The miracle is NOT that I got up early

I was standing in the bathroom, bleary eyed and confused.  Why was I here?  Why was I even up?  The clock/radio over the toilet read 6:03.  I don’t have to get up until 6:45.  This is horrible. 

It all started coming back to me in hazy, sleep-colored waves.

I marched back into my bedroom.  Sassy and The Bandit were wrestling on my bed.  I have no idea what they were even doing up in the first place.  Traditionally I have to blow them out of bed with a squirt gun of ice water and a fork lift.  Unless it’s the weekend.  Then my charming babies are up at the crack of dawn and demanding breakfast.  This was a school day and thus inexplicable.

I dimly remember Sassy urging me out of bed, “Mom, you’re late.  Time to get up.”  Of course I got up.  If someone tells me I’m late getting up, I don’t analyze it, I get up.  I’m always late getting up.

This time I figured it out before I got into the shower.

“Get out of my bed,” I holler.  “Why did you get me up?  I still have like a hour to sleep.”

“I don’t know,” she says, using the standard kid go-to phrase when questioned about anything.

“Get dressed and go watch cartoons or something,”  I point at my bedroom door to emphasize my point. An hour early.  My god!  I’ve only been in bed for four hours anyway.  I mutter to myself as I climb back under the blankets. 

Mercifully, my superpower is the ability to fall asleep almost instantly, any time, anywhere.  That’s a darn good thing since I never get enough sleep.  I covet sleep like Donald Trump covets attention.

Eventually, I did get up.  The cartoons were turned all the way up in the living room, but the kids had their clothes on so I let them get away with it.  The Bandit was making toast.  He’s been making toast like, well for lack of a better word, like a bandit for the last several days.  Our toaster was in horrendous shape.  Everytime we used it, swearing would ensue.  The toast would emerge black and charcoal-like on one side and raw on the other.  Last weekend it actually made a scary popping sound that was quite alarming.

I still had some “atta girl” points at work, and since we really had no idea if work would still be there in the morning, I quickly used my points and ordered a new toaster.  Then I promptly forgot all about it.  Several days later, when Sassy, the Bandit and I got home, there was a mysterious box on the porch.  When we opened it up a shaft of light burst from the box like the Arc of the Covenant in Indiana Jones. LO! A toaster.  A beautiful white, four slice toaster.  The Bandit thought four slices was the most outstanding thing he’d ever seen.  He’s been very sheltered in the small appliance department.  I figure we don’t want to spoil him with crazy things like food processors and such.

So this is a grilled cheese, but I still think the toaster has the capability

We plugged  in the new toaster and he immediately dropped four slices of bread in the slots.  Minutes later, out popped beautiful brown bread.  I’ll admit, I felt a little teary-eyed.  Bandit looked at the four perfectly toasted pieces of bread like they were a certifiable miracle and I should call the Holy See about canonizing it.  After all, we’d only have to prove two miracle to have the Proctor-Silex toaster made into a saint.

I’m here to tell you people, even as a nonbeliever, I’m totally quitting my day job if, all of a sudden, out pops bread toasted with the face of the Virgin Mary.