I keep a running mental health tally of why it’s not so bad to be 56, wrinkled and achy and why I certainly shouldn’t be envious of the 30 year olds.  Along with being ‘young’ comes those duties and responsibilities that I was all too happy to shirk a few years back.  There are perks to being on the far side of middle-age.

I am grateful that snow days and school delays are no longer the center of my universe and enough to set me in a tailspin before I’ve even had my first cup of coffee.

What to do with the children?  Should I call in sick?  Do I dare to leave them alone, unsupervised, while I slog off to work?  The kids are celebrating.  NO SCHOOL, hurray! Whilst mom is frantically trying to conjure up a workable plan that won’t get her reported to children’s services or shit canned from work.

No wonder mothers get loony.  Juggling the everyday logistics of parenthood is a real juggernaut.  When things are going well, which means any day short of a catastrophe, it’s do-able but throw in a snow day, a sick kid or a flat tire and you’ve got the makings of migraine and a mother who is stretched way too thin.

I remember the cardinal rule at the babysitter’s: Do NOT EVER bring a sick child to my house.

Guilty as charged, more than once, only to be busted later in the day when the babysitter rang me at work and said, “Did you know that your daughter is sick?  You’ve got to come and get her, now.”

Of course, I always feigned innocence.  Sick, really?  No, I wasn’t aware that she had a 102 fever and was spewing Pop Tarts.  If I had stayed home from work every time one of my kids was “slightly” sick I would have been staying at home all the time, job-less and income-less.

Hell, I figured my kids were contaminated at the babysitter’s in the first place so turn about was fair play.

I am eternally grateful that the only creatures I am now responsible for are dogs, whom you let out, let in, pet, feed, water and can then ignore, if you so choose.

I loved my children when they were small, but I think I might like them a little bit more now that they can fend for themselves (usually) and don’t need me to serve as their alarm clock, chauffeur, nurse and ATM.