Rich Tones! Conturing Highlights!

The baby is napping. I am finally, finally doing something about the legions of gray hairs that I'd like to be confident enough to wear with grace, but instead dye into auburn submission. I can't remember the last time I did this, but it was at least five inches ago, apparently. I am too poor and cheap to go to a salon (you're talking to a gal who only gets her hair trimmed every 4-6 months), so I do it at home. If you've done this yourself, you know that this involves ammonia fumes, swearing, ruined shirts and little splats of color on your bathroom vanity, discovered long after it's become a permanent stain (and by the way, Miss Clairol, calling them "expert colorist gloves" does, in fact, give me a little burst of confidence. By gum, I can do this! When I put on these gloves, I'm transformed into an expert colorist! Maybe I'll add highlights and a little trim while I'm here! After all, I'm now an expert!). So now I have this nice window of babyless wait time while the toxic chemicals leach into my scalp, and I figured I should grab the opportunity to write before I am driven, as the commercials would have me believe, into an ecstatic shower experience after which my hair magically dries into silky, natural perfection.

I'm not sure why I feel the need to begin every post lately with an apology and an explanation for not posting more, followed by another apology for not reading/commenting more. MOTH keeps reminding me that this is for me, but I feel an obligation as a (tiny, insignificant) part of the blogging community to participate more often. And, as y'all know, nothing is more inspiring for witty, poignant writing than ENORMOUS PHANTOM PRESSURE. But there it is: I am sorry, and I do continually hope to get better. As for the explanation, I think I mentioned that I'm working full-time and MOTH part-time, and I just started another round of the parenting class that I teach, so we have approximately 20 waking hours a week that all three of us are in the same place. Add this to the fact that Tankbaby has recently become enamored of my laptop--well, that's not exactly recent, he's always been interested in it, but we're now moving into high-school-first-love-but-Mom-you-don't-understand-we-NEED-to-be-together territory--and I have had to forgo my writing-while-nursing time.

Also? I have student teacher shadowing me this quarter, and, while she's perfectly nice, it's unnerving to have someone ALWAYS THERE, watching your every move. All day, every thing I do must be explained, analyzed, and dissected. Not in a bad way, mind you, and she's not, like, bludgeoning me with questions, it's just that she's learning, and I feel obligated to try to make this experience as rich as possible. Also, she's really quiet and I find myself jabbering into the void because surely that will make her want to talk more, right? Sigh. There's a part of this that is challenging, but necessary, which is to try to do my job well and efficiently while still taking the time to train another person and give her opportunities to take on responsibilities. Then there's a part that is challenging, but unnecessary, unless you're me. And insane. And that's the part where you torture yourself wondering if that joke was lame, if you have something stuck in your teeth, if she's judging you for wearing the same jeans three days in a row. Imagine that feeling of standing up in front of the class for a book report or whatever, but it's ALL DAY. Every day, FOR NINE WEEKS. It's the intense scrutiny that gets exhausting, even though I'm sure this cute, perky, 26-year-old has better things to think about than the batty new(ish) mom who talks too fast and drives too slow and really does wear the same jeans three days in a row. I'm sure she doesn't notice two-thirds of what I do, but a) I can't help but be aware of it, and b) OMIGOD, THAT MEANS SHE IS NOTICING ONE-THIRD OF WHAT I DO I AM A LOOOOOSERRRRR.

Ahem. Anyway, the point is that I'm feeling rather under-the-microscope all day lately, and am therefore often coming home wanting to not talk (or write) to anyone about myself. I'm happy to listen, but I'm a little sick of my own brain right now.

And finally, my little corner of the world is being bombarded with sadness lately. We here in the Falling house are doing alright, but in the last two weeks:

• A friend's husband is facing disfiguring surgery in another attempt to halt the cancer (don't chew tobacco, kids. Really, really, just don't.)
• Another friend is beyond ready to have kids, and her partner keeps flipping back and forth, so she's caught trying to decide whether to stick it out with this (really quite wonderful) person and hoping that he stabilizes, or go off on her own and try to meet someone quickly or resign herself to single motherhood.
• A very very dear friend just told me that she and her husband might be getting a divorce. I'm beyond shocked and sad and I don't know how to help and I'm scared because it's so close to home. Like, I've had friends split up before, but there was always something intrinsically wrong (at least to us outsiders) that was there from the beginning. This would be the first couple that we know who is...well, like us.
  
• A family that I've been working with for a year just had their kids pulled by DHS. The kids are now in foster care and I'm just praying that they stay in our area so that I can keep working with them. It's a family that's been in crisis as long as I've known them, and I can't say I'm terribly shocked that it's finally come to this, but the whole situation is so sad and awful. This is just a part of the job sometimes, and I know that, but I get punched in the gut every time anyway. I'm worried about the kids, and I'm sad for the parents, and I am disgusted by the system that fails us all.
  

While any one of these things could probably make an interesting post, I find myself loathe to get deeper into the sadness. I am also hurting for my friends, and don't feel right about mining their tragedies for a blog topic. But when I go to write, these are the thoughts I keep straying to, and so I watch the Madonna episode of Glee again and prop my boy up on his tiny round steamed dumpling feet and watch him stand on his own until he realizes what he's doing and then drops to his knees.

Aaaaand, I gotta go. It's been 15 more minutes than the box advised, and I'm fairly sure I can hear my hair shafts crying out in pain. Beautiful, reddish-brown, natural-looking, expert-colorist pain. Time for that soft-focus steamy shower, during which I'm sure I'll think of something better and more cohesive to write about next time. Maybe I'll wear my expert blogging gloves.