The Realness of Life, even at the Gas Station

Yesterday was a bizarre day.

It was payday!! Yippee, because we love payday and Target is way more fun on payday. But even before I made it out of the house I paid all of our bills online… which is a bummer. Anyone ever feel enthused after paying all of their bills? And of course this month my car tags are due. Tags are not a fun bill on a practically brand new car. Enter sad face.  And after I paid all that I could online I looked at the bottom line and thought, “How can this be?” Where did all of the money go? Please tell me I’m not alone on that one.

Anyhow, the cleaning ladies came bright and early. (Now don’t get in a tizzy, my MIL pays for the cleaning ladies, God Bless her.) But for us that means that we have to be out of the house an hour early. Which doesn’t go over well for certain little somebody over here. Which makes for a stressful morning for mama bear. Anyhow, we got to Starbucks (hey, it’s a cheap and fast breakfast) and as we are giving our order I look up and Monkey shakes his head and says, “I think I’m going to throw up!” and then of course, just about convulses in front of everyone in Starbucks. I grab him and shove everyone into the bathroom. Luckily for us, he made it in time to do his business over the toilet. Poor thing was shaking from head to toe, so there I am holding his whole body up, whisper yelling at the other two NOT to touch a thing. When he is finally done we wash hands and then get in line because everyone is complaining that they are hungry. The way the Barista treated us, you would have thought we had leprosy. I was ticked and at the same time trying to put on a smile. My kids were still hungry and we were already there. I got our order to go.

After eating we had to get gas because of course the light was just about to come on. So I drove across town (down hill) to the cheapest ghettoest gas station ever. I’m about to start pumping gas when a young lady comes out from the mini-mart and starts screaming. Seriously screaming! Not like she’s hurt, like she is about to kill some one. She starts yelling at someone in her car, “She says I didn’t give her a BEEEEEP-in $10 bill!” Then she goes back into the mini-mart and is screaming foul words like a sailor at the poor cashier. (I’m totally just watching this as my car is filling with gas.) Then another lady gets off the car, which I’m presuming is her mom and she goes inside and starts yelling too. Oh, my, word, the apple does not fall far from the tree. I could not believe I was watching this. I just kept thinking if I watch a crime I better grab my phone, but I don’t want to open the door because then the boys will know something is up. It was crazy. They both come back out and are still yelling. It’s 7:45 in the morning. Finally, this man walks over with his debit cards and says, “I’ll give you $10.” And he puts ten dollars of gas in her car. I truly think he was an angel. As I was driving away, I thought, “How come I didn’t think about doing that?” Even after my bill-paying woes ten bucks wasn’t going to break the bank.

I was just so thankful at that moment. I had enough money to put $80 worth of gas in my car.(Before gas prices sky rocketed in the afternoon) I was headed to Target to buy things like lotion, and deodorant, and toothbrushes for my kids. Nobody is going to be hungry this week. Later on, I went to Costco and bought boxes of “lunch snacks” i.e. junk food, as we like to call it “convenience food.” I even texted Mr. Dunbar about some absurd purchases I was hoping he’d okay. He didn’t.

I don’t know, ten bucks was an absurd amount of money to that woman, left me thinking about it all day.

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