Dear Diary: End of Summer Emotions

Dear Diary,

I'm feeling a bit panicky this week - it's the last week of Summer vacation and I feel like I need to do all the things with my girls. The roller coaster that is the end of summer emotions is getting to me. My little inner gremlin that loves to make me feel like an inadequate mom/wife/human apparently doesn't think 3 weeks of Musical Theatre camp, a week at Disney, various other fun activities and nearly 2 weeks in Ohio with family was enough. Rude.

Anyways, I decided to take the girls to the zoo for the day. We have a nice zoo, complete with a really fun splash pad that has plenty of shade for the grown ups. The parking lot is currently under construction and is a bit of a hot mess. While trying to find a parking space I managed to get myself trapped in a dead end, right behind another car that needed to get out too. There was no room to turn around so I had to flex my reverse skills, (which are rather great as my car has like all of the cameras and alarms and shit). Even with all of that, I managed to ram the rear end of Agent Poopy into a tree. I have NO idea how. I saw the trees on either side of it, but not the one I hit. I've heard people say "I never saw it!" when describing their own incidents but I've always thought that was a ridiculous, cop out thing to say. Now I understand. I'd love to blame the kids, you know, say they were arguing or something. But nope. We were all really jolly and excited to be going to the zoo! Oh and by the way, my car's name is Agent Poopy. Dubbed by the children.

Diary, I was so angry with myself. I was saying things in my head like "how can you be so stupid!" "you're such an idiot" "you dumb fuck". And then I was getting frustrated with the kids, for no real reason, they were just existing... Living their best lives getting out of the car and kicking the sand. The 5 year old even looked at the dent and said "It's not so bad mommy! It's okay to make mistakes". I pretty much ignored her. 😭

I texted the husband and told him a tree jumped in my path. He responded with "I'm pretty sure trees don't work that way, but hope everything is okay" I froze. I realized I was being ridiculous. No one was hurt, the car is fine, its really just a dent, IT'S OKAY TO MAKE MISTAKES. The 5 year old was so right. I never should've brushed her off.

The fact that I was able to shift my mindset relatively quickly has made me feel really proud of myself. I've been working really hard to treat my own being with kindness and compassion, I'm taking this as a personal win. AND, the 5 year year recognized it before me! That's a parenting win too.

After that shift, I completely forgot about the incident for the rest of the super fun time we had at the zoo. When we got back to the car I was a little startled but I also laughed a little bit to myself. I mean, how ridiculous is it really.... how is it possible that I didn't see that dang tree?

Love, Della