When you can't even blame Friday 13th

There are days that start with a bang and get progressively worse. Today, 6:30am and the fleet of backhoes, steamrollers and stern-faced men processing up our drive was the pistol start catapulting us from sleep, into the nearest pile of clothes, and out to move our cars before they became part of the asphalt. In our excitement, we forgot to let the dog out and he, in his excitement, let us know his disappointment by emptying his bladder and bowels by the mudroom door.

The high-pitched whining of the dishwasher only caught my attention after I had resolved the first debacle, but having whined like this through the night - without actually bothering to wash the dishes - it soon let us know its thoughts by juddering and grinding to a halt. In resigning itself to appliance redundancy, the sleek Bosch dishwasher joined the extremely handsome Viking refrigerator as a shiny hood ornament in my kitchen. After three unsuccessful attempts by supposedly credentialed refrigerator repairmen , we asked them to bring us a temporary spare while they ordered even more new parts and figured out a viable game plan. Nearly a month on and I have become so comfortable with having to retrieve items from the plain but functional mudroom fridge that somehow the urgency has passed. Visitors tend to fan the flames of indignation when they throw open the glamorous stainless steel doors only to find room temperature, empty white shelves. But since the repair company hasn’t called us in over two weeks, I suspect we may be at a stand off.

That’s alright, my husband and I decided it might be time to indulge in a little weekend break, one that didn’t involve packing up a suitcase of diapers, rash cream, 20 changes of clothing for a 3 day period, and half the ‘read with me’ series from the local library. In short, not taking the kids. Kind friends were engaged, the children gently broken into the idea, and the countdown could begin. Except, while everyone has been in marvelous health for the past couple of months, both children and I have come down with a mystery malaise that could be a summer cold, a sinus infection or an ungodly plague of allergies, or all three, causing us streaming noses, foggy heads and unsteady feet.

The youngest, just officially entering his terrible twos, has spent the past week endlessly drooling thanks to the arrival of three new teeth. His allergy-laced head cold, red, streaming eyes, and an inner-ear equilibrium apparently off, are all seriously impeding the simple task of walking and causing him to fall, Charlie Chaplin-style, every fifteen to twenty minutes. Adding insult to injury, it turns out the hand-me-down shoes we’ve been clamping on his feet might have tipped the odds out of his favour. After one spectacular fall when he tripped over his own feet, I rushed him to a proper shoe store to get his feet properly measured. Not only are they still unusually wide, (which limits the selection to five sensible styles in a store full of hundreds with shiny fire engines and glittery rainbows), they were a whole size smaller than the shoes he was already wearing. The clerk looked at me as though I was morally bankrupt. Or maybe it was the gash in his lip that prompted the disdain.

Pre-trip nerves over leaving two reasonably compliant under-five year olds with congenial family friends are probably warranted, even appropriate. But the prospect of leaving two teething, snotty, tearful, foggy children, and an 80% chance of a related ear infection in one if not two, certainly ups the ante and makes me wonder whether we should arrange back up least the first set flee the house screaming.

The fat lip from the shoe-related fall has also put a tiny hiccup in the youngest’s very recent speech development. Favourite words are currently fish, fire truck, and fountain, all which are now being repeated incessantly with sh- in place of f-, earning strange looks as he belts out shish, shuck and shount-it. Or again, perhaps it’s the facial damage that is being clocked and sniffed at as proof of lax mothering. At least I managed to intercept him before he ran over the driveway’s hot asphalt in his new correctly fitting shoes as I don’t know how I’d have explained melted soles and burnt feet.

Our weekend trip is still on, and I’ve primed the paediatrician that she may get a call about my son’s ears. But it’s only just dawned on me that this Friday is the 13th. Given the way the week’s going, perhaps we should stay put.