Crazy mama

Or burning the candles at both ends…again

My dad has told me my whole life that I try to do too much.  Those only given a superficial view of my life often find themselves being impressed with the amount of things I seem to juggle at once.  Let the record state once and for all that what I am doing is in no way, shape or form impressive – throwing all your balls in the air and chaotically running from one to the other trying to catch them as they hurtle towards you with ambiguous success is not impressive.

Cleaning the house, finishing the Christmas shopping and finishing off the packing on Monday in preparation for the drive South led to several moments of reflection where I asked “why am I doing this?”  Having not gone South for several weeks I seem to have experienced some type of amnesia about what it entails and with Christmas to also factor in the chaos levels were at an all time high.  I wasn’t until we finally got to Mark’s parents house that I realised my flight the next day wasn’t at the relaxed time of 11:30am as I thought but rather 9:30am (somehow I had managed to check in online and print my boarding pass without realising the flight details) and so the relaxed start I had in mind was replaced with a 5:30am alarm.

Alby was an absolute treasure – silent on the drive to the airport (possibly stunned the whole way), content to move from pouch to pushchair to pouch as we negotiated bag drop, security and boarding the plane and thoroughly entertained waddling around the crowds at Terminal 5 he took the morning in his (unsteady) stride.  He fell asleep before take off and didn’t wake until we had landed – a treasure.

In addition to not realising what time my flight was I hadn’t appreciated which airport we were flying into until at Heathrow.  (In my defence I knew we were flying in and out of different airports but had just got them the wrong way round, making my pre-calculated routes from airport to hotel now redundant). Eager to dodge the 50€ taxi fare we jumped on a transfer coach into the centre of town.  From there, frustrated by having folded and unfolded the pushchair for what seemed the hundredth time I stuck my bag on back, Alby in the buggy and walked for an hour across the streets of Paris to the hotel.  I thought it was bliss.  Alby did too once I had finally realised that just because I was sweating didn’t mean it was a warm day.  An extra jumper and his snowsuit pacified the tears and he seemed content enough to go along with his crazy mother's plans bumping up and down the curbs and over gratings as the wind carried smells of crepes and waffles (and cigarettes) under his nose. 

Once at the hotel the slob inside me finally came out and I ordered two films to chill out in front of whilst Alby charged up and down the room 100 times.  We went out only to buy snacks and water from the local supermarket – then early to bed to recharge the batteries in preparation for the sightseeing ahead.  Bonjour Paris – j’arrive.