Inadequacy

School supplies have started appearing on store shelves, warm evenings with stagnant air render us fodder for mosquitoes and patience is a virtue lost to days past.

I reach this point nearly every summer, and this one is no different. Too much of everything and everyone else and not enough time to think without interruption. The ability to focus on one item is a distant and evasive memory. It's during these last months of summer vacation that my inabilities as a parent becomes apparent to everyone, not just me.

The loudness of unrelenting noise, bickering and constants in their demands leaves me worn out and grumpy and in a constant state of irritation that is one hair away from a complete temper tantrum (a mommytrum).

I hate that person. I hate everything that she is and actively work to evolving into her, this shadow of a destined fate. While I am successful during most days in the year, it is during summer break that I stumble in this endeavor. I fall and fail in such a grand fashion that the sting of my failure washes away the memory of any accomplishments that I'd made the school year before. And I hate myself for it.

Each night as the children are tucked in, I promise to myself that I will do better, I will be more patient, I will spend more time with them, read them more books and be a better mother. But this is an unrealistic expectation. I work from home, and it is the nature of children that they interact with their mamas at least 30 times in an hour, if not more.

This constant is what does me in. During the course of the school year, their brains and bodies are engaged with learning, practicing and constant stimulation. Weekends are a time of relaxing and having fun and getting caught up on chores that didn't fit in our schedules during the week. Given the shear amount of work to be done at home, even those days are often full and moments to relax are cherished. Once school comes to an end though, the days stretch into one long unending and mind-numbing weekend that lasts 80 days.

Teachers eagerly release wiggly children into the wilds of their homes where their active little minds and bodies are no longer being filled with useful and practical bits of information. No, instead they are filled with boredom and irritation at their limited social life. At least that is the way it works in our home. I've work to do if I want to keep my mind sane and money in my account leaving little time to 'play' cruise director.

We've made the hump, and are now on the down slope of vacation, and though that seems like it should be easy from now until the end of August, these are the longest days. Summer vacation is a marathon. And like marathon the easy part is at the beginning. There is a lot of energy and excitement and the challenge is to find the right pace and stick to it so that you don't crash and burn before you finish.

I thought I had it all worked out, but as the days have melted into each other I've come to the realization that yet again, I was mistaken.

My liver and I need to hold it together for 30 or so more days. School starts in 35, but the week or so before is filled with a flurry of Back-to-School excitement that we all find refreshing, like a salve on skin weathered from having spent too much time in the sun and wind.

As has become our ritual, when BW and BB see me at work on a blog post, they inquire about it. In chatting with them about the topic of summer and how I feel as though I'm not as good a mama as I can be. BW paused deep in thought, and replied "Well, mama. If that's true, then I could certainly be a better child. I think we are all doing it just right. It's just a tough season." BB nodded in agreement and said that she missed the homework too.

Together my team mates and I will slog through the next several weeks and hopefully arrive at the end of the season unscathed.

They did make me promise them two things. To laugh more, and to write more. Those are promises that I intend to keep.