A week passes.

Just like that, I’ve survived my first week at my new workplace. I’m still breathing, still alive, but quite imperceptibly, the need to re-prioritise my life has crept up on me. I suppose it’s the realisation that soon, when I no longer have my predecessor to fall back on for information, advice or a firewall, I will have less time and a narrower bandwidth for all the other things that are going but which are equally important. Like the kids, who are really trying of late, what with the incessant bickering and undesirable behaviour that makes you want to laugh even as you know you should be furious.

The other day, Alison left a bowl of fried rice laden with Chinese sausage slices to go and get a drink, and returned to find that every last slice of sausage had disappeared from her dinner. She was hopping mad of course. The culprit, however, very smartly claimed that she was “just sharing because Mommy said we have to share”. Another time, this self-same culprit shook her little fist at my mother-in-law, who had to swallow her chuckles and put on a stern face while she enforced a time-out.

These things while naughty are funny, yes, and cute, yes, but it’s the fighting that really gets my goat. No mother wants to return from a day’s work to see her kids going at it tooth and nail but increasingly, that’s what I’m being treated to. Alison and Zoe are each at different stages of development, but the shared characteristic is that neither wants to back down in a fight. Which translates to neverending spats. Which makes me want to scream, pull my hair out, pull THEIR hair out. Anything to make it stop. I really hope that this passes soon. Is it any wonder that we’ve only just returned from Tokyo and already I’m dreaming about our next holiday?

April 9, 2010

Posted in Kids, Work.