Tuesday blues.

Recently: standing at the kitchen counter, attempting to peel a hardboiled egg. The white kept coming off with the shell until there was hardly any left, and I stood there, pissed off, late, a million things to do, thinking, “How am I going to do this when I’m a mom?” That’s the question I ask whenever these mundane tasks don’t come easy, like removing an egg shell in one deft maneuver, the flat side of the thumb, the way my dad does it over the sink. He makes it look simple, but it’s not so fucking simple. It’s a craft. And I worry that in ten, fifteen years, when there’s a passel of children pulling on my skirt hem, rolling their sippy cups across the linoleum, screaming for their breakfast, how will I breeze through the mindless bullshit without losing my mind? Example: opening a can of soup over the sink without losing the grip of the can in the opener and dropping the can and spilling all the soup? Or laundry? Loads and loads of laundry? Or hauling groceries into a car and a child in a car seat at the same time in the rain, and the hubby’s on the phone, “What’s for dinner, darling?” How does anyone do that? (I can see my mother now, reading this, saying aloud to her iPad screen, “For God’s sake, Cary, stop THINKING so much.”)

January 31, 2012    34 notes    Comments

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  1. caseyliz said: i’m 25 years old and i cannot—CANNOT—operate a can opener. (i grew up with an automatic one, so technically this is not my fault) it’s okay.
  2. thecooknook said: marry rich
  3. the-house-of-oz said: You’ll learn as you go + ask lots of questions from family and friends. A tip for hard boiled eggs: the newer the egg, the harder to peel. My grandma taught me that.
  4. needcaffeine said: You just need to chill out & take it one step at a time. Experience is what teaches you these tricks, they don’t all come at once. BTW, for a hard boiled egg, use cold water while peeling it will come off easily.
  5. caryrandolph posted this