Perfect Imperfections

This week. I shake my fist at this week! It started off quiet and unassuming. Sunday, we played with all of Tommy's new toys, most of which have four wheels and make my stereotypical boy very, very happy. Monday morning, my parents picked up Luke and took him to the beach with two of his cousins, then we met them after Tommy's nap. Tuesday morning, we went to the farmer's market, where I ate three tamales for breakfast.

And then, then. It all went downhill. Tuesday afternoon, Shane helped his mom with an errand. I went to my parents'. We came home at about 3:30 and it was 89 degrees in the house and steadily rising. Shane got home an hour later and started calling air conditioning places. A local place told us they'd be out, so we waited. And waited, but we ran the sprinkler while we waited.

I was so hot that I actually placed my lawn chair in the sprinkler. I don't mean to be a baby because I grew up without central air, but I lived in an old house that was meant to cool naturally. Our house is not. By 7, the AC guy hadn't shown up and Tommy was angrily (and sweatily) hitting me and yelling night night, so the boys and I packed up and headed to Shane's parents. It was cool and the boys were excited, but I had flutters of the weirdness of encroaching on my husband's parents without my husband.
But when we got there, my father-in-law pulled in at the same time, toting a big bag of ice cream from the grocery store. He made us ice cream sundaes and then I tucked the boys into nice cool beds and tucked myself in with a book. Shane called and the original AC guy never showed, so he called another who finally made it to us at 10 that night. He replaced a coil but told Shane that it really looked like we needed a whole new unit. Oh, and at some point I noticed that my phone wasn't charging but chose to ignore it.

Wednesday morning, Tommy woke me at six and my father-in-law made a crazy amount of pancakes. With chocolate chips. It was like staying at a free, awesome hotel. Shane came over and we went home to our cooler house, which great. Except for the part where my phone died and despite my best troubleshooting efforts (and Adam's, too), it would not charge or revive. I contemplated throwing it at the wall, but instead, we took Tommy to his two year well visit, where he received a clean bill of health and diagnosis of a growth spurt. Homebody is now in the 95th (up from 90) percentile in height and the 20th (up from 10th) percentile is weight. And his head is still hanging in there at a giant 90th percentile. Except for the block head, he has the figure we'd all love. We came home, Shane and Luke helped his mom with another errand, while I brooded over my phone, eventually deciding that I should send it to fix-iPhones.com. Putting my phone in an envelope at the mercy of the USPS? Almost as hard as when the boys were born and the nurses and Shane took them to the nursery for a check up. But I cut the cord and did it.
Then, of course, OF COURSE, I started sweating sitting inside the house and was all, This isn't right. Why am I sweating? AM I DYING? Oh, no wait, the air is broken. Again. I packed overnight bags again, Shane made calls, and the same guy as the day before came out and was like, Yeah, remember how I told you the coil was a temporary fix? When I said temporary, I meant really temporary. Also, it is going to cost you approximately eleven zillion dollars for a new unit and also, we can't fix it until tomorrow, suckers.

So, back we went to Shane's parents, discussing which child we were going to sell to afford the new air conditioning. But oh, it was cool and they had ice cream and the boys were happy. I took a shower that night and noticed that my calves were more well-defined than well, ever, and hey, thank you running. I slept well and woke up at six to lace up my shoes and go for a 3.2 mile run because remember those calves? I want to keep them looking nice. It was so hot out and I felt a little silly, like when you see people at a hotel on the treadmill and you wonder why they don't just stay in bed and relax? I get it now, though, because I felt so good And when I got back, Shane's dad had bagels and fruit set out. See: like staying in a free hotel.

Shane spent all day at our house, during which time the thermostat crept up to 100 degrees and he inexplicably decided to vacuum while the boys and I hid out in the cool cave of his parents'. Finally, a zillion hours and a zillion dollars later, we had a new air conditioning unit, but it took the house a long time to cool down so we spent more time in the sprinkler.


This morning, I woke up and the house was a blissful 76 degrees. I was under a blanket. A blanket! And then, the iPhone place called and apparently since I am a spaz who drops my phone in water a lot, a lot, the USB port was corroded, but they replaced it and it charged fine and it's winging its way back to me this weekend.

In the midst of this, I've dusted off my Nikon and taken some non-phone pictures of the boys. I maybe gained a better relationship with my husband's parents. The boys definitely gained two fun nights staying up past bedtime, eating ice cream. I was thinking that there's not really a silver lining in the cost of the new air conditioner, except that it came in this box.

My children played in this box for one hour, before I finally made them get out and come eat dinner. Normally you'd make a joke here about the kids playing with a box when you spend all that money on toys, except that by virtue of costing one zillion dollars, this box is the most expensive item my children own. And they used it well. It really is a pity that we're going to have to sell one of them just to afford this box.

I hope your week was perfect--and if it wasn't, I hope you found perfection in the imperfection.