nancy drew
(nancy when she finds that elusive clock)
mothers take on many roles: taxi driver, referee, party planner, aesthetician, tutor, home chef, nurse, cleaning service… but one gig no one talks about when you are pregnant is that of detective.
(here i am schlepping my kids to hip hop or trumpet or hebrew along with all of the other boulder moms)
(here i am calmly mediating a disagreement between my children… lucy has on some spectacular boots!)
(here i am welcoming a gang of kids over for a play date)
(here i am making dinner)
(here i am making dinner when i’m tired)
(here i am vacuuming… my favorite job!)
“mama - WHERE are my orange socks with the pom poms that i last wore at least six months ago and i NEED right now otherwise i canNOT go to school??”
“mama - WHERE are the good goggles with the blue strap… these sixty-five other goggles don’t work!!”
“mom - WHERE is that form you were supposed to sign that i never told you about and probably left in my locker that i HAVE to turn in today??”
“mama - WHERE is that (tiny, sticky, squishy) thing i got at so and so’s birthday party that is so SPECIAL to me that i can never get again??”
('i’m not even sure what these things are but they are GROSS!)
luckily for me, in addition to reading the little house books, i spent my childhood poring over the nancy drews so i learned how to solve all kinds of mysteries (i also logged a lot of time watching scooby doo and picked up loads of tips from velma) and am a veteran sleuth.
(here i am looking for lucy’s squishmallow)
(found it at the top of stairs next to her back pack)
(this gang was really brave… they got into some scary situations!)
in addition to finding random items for my children, i have also been engaged in many mind-boggling cases related to my home, most notably the laundry. when i put four pillowcases into the wash, WHY do only THREE come out? (i still don’t really know why, but sometimes they miraculously reappear which is beyond exciting!) WHERE do all the socks go? i actually have a system now for the socks with no friends… they are placed in a special drawer to wait for their mate. if they are still there after a year or so, they are relegated to the bin so they can’t frustrate me anymore.
the last six months or so i have been working a REALLY challenging case. at least twice a week i would get out of shower, throw a towel around my head and dry off. when my whole self was thoroughly dry i would remove my head towel and my hair would be full of bubbles! and always on the left side! i couldn’t figure out WHY after over FIFTY years of bathing i forgot how to rinse my hair. it was so frustrating because i would then have to get all wet again to clear away the left side bubbles. i HATE wasting time (except for watching TV… i can do that endlessly) so i got to the point where i would have to take a beat before exiting the shower and ask myself if i’d REALLY rinsed my head - kind of like the way i try to notice where i am parking when i go to the market or target or especially the giant costco lot so i can find my car after shopping - most times i cannot!
further, my hair had gotten really tangly and difficult to comb out after a shower. since my hair is also in its fifties i thought maybe it had just gotten old and ornery too. but the other day i was in the shower to clean something (wearing clothes) so i had my readers on… turns out i was washing my hair with one bottle of shampoo and “conditioning” it with yet another shampoo… DOUBLE shampooing and NO conditioner at all. the writing on the bottles is so tiny i couldn’t read it! (this doesn’t really explain why i was leaving “conditioner” in my hair on the left side - clearly after decades of training i was still a little lax about the conditioner rinse.) so i am NOT losing my mind (well… maybe just a little) but i AM losing my eyesight. i can’t tell you how satisfying it is to put this case to rest. now someone just needs to invent waterproof glasses so i can tell what i am putting on my head (thank goodness i have never used nair!) i am sure nancy would be proud.