When Patience Gets Tested

Ever wake up and just feel like "it's going to be one of those days?" Well, I did, this morning! Awhile back, my husband and I had decided that we wanted to remove the carpeting in our home and replace it with hardwood floors not just for aesthetics, but also because the children have so many allergies that carpeting just seemed to harbor all they were allergic to no matter how often I vacuumed. Now you do the math, with four children, how often do you think I get to vacuum? People who know me well, know I am a "neat freak"...I prefer the word perfectionist; in any regards, even a perfectionist can't vacuum every day.

Anyways, I digress. The one morning everyone should be up early because the installers are supposed to arrive bright and early, no one wants to wake up - not even the 3 year old whose usually the "rooster who crows" and gets us all going. Well the "rooster who crowed" or I should say the "bedhead who caught a glimpse of the clock" was me and I started "crowing" like it was no ones business!

All the "crowing" and hustling to get everyone up and downstairs; dragging books for teaching with me so I could have my usual school day with the children only led to a headache. The installers arrived right on time - NOT! They arrived at 10:45...the minute I was pulling out of my garage to take the older children to their tutor. Talk about a day already off schedule getting even further off schedule!

Backed into the garage again; welcomed the installers (all 10 of them); excused myself to take the children to their class and then rushed back home. I wanted to be certain furniture being moved wasn't being done so carelessly (I hear you saying "perfectionist", but not so...no money in the budget to replace damaged furniture and so far the installers hadn't given me much faith in their abilities!).

Then the endless movement of old carpet being carried out...like a procession of ants. Rolled carpets on their shoulders as they came down and empty handed walking upstairs to only come back down moments later with the burden of old carpeting on their shoulders. It was actually quite mesmerizing or maybe I was just "zoning" out of exhaustion!

Then the pounding began and would not stop. Like the procession of ants/men, the sound would start at one end of the house and just "drum roll" down the ceiling. I could just imagine the men lined up in a row pounding rhythmically whistling while they worked. Haven't I heard that somewhere? Oh yeah, Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs! But this was no fairy tale and no Prince Charming to save me from the racket. To top it off, the two younger children were talking and playing above the noise; oblivious to the hammering and oblivious to my headache turning into a full blown migraine. Oh, the joys of being young and oblivious!

Prince Charming, my husband, was given the small task of picking up the two older children from their tutor at 12:00. What time does he get there? 1:00. How do you think the tutor felt? Well, she wasn't whistling while she worked; surprised she didn't bring a hammer here to "install" a few things into me as well! So much for Prince Charming saving me! He dropped off the children, took a look around and left. HELLO...care to ask how we're doing? Guess not. He had a meeting to attend to and the noise was distracting him from his prepared thoughts for that meeting. OH REALLY! Imagine being in that noise for hours on end? Now 2 children became 4 and the noise level went up several notches. Apparently the older children were also oblivious to mom's migraine and were grateful that the noise made it impossible for their mom to teach...can you all say "snow day" in the middle of spring?!

Well, all kidding and migraine aside, the workers were amazing, efficient and truly as considerate as they could be. I mean really, Anita, there is no way to install floors quietly. Now you may be asking, "why didn't you leave?" Well, now you can call me a perfectionist...had to be sure the work was being done nicely!