It’s Tuesday of the week leading up to Christmas and both kids are off from elementary and preschool. Monday was rainy, but today there was some sun. This morning we went to the park and library and hit the grocery store for a top off before all the events of the weekend. I am signed up to volunteer with livestream at church on Christmas Eve Eve and I have to drop of presents at my brothers house before my Mom shows up Friday.

We are about halfway through the loose food shopping list in my head when Ivy starts fussing about her bunny-ears she’s wearing. I am right in the middle of grinding a pound of bulk Columbian roast coffee when she decides the only solution is to be picked up. As I scoop her up, her booted foot catches her older sister squarely in the mouth. Suddenly, I have two loudly crying girls in the middle of Winco. As I am holding one while trying to fix her hair and comfort the other, some lady sticks her face in my line of sight. “You got this mom!” The coffee grinder starts making a choking sound and I realize I might have over filled it. I use my hair-fixing hand to jostle the grounds-catching bag before it nearly topples to the floor. Again, inexplicably, the woman with tie-dyed face mask cranes her face into my line of sight. “I remember when I had kids,” she starts. I turn off the screaming grinder and turn to my eldest child while sliding a forty-pound Ivy to my other hip. “Sorry your face got hurt, Honey,” I condole. A third time, the frizzy-haired shopper tries to engage me, but I just can’t. “Go away,” I say in a low, but much less accommodating tone than the one I would have liked. It takes about ninety seconds to return our tiny, but disruptive trio to normal decibels. The helpful shopper has melted back into the aisles again. Ivy refuses to be put back on the floor or into the cart for the rest of our abbreviated route through the store. Eliana stoically pushes the cart and we get frozen juice and ice cream. I go directly to the shortest line to get out of the store. Eliana starts asking a non-stop stream of questions only a nine-year-old would think of while Ivy discovers a display of toys six inches off the floor. I tell the checkout woman, “I brought five bags.” Then we park the cart at the end of the checkout lane. Eliana helps bag the food coming down the conveyor belt while I remove the toys from Ivy’s hands and put them back into the display in a firm, but gentle motion. I rearrange a couple of bags of dinner rolls to keep them from being smooshed, and then fish out my debit card from my purse, pay for the groceries, thank the checker, while keeping Ivy in my line of sight the whole time. As we exit the store, I do a quick scan to see if rainbow mask is still there, but never see her again.

So, if you’re a fifty/sixty-year-old woman that tried to encourage a not-young shopping mom yesterday, sorry I was short with you. Being out in public with kids takes every ounce of concentration that I have. It’s not a great time for me to engage with strangers. Please don’t feel bad, but also know it’s not helping. Merry Christmas.