having a bad day

...ever had one of those bad days where ur only halfway thru
ur morning & already u know it's BAD...
& ur wondering to urself can it get any worse than it is already?
well, tell me if this isn't a bad day or what...

last night my daughter was complaining of stomach pains
& it really scared me, we almost had to rush her to the all-hours HIP clinic
but i gave her some medicine that could help her sleep & after a few minutes
she lied down
& rested & i stayed by her side until she fell asleep...
so thank God it was nothing serious, i was afraid it was an appendicitis attack
(cause i had one of those & i thought the symptoms were almost the same...but it's not)

so, i woke up today not feeling very well-rested,
my daughter was feeling much better & decided she can go to school...
that was good...
until my hubby started glaring at me for something i said to him last night...
(he was still harboring some ill feelings apparently...when i told him why don't he sleep earlier instead of being so obsessed with his guitar-playing & then complain to me about how our son wakes him up early the following day?!...that's all! i hate how he can sleep on bad feelings & carry it over to the following morning! what's up with that?! )
i mean, can't we start fresh every morning? it's a new day isn't it?

& today, it was over some petty things...
i just reminded him that our son don't have any more juice pack to bring to school,
(which was in the grocery list that he intentionally forgets to bring when it's his turn to do grocery...) his excuse this time was,
he wasn't finished doing his grocery yet...
(what?! he wants to go to the grocery twice instead of just once, when he really hates to do grocery?!
i don't get it. )
So, he had to run out to the corner store & get a juice pack & milk too -
at more expensive deli prices...
then he comes out & lashes at me that i've been attacking him since last night!
(yep! those were his exact words...go figure)...
By reminding him of things that he already should know (as a "parent"), & hopefully do as part of his responsibilities, he thinks i'm attacking him!
So i told him, it's all in the way he takes it.
If he takes my reminders as harsh criticisms & thinks i'm on the offensive,
THAT is HIS problem... cause i didn't intend it that way.
only that if i don't remind him, things will just be forgotten & all we will hear are his & my complaints....rackets, rackets, & more rackets.

so, we both rushed to our morning,
he dropped off our son to school,
my daughter wished everyone goodbye as sweetly as she is,
my Mom hides out in her room to avoid any further friction in the house,
& i run to my bus stop...
& guess who greets me at the foot of the stairs on my way out?!
- Yep, my mother-in-law...
she just happens to be awake so early today
& must have heard our little exchange of words,
& wanted to see how my daughter is feeling today & maybe put her 2cents in...
...( it was enough for me not to sprint out of there to the bus stop like a woman running a marathon!)

(& that was only 7:45 am. :)

next stop, my office.
at around 10:00 this morning, my EX-hubby (my daughter's Daddy) calls to tell me he wants to take her around November for a week's vacation to Indiana to visit his uncle's family.
(Fine, i knew this was coming sometime ago, but i thought it wasn't happening anymore.
U don't know my Ex-husband, nothing is for certain with this guy...everything is just let's see what happens & we'll save our reactions till then...he can just change his plans as easily as the wind blows... )
Well, as i wasn't in the best moods already, i tried to hear him out.
I asked him what if our daughter doesn't want to go with them?
what if she doesn't want to miss any more school days than she has to,
(cause they already have plans to go back to the Philippines for a vacation in January 2005- & that i had agreed to.)
But hey, he had to give me this "attitude" that it doesn't matter what i think,
or what my daughter says, nothing really matters except his decision that's already made up! Can u believe it???
I had to roll up my eyes, instead of banging the phone down to his ears, & pray to God for some patience...
But patience i couldn't find & a little argument ensues....(my second for today, i'm doing really good, didn't i tell U?)
it's a good thing there's hardly anyone in the office today
- my boss is out on a seminar all day, & well i probably raised my voice once or twice...
when my ex started ranting on about how he doesn't care about our public school system anyway,
& that the family is the most important thing over school,
& how my daughter's school is not important & this & that...
(sigh)
which brought us back to the perennial argument of whether each one of us have been able to use our hard-won college degrees (his is a B.A. from NYU & mine a B.A. from the University of the Philippines - which i happen to be proud of! Thank U!)
But NO, he had to put down my education & ask how am i really using my college degree now?! (just because he didn't want to put his own education to good use! he had to try & step all over mine!)
...& to top it off, he had the nerve to tell me that is this my way of using my education
- by learning how to type?!
THAT broke the ICE for me, the ungrateful disrespectful EX that he is, & again i realize how it was that i had to break off my mistake of a marriage to this guy...
(another sigh...then enough is enough & i had to tell him off!)
..i said, that i don't have time here at work to listen to him complaining about everything including the U.S. school system! ( cause if he can't change it right now, where we are at this point in our lives, then why not work with it? that's my philosophy)
NO, not him, my EX thinks he's Mister High & Mighty & too good for this system, that if it doesn't work for him, he just won't deal with it & just leave it & maybe try to make his own system...which in philosophy may be nice & idealistic but in reality really stooopid!!!
when u don't know the first thing about changing the system! Why then didn't he become a teacher! I mean what the hell does he want from me?! not put my daughter through school,
or home-school her when i have to work full-time to earn a living since he doesn't have to give me any child support (cause he also doesn't go by the court system! Thank God i haven't brought him up to court again...cause i just don't want to deal with all that fighting over money, i'd rather maintain my friendship with my EX for the sake of my daughter...but sometimes...)
God, give me a f-&$&^@#! break.
The reason why single-Moms or even remarried-Moms have to work twice as hard is because of these ungrateful fathers,
who want to shun the system that they themselves have turned their backs on because they're either too lazy or too damned proud to work with it...for the sake of what?! their freaking philosophies!
Dammit, i'm so sick of philosophizing, finger-pointers who don't even have their two feet planted firmly on the ground.
...to make a long morning short! i just told him off & if he wants to discuss this further he will have to call me at home tonight (not at work!)...
& SO, I HUNG UP THE PHONE ON HIS PATHETIC WHINY EARS!
(& that felt good!)

I'm sorry if i sound whiny to U too, but i just need to VENT.
there are days like this in my life,
& there are good, nothing-can-go-wrong days...
usually i am on good terms with my EX,
& also with my hubby....although sometimes we're more like "friends with benefits"
but there will always be days like this...
& then i wonder to myself...
with all the so-called "baby-Daddy-DRAMA" that surrounds me,
what must i do to change my Life
& make it better???
cause God knows, this is not how i want it to be.
It's got to be better than this.
(maybe, single-motherhood can be bliss...)
all i ask for now is, i hope my day turns out better.
:) Jay