As Bob Dylan once said,

The times they are a-changin'.
And so is this old body.
All signs are pointing to it. Guess I'm going through "the change". Now don't get me wrong, I'm all for aging gracefully and all that poetic nonsense, but do I have to suffer my change and its accompanying emotional rollercoaster ride at the same time that my three daughters are starting to go through some emotional changes of their own? While my two older sons are by turns either strapping young men or wailing preschoolers? At the same time that school turned them loose on me for the entire 10 months (sorry, weeks) of summer break? It's not fair, I tell you, not FAIR (stomping feet)!
Two days in a row now I've cried real tears over paltry stuff the kids have done or said that would barely get an eye-rolling response from me on a normal day.
The kids ask me if I'm OK and I honestly don't know how to answer. Physically? Yeah, right as rain. Mentally/emotionally? I feel like a 14 year old whose crush has just called her fat. I feel like I just watched all the sad parts of Bambi, Dumbo and Old Yeller. I feel like I've been looking forward all week to eating my favorite Ben and Jerry's only to see the empty carton on the kitchen counter and chocolate smeared all over the face of my nine year old.
I need a vacation. What's that? I have a week at the beach coming up? Oh good, just the relaxation I need. I get to pack everything the eight of us could possibly need for a week. I get to figure out what to do with all our animals. I get to count six heads in the surf all day like a mental patient. I get to make sandwiches, sweep sand, go grocery shopping, do laundry, cook dinners, schlepp everyone out to touristy things, and listen to complaints about sandy sheets. All this while feeling alternately hot, bloated, crampy, and like I could cry over someone asking me the time.
Can't wait .....