapter books and some early reader books for the 3 year old that certainly enjoys torture by way of making noise. I have no money to pass on to my children as a heritage, but perhaps I can pass on the story of their lives, a little creativity mixed with truth. Books that have four wild children in them with a mother who never gets angry but always, amazingly, does just the right thing.

And now, what is this? Amidst the 3 year old than can't stop talking, the middle two children come in, one tattling and the other whining so loudly the sound barrier must surely have been pierced. Middle Girl says: He ripped the thingy that goes over the thing! (Now noisy 3 year old, whom I have asked to stop talking, is talking without opening her mouth. Mostly grunting and angry growling noises are coming out.) Middle Boy whines: I didn't do it, it just fell down when I touched it! I use my Super Mom Powers to see that Middle Boy is lying and order Middle Boy: Go to bed! Then I ask Middle Girl: What got ripped? The outside blinds in the back patio? Middle Girl struggles to find the right words as she often does. After an annoying game of charades, Angry Mom discovers that Middle Boy has demolished the fabric cover that shades the outside swing. Angry Mom tells noisy 3 year old to clean up and get ready for bed.

Will Nap Time save Angry Mom from pulling her hair out strand by strand?

Time for a commercial break...