It’s not very often that I get to go somewhere with one of my children, just the two of us. When you have five kids, inevitably they have some of the same friends, and get invited to the same birthday parties. Not today. Today, it was just my son and me. We went to the birthday party of a friend he knows from school. The boy is in another grade, and I didn’t know one single child there, other than the birthday boy. It was absolute chaos, the way a birthday party in summertime should be. The family rented a huge, inflatable water slide, which was set up right next to a trampoline. Nearby, faces were painted, balloons were twisted into animals, a clown entertained. A large tent housed a full luncheon buffet, complete with beer on tap. My son had a BALL, while other parents and children cast curious glances our direction. He screamed his way down the waterslide probably fifty times. He ate an entire plate of barbecue chicken. He bounced around the trampoline, squawking and chirping. He tenderly hugged his friend. He waited sooooo patiently in line for a balloon animal shaped like a dick and balls sword. And for three and a half hours, I watched him enjoy himself, all alone. And the entire time, I stood nearby, all alone.

I expect that my autistic son will have trouble fitting in with people he doesn’t know. But I’m not accustomed to feeling that way myself! I didn’t have any meaningful dialogue with ANYONE there, except the hostess. Everyone seemed to just … move away from us? Eventually, after making small talk with half a dozen other parents that didn’t go beyond saying hello, I figured I was just there to keep my son out of trouble. He had a wonderful time. He had cake. Then we left.

On the drive home, I started to think, perhaps it’s a blessing that we have such a large family. I’ve often wondered how different things would be for my son if he were an only child, and I had all the time in the world to devote to him and his needs. I’ve come to the conclusion that it would kind of suck, and we’d probably be terribly lonely. Thank goodness we have lots of other kiddos right here at home to play with every day!

No, not really – but I’m starting to feel like I should!

Here’s my Vent Of The Day. Oldest child didn’t get up on time. The excuse is always the same, “I set my alarm, but for some reason, it didn’t go off!” I sympathize with her, for real. I have no idea why they make high school start at the crack of dawn. Elementary-aged kids have such an easier time getting up when it’s still dark – they should have elementary school start early and high school start later. But they don’t. Anyway. She didn’t get up on time. So instead of rushing around and heading out the door and hightailing it to school, she got dressed and then sat on the couch and pouted.

Um, yeah. I don’t understand this problem solving approach, either. Eventually, I realized she was sitting on the couch and asked her what was up. She didn’t have an answer for me as to why she hadn’t left yet, beyond, “I don’t know!” She somehow had herself convinced that if I didn’t call the school and excuse her immediately, that they wouldn’t even allow her into the classroom. Like they would just shut the door in her face. Like they would prefer that she miss an ENTIRE 99-minute class, rather than just miss the first 25 minutes.

This required my husband actually driving her to school and walking her into the front office, where we could get some clarification on the tardy policy. He called me up on his way to work and said, “GUESS WHAT, babe. You won’t believe this. But they’ll actually LET HER INTO CLASS even if she’s late.” I know! I was stunned, too. (Not really.)

Tomorrow begins finals, at 7 in the morning. Tonight, I’m putting about three more alarm clocks in her room!

Is that show Clean Sweep still on? I haven’t seen it in a looooong time, if it is. I think the Clean Sweep people need to come and visit my husband. I can’t understand how we had a MASSIVE, ginormous, insane garage sale when we moved, and another garage sale in the springtime, and Salvation Army came and picked up a bunch of stuff in my driveway a few months ago, and still…STILL, I am drowning in a sea of clutter. We have a stack of boxes in our master bedroom that hasn’t moved much over the past twelve months. These boxes drive me insane. Several times, I’ve tried to go through them, and it’s just too overwhelming. We discussed tackling this mess during the eleven days my husband was off work for the holidays, but it just didn’t happen. Either I was sick or the kids were sick, and it didn’t happen. We didn’t take the kids to that chipmunk movie, either. Damn!

But today is a new day. It’s Monday, and it’s back to work for the man and back to school for the oldest. The little ones are still home with me for a bit longer, but they’re obsessed with Nick Jr online lately, so I could probably paint the entire house without them noticing. I decided that today would be the day. So, armed with coffee and motivation, I started opening boxes. Out of the probably dozen or so boxes, I unpacked two. The rest, I labeled with sticky notes so my husband can see at a glance what’s inside – but I can summarize it for you in two words: HIS SHIT.

I’m stunned by how many boxes and boxes of MAGAZINES we moved. What is it with men and magazines? What is the purpose of keeping years and years worth of Popular Mechanics and Playboy? Will he ever look at them again? I can pretty much guarantee that the answer is NO. But they’ll be our legacy, mark my words. We may not have much to pass on to our children, but they’ll never want for mediocre porn or outdated tech articles. And if they get tired of reading old magazines, they can listen to an entire crate of mix tapes from the 80s! Maybe they’ll stumble upon some old relic computer from our generation and they can install tons of outdated software on it – I have an entire box of it, just waiting for them. And for some light reading, they can kick back with stacks of college textbooks.

Spring cleaning is here – and now that I’ve gotten the ball rolling, I’m certain that my husband will be ready to dive into this cache of crap, and do something with it all. I just know it! In the meantime, I need to figure out what to do with a king size memory foam mattress topper, now that we have a new bed that it won’t fit on. It’s rolled up and pushed in the corner of the room like a gigantic Chipotle burrito, but it’s really got to go!

One of the things I really love about my husband is how I always feel safe with him. He’s a big dude, and can be intimidating if he wants to be. It’s like the best of both worlds, really: he’s such a super nice guy, and people so often seem relieved to discover that he’s not some aggressive badass, they fall all over themselves being accommodating. I love that we can go anywhere, any time, and nobody EVER gives us a hard time or talks shit to him. It’s downright delightful.

And I feel like sort of an authority on being messed with, because I used to be married to a guy who was NOT the least bit intimidating. He was a fairly small guy, not the least bit confrontational, and people obviously picked up on that vibe, because they messed with us all the time! So often, we’d be at a show or a bar or restaurant, and some drunk asshole would start hassling us. And it was always ME having to resolve the situation. I hated that! I’m very pleased that I’ve left behind that whole phase of my life. What can I say: I like my man to be the man, y’know?

Today, I was having lunch out with my daughters and I overheard a couple of guys a table away from us. They were 30ish, dressed business casual, and totally engaged in their conversation about…TWILIGHT. They were talking about seeing New Moon over the weekend with their wives, and actually discussing the differences between the book and the movie. It was like listening to my teenage daughter and her best friend going on about who is hotter, Jacob or Edward.

I can understand guys going to see Twilight with their wives; I drag my husband to see movies I pick out all the time. But if he started talking about Twilight with his buddies, they’d probably threaten to punch him in the vagina. Come on, guys – we let you have Transformers. Leave Twilight for the girls!