"Parenthood" had a lot going for it when I first saw it in junior high. A few funny jokes, some very quotable lines, Mary Steenburgen, and what turned out to be my first glimpse at a female-oriented "accessory". It all seemed very mature to me at the time, and of course was so far off from my life, in a temporal sense, that it was almost completely foreign.
When it came on tonight, I had to watch it because it is one of those grating movies that must be watched when it comes on. Very early on in the movie, it is established that Steve Martin's character is 35 years old. 35. I'm 33. I immediately had to lie down and do my special breathing that keeps my brain from exploding. How could it be possible that I'd gotten to the point in life where I could be Gil Buckman? He wore a suit to work and was working at being a partner (whatever that means) and had an adult-looking house and could improvise an entire cowboy/balloon man routine at the drop of a hat. I'm feeling stiflingly inadequate. Just imagine when I'm Jason Robards's age.
Jen has been working on project/homework/finals stuff for the past 92 hours straight. Care of the kids fell solely to me tonight, but I did it happily and joyfully because I adore my kids and I am achingly happy that I'm not Jen right now. My envy of her going back to school ends at this time every semester.
There's some quirks to single-parenting that we haven't overcome yet, and bathtime is the big one. The girls were overdue tonight, those filthy little rugrats (that we spent the afternoon in the yard eating dirt didn't help), but I couldn't work out how it would work. I can't do them both in the bath at the same time, I don't think. Maybe I could. That's probably the only way to go; there's no way I could leave one downstairs while I give the other a bath, that just seems overly risky. Hmmmm.... I opted for the half-assery of just wiping their face and hair down after dinner, followed by a hasty comb job. Perfect.
Day eighty six
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