My Exciting Life

Someone talked to me recently about longing for excitement and wishing their lives weren’t so humdrum and they could go places and do things.

I can’t remember who this was, because I can’t remember much of anything at my age, but that’s ok, because I have been able to stay home for longer in one stretch than I have for the past year, and this makes me happy.

And even when I stay home, my life is very exciting.

This morning I was yanked from a sound sleep by my cell phone ringing. It was Emily. She was crying. Now when you’re a mom and your daughter calls you, very upset, at 4:30 a.m. you imagine in a split second things not lawful to be uttered.

This is what was actually the matter: most of the Knepps were gone and Emily was spending the night with three of the younger children. She was in Jessica’s bed, the top bunk. At 5:30 this morning Jessica’s alarm clock rang so Emily did what we all do when the alarm goes off—she bailed out of bed to turn it off. Since she wasn’t at home like she thought, she fell to the floor with a great jarring jolt. She woke up then.

Emily figured out she was in pain but still in one piece and was going to go back to bed when she realized her hand was wet. She went to the bathroom and saw that a square of skin was missing from her chin.

That’s when she called me.

I mothered and doctored her over the phone and by mid-morning things were much more cheerful even though her jaw and teeth are so sore she can hardly talk or eat.

Meanwhile, I couldn’t go back to sleep after that phone call so I got up and chopped onions and chicken breasts for today’s hot lunch at school. This is getting to be a major production with the school population growing every year. We now have 42 students, which meant that I was making pizza for 50.

(Another mom was bringing dessert; we were both bringing veggies.)

After I got the children off to school I made 2 ½ batches of pizza dough and put it in a huge bowl. Then I got myself ready and carried the stuff out to the Honda, which is Paul’s little old decrepit but reliable warehouse car that gets unbelievable gas mileage.

Meanwhile the dough was rising. Rapidly.

I set off down the road with the bowl of dough in the passenger seat beside me, and when I wasn’t shifting gears I was stabbing and scooping at this huge white ballooning pile of dough with a big wooden spoon, because it was taking on a mutant life of its own and threatening to engulf everything in the car.

At one of the road construction sites on 99 I sat there stabbing and stirring while I waited for the pilot car. I was afraid the policeman that slowly passed in the opposite lane would make inquiries but he didn’t.

It is very exciting to get emergency calls early in the morning and to drive the Honda to school while trying to keep rising dough contained. Who needs mountain climbing or a trip to Vegas? Not me.

Quote of the Day:
“No more two-story beds for me.”
--Emily