Bad mommy!

Ok, so I'll admit, I'm a procrastinator.  I have a tendency to put things off until the last minute.  I was a bad mommy this week and kept promising Emily that I would make her lunch.  Then I would forget.  Bad mommy.  So today, when she asked me where her lunch was, I told her that I would bring it to her at lunchtime.  I woke up at 10:00 and thought about it at 10:30.  I haphazardly threw a peanut butter sandwich, a plum, some craisins and pecans, and a cupcake into her lunchbox, thinking that their class doesn't eat lunch until 11 anyway (the school is literally right down the street). 

I look like shit at this point, no shower, nothing to evidence that I've been anything but a lazy bitch all morning.  I'm pretty sure I hadn't even brushed my teeth.  Now I'm not just a lazy bitch, but a nasty bitch too!  I throw on some jeans and hope that the coffee breath covers up the stank breath.  Grabbing her lunchbox I run out the door and race toward the school. 

I get into the school and notice her class sitting in the cafeteria, eating lunch.  Her teacher sees me with the lunchbox and is waaaaay too excited, but with cause.  Apparently another kid in Emily's class has the same lunchbox as her, and Emily thought that I had already brought her lunch.  Can you say meltdown?  She cried to her teacher because she thought mommy wasn't coming.  Teacher let her pass out the milks, which calmed her down, but I swear, you should have seen her face when she saw me come up behind her with her lunchbox full of goodies.  I saw God today, through my child's happiness of fulfilled promises.  She pushed aside her lunch tray full of mystery meat and grabbed her handpacked lunch with a smile that I don't get to see often enough.  It was beautiful.  She hugged me before I left and whispered,"Thank you Mommy!" in my ear. 

Oh happy day, you bad mommy!  As I drove home with my smelly breath and dirty jeans, I knew that I had just made one of those moments you don't recognize often enough in life.  Sure, I could have let her eat her lunch at school and made up an excuse for why I didn't come, but how would that have affected my child in the long run?  We can't always be everything for everyone, but we should be what we can.  And I think I just was.