I can find the funny

People with healthy ways of adapting to life find the humor in things (or at least that is what I've read in Prevention). People with unhealthy ways of adapting to life, those of us who kick and scream and throw little tantrums on the floor when life is it's usual taciturn self, have a little trouble with finding the funny in some of the big wads of crapola that life shoots at us through a straw.

Now bear in mind, when I say crapola, I don't necessarily mean cancer or death or divorce or anything really traumatic. Crapola is anything that doesn't go as I'd like. And sometimes I've found, life enjoys pummeling me with little tiny spit wads of crapola for months and months at a time. And just when I think they have ended and I can enjoy a "peak" in life, I find it is merely a molehill I have stepped upon and not a mountain.

So let's review. Pretty much N's birth was the best thing that has happened in the past 3 years. After her birth, unfortunately, alot has been downhill. Her torticollis, my nervous breakdown, D's dad dying suddenly. There was a slight molehill, possibly a tiny hill, but then since August of this year, it has been D's gallbladder surgery, my ovarian problems, and N's illness marathon.

I had already written off December as sucking, but I had never designated it as sucking anything in particular. This afternoon I determined that it is "sucking ass."

I woke N from her nap because she was wheezing in her sleep. She then proceeded to run a fever, have a coughing jag, and spit up copious amounts of mucus all over herself and me. I called the after-hours service for advice. The lady, who could hear N wheezing and barking like a seal with emphysema, told me to go the pediatric emergency center. Of course, by the time we arrived N's wheezing had slightly improved. So we signed in and sat with all 11,000,000 other people there. Finally, I decided since she was not turning blue, I'd be better off to take her to our neighborhood urgent care where I might not have to wait until she is of legal drinking age to get someone to look at her. All of this, mind you, is coupled with the discomfort I am having in my lower abdominal region from this damned cyst as a result of lugging my baby around the city of L trying to find someone to get her to breathe normally.

Now before getting to the nearby clinic, I have to run home because 1. D doesn't know where we are since I left in such a rush, 2. I left the oven on with our tortellini in it, and 3. I think there is a candle burning somewhere in my house. I have to listen to a short lecture about how worried D was, and that I need a cell phone again, but we are momentarily on our way.

And that is where I finally get a glimpse of the funny. N was such a big girl with Dr. Bird, so brave and good. And not once, but twice she said, "Mommy, I love you" and gave me a kiss. So aside from feeling tremendously proud of her, I was also feeling gushy and over the moon in love with my kiddo. Maybe because I was so at ease that I was able to get a glimpse.

We had told N that we would stop at McDonald's for a Happy Meal, so she was talking about that with her little raspy voice. The nurse was about ready to give her a steroid by mouth and handed her a bedpan since many kids yak it up within a short period of time. It was at this point that my brilliant little girl said, "I'll put some fries in my bowl."

So fast forward 45 minutes or so and there we were: N eating her fries out of a bedpan, D and I eating a very disgusting, overcooked and dry tortellini, and me hoping that we will soon be on our way out of this short-lived valley.