I like to be exceptional. Who doesn’t? Even if people like to be exceptional quietly I am pretty certain most people don’t wish for a future of monotony and hum drum.

I am taking classes again. Eight credit hours on campus at least 3 independent study (6 if I can ever start my other IS class). And voice lessons. Did I mention I am also a mom? So my children are sort of getting the shaft lately. I have a sitter with them every Monday afternoon, I am gone 2 nights a week and only partially present the rest of the time, since I am trying to speed read my textbooks and write papers.

Now I need to find 12 hours to volunteer in a field related to my abnormal psych class. Hmmm… Where do I find 12 more hours? It doesn’t sound like a lot. Just one more night a week to be gone from my family for the next 6+ weeks. Or a couple of Saturdays, dodging the holidays. Or my other option: Just do what I can comfortably.

So back to being exceptional. As much as I love to excel and have a beautiful number on my transcript–4 point O. I think I would rather be acceptable, passable, mediocre and giggle with my Eden, snuggle with Alden and have a conversation that lasts more than 2 minutes with Chad before I crash at 9:00pm.

This morning I had an out of body experience. Kids were doing normal kid stuff, meanwhile I was showing a full set of venomous teeth. After watching my very ugly grumpy self from what felt like afar I would simmer down and try to “talk nice.” But My! That monster me is pretty big and stormy when it wants to be. My own time outs were just not cutting it today. I need to have the really nice, lovely, sweet, fun, wonderful me come back and re-inhabit this body and send monster mom far away.

Funny how I feel like I am watching myself act horribly and I end up saying, “Oh no! Don’t do that!” But it is like talking to a ridiculous character on the TV who who goes ahead and does just what everyone knows they should NOT.

Jokes aside– It is difficult not to feel like you are the center of the universe. I think my thoughts and feel my feelings all day everyday. No matter how many times I empathize with others the chapters in their Book of Life seem to go on reading blank unless I am with them–whereas since mine is open all the time it feels like it is the only one. (I have never been very good at reading more than one book at a time).

Anyway… So Chad and I hear a BOOM CRASH WAIL in the middle of the night. Chad bolts up and grabs Alden. Just looking at Chad’s face I knew he was asleep. He was seeing a completely different scene all around us than I was. The terror he saw was written all over his face. I NEVER want to see him like that again.

I grabbed a crying Eden off of the floor where she had fallen out of bed (the BOOM CRASH WAIL). Chad was still trying to will Alden back to life. Was Alden crying? I don’t remember. But Chad’s face had fallen. The light in his eyes, the strength and confidence in his figure–really everything everyone sees in Chad–was far away.

I have often felt overwhelmed by what would happen to my life–to me–if anything happened to one of the kids or Chad. I have wondered if losing me would put much of a dent at all in Chad’s life. He is so self-assured. I will never wonder again. And he needed me. I was the one who could talk him down and give him the support he needed. Sometimes I feel like Chad does all the giving and I do all the taking. As much as I am haunted by his fragile image holding Alden in the night, I am comforted to know that he needs me and I am what he needs.