The Happy Homemaker

I had a rough day yesterday. I was down and in low spirits. I can’t be a happy homemaker all of the time. Sometimes a homemaker has down days, days when it seems like the world is crashing in on you. My day was slow. I didn’t do much housework. I didn’t even read or study. I spent most of my day lying down. Most of my problem was the fact that I am having a very heavy period. I am bloated and exhausted. Part of my angst was that my husband was leaving the next day. I had been fighting off tears for weeks as I am not one to show mushy emotion. I can show anger with no problem. Mushiness is just not natural for me. That is why I hate “chick flicks” or anything else that is irrational. I especially hate those “yo go girl” shows. I consider myself an individual first, a woman second. ( I hate labels too, like the one if you are an English Lit major then you MUST like Virginia Woolf!!! Or you are a small minded bigot nazi who just doesn’t UNDERSTAND! Whatever!)

I was sad because I was tired of “falling off the roof” as my Grandmother used to describe periods, and sad because my companion, my husband was leaving for a while. I was not sad because I was oppressed in a cage of housewifery in a wasteland of Suburban America. In other words, I just needed to chill that day. Chill I did until my daughter came up to me showing me a knot in her hair. She asked me to cut it out. Her bangs were long and her hair was messy, so with sewing scissors the only scissors I had, I began to trim her hair and cut her bangs. Of course, it quickly turned to disaster as her hair got shorter and shorter. The back was still to her shoulders, but the front was um kind of short. In other words I gave my daughter a mullet! With one look my daughter screamed and cried and announced that she can never go to school again. (she is not even 6 years old???) She even put a blanket on her head so that no one could see. I felt so horrible and hated that I messed up my daughter’s hair. I went to my bedroom to cry for a minute. I waited for my daughter to also calm down. Then I took a brush and tried my nest to fix her hair. It really didn’t look too bad and wasn’t too much like a mullet. It was kind of punky looking and it was a hairstyle that I might have had as a teenager. My daughter however, wants her hair to look like a Disney princess, not a punk princess. So I pinned up the front of her hair and put the back in a pony tail. I told her we would let the front grow out a little bit more and then we would take her to a professional to fix the rest up. She was finally satisfied, but it was by that time 6 PM and I had not started supper.

That is when I cooked what my father always cooked when he wanted a quick meal. He calls it fourth down spaghetti because it can be made in a flash. He also has fourth down chili. My style of spaghetti is actually quicker. I defrosted ground beef in the microwave. I always keep a stash of ground beef handy in case I need to make a quick meal. (hamburger helper anyone?) While the meat was defrosting I chopped up an onion. Then I browned the meat and added the onion. I boiled water and cooked the noodles. Then I added Ragu sauce to the meat mixture. Cooked the sauce and noodles. Drained the noodles and added them to the meat. Everyone was full and happy and I got to watch Ugly Betty!

Thank you Daddy for Fourth Down cooking!