All I wanted was a cut and color and a Starbucks. I had two precious hours to make that happen. I want to yell at the 50-somethings sipping their coffees over luxurious chats or the high-heeled working 20-somethings, “do you know what it takes to get me here?” Of course I hadn’t constructed a relaxing day ahead of my appointment because I have a three year old boy who needs to RUN (EVERY day) so I’d thrown the baby in her bucket and traipsed off to Sea World with other friends whose children also need to RUN (EVERY day) and together we had all RUN all over Sea World and my new wash-by-hand Love Stitch sweater had been splashed by an ornery dolphin (just standing by their pool—not anywhere near the splash zone at the arena) and of course the baby had woken up early because she wasn’t taking her morning nap in her quiet comfy bed so then she was crying and then we were all running to nana and papa’s house because I had the hair appointment scheduled and I had arranged for my two parents to take care of two kids (and they were both slightly nervous about the whole thing and I was like come on that’s man on man strategy and I do the majority of my days trying to tackle two kids by myself) and we get there and I’m trying to extricate myself (count down, 5 minutes now until appointment time) and then baby girl decides to poop all over her outfit and it’s running down her leg and my mom looks at me and I’m like, yes…I’ll change her so finally I leave nana reading a story to little man with baby girl quietly bobbing around like a turtle on her tummy next to them (shouldn’t I get accolades for being able to actually leave with two children quiet and happy?) and rush out the door, texting my hair stylist that I’m on my way and all I want is a Starbucks. Starbucks is peace and calm and with a yummy drink in my hand, the whole world will be sunshine and roses. So I run into Starbucks and have to get, of course, new-on-the-job-trainee-girl who is asking me if I want my Vivano chocolate smoothie grande (yes, it always comes grande size) and then has to call in reinforcements because she can’t find it in the cash register computer thing and then supervisor girl says, oh, this is a great drink for you to learn and I clench my hands together while she slowly shows her how to measure out each of the ingredients and then trainee girl can’t get the simple dome lid on and has to call over further reinforcements and it’s taking ALL I have in me to not grab the drink and the lid myself and RUN and then I jump in my car and WHAT? there’s a forklift behind my fantabulous trying-to-be cool-mom-car-SUV slowly backing up through the only exit in the parking lot. Really? A forklift? In downtown La Jolla? So helpful construction man oh so kindly helps me back out so that I don’t take out the forklift (because I would at the speed I was going) and maneuver me around the other Village People clad forklift observers hanging out in the parking lot (really, how many construction workers does it take to drive a fork lift?) and I’m suddenly James Bond screaming through traffic and dodging pedestrians hoping no one recognizes my completely obvious license plate (did I have to put my company name on it???), screeching into a parking space, pounding up stairs and apologizing profusely to my gorgeous 20-something hair stylist who, like the love that she is, has already mixed my color and for 90 precious minutes I sit in a chair and loiter through the pages of US Magazine, smelling like dolphin water, getting texts from my mom through the process (both children are now UP which reads in truth WHEN ARE YOU COMING BACK???) and I race back to a squawky baby girl rooting at her hands and a 3-year-old telling me that we need to leave a pacifier at nana and papa’s house because baby girl is LOUD and my hair is wet still because of course 90 minutes is ONLY enough time for a cut and color and not a blow out and I think, some day again I will waltz in and out of a hair appointment with perfectly coifed locks that flow in the breeze behind me as I exit. Someday. Not today. But someday.

But someday I will also have two teenagers that keep their doors closed and brood over dark music or talk incessantly on the phone to their friends for hours and I’ll have all the time in the world to go get a perfect cut and color and linger over my peace in a cup Starbucks and that day I’ll wipe a little tear out of my eye and long for the precious 4-month-old girl that snuggled in next to my cheek or the 3-year-old boy who when I asked him what he wanted to thank God for from the day replied, “for you, mommy.”

I have a friend who likes to say that, “this is my stage.” And it’s a short stage. It’s a short stage of extra long roots because it takes too much work to coordinate all that and miss a whole afternoon of work more than every 3-4 months. It’s a short stage of leaving the hair stylist with wet seaweed for hair rather than a perfectly blown out do. It’s a short stage because having my babies is such a short stage.

And any one of my many friends who have prayed or been pricked or spent thousands of dollars in their attempt to please please let me be a mommy would scream and yell at me for whining about my hair in this post. So I say thank you, God, for my seaweed-hair-long-root-stage. It’s just my stage. And I thank God for it.