The longest case of the Mondays

Having a case of the Mondays is no fun. Having a case of the Mondays on a Friday, blows.

This week was tough. I spent last weekend in San Francisco celebrating the 30th Anniversary of their Basque Cultural Center, surrounded with Basques from all over the place: Boise Basques, San Francisco Basques, Basques from Bizkaia and Gipuzkoa, from Navarre and Iparralde. This was my third time in San Francisco. I know these trips are real any yet they feel like a separate universe, with its own laws and a limited number of seats. It’s Friday, you land in San Francisco and forget about the rest of the world. You live that weekend like that’s all there is, hanging out with people who come from far away but feel just like you, only with different accents. For four days you don’t think about your family, your significant other, your kids. Everything can go and sometimes, it does. Then Monday comes around and everyone goes home and you think it’s ok, we’ll keep it up by email, Facebook or Skype, until the time difference, the age gap and the language barrier hit you smack in the face.

So I’m chugging along, making the best out of this stupid week, and it’s finally Friday. Waking up my son in the morning is absolutely delightful. He needs about 2.5 seconds to wake up and come snuggle with me in the kitchen while I check my email. The way he thanks me for making his cereal you’d think I was up at 3 in the morning cooking an All American Breakfast. Waking up my daughter, on the other hand, is the most excruciating thing ever. We go through a 15 minute ritual every morning to start her up “the right way” and avoid a meltdown (wake up notice, 5 extra minutes in bed to get used to the idea, second wake up notice, another 2 extra minutes, rolling – literally – from her bed onto the floor, wrapping her in her princess blanket, carrying her to the kitchen and depositing her little butt on the chair). And you have to do it just so; skip a step or raise your voice slightly at any given time in those fifteen minutes and you’re screwed. Like this morning. I got impatient before the end of the ritual and man, did I pay the price! A one-hour meltdown. 60 minutes of non-stop crying. I have a splitting headache at this point.

I finally drop the kids off at school and proceed to take my frustration out on my friend. Luckily, he never gets mad. I don’t get it, but maybe some day he’ll let me in on his little secret.

I arrive to work and some asshole gives me attitude in the H-P parking lot.

Thank God I won an award shortly afterwards which set a positive tone for the rest of the day!

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