TGIF.

I can’t remember the last time I’ve been so relieved for a week to end …

Monday, we were exhausted from our whirlwind weekend of preparing and celebrating Easter and Phoebe’s first birthday … At my workplace it seemed as though every other business in the city was closed for some post-Easter recovery. And every other person had fled the city because the schools were on spring break. … In our office, we were working with a bare bones staff and an editor who was there only for the morning hours before taking off on his own vacation … I was following up on a handful of serious incidents from the day before. I was stuck dealing with the bottom rung of staff from the agencies involved because all of their superiors were on their vacations. Terribly frustrating.

Tuesday, with a good chunk of our money going to taxes and bills, we were scraping the depths of our bank account and counting down the hours to a pay check on Wednesday. I had been putting off filling my gas tank and was driving on fumes as I took Phoebe to the daycare Tuesday morning. Eventually, I made a pit stop at our house and filled up with a gallon of gas I’d put aside for our lawn mower … Then, feeling anxious and harried, I accidentally bumped the side of Phoebe’s head on the car door as I was getting her out of the car seat and reaching for her bag. She erupted with big tears as I carried her into the daycare and had to leave her; I felt awful … And there was some accident at the daycare involving our provider’s daughter’s weeks-old puppy who fell off a couch and broke her leg. We got a call Tuesday night telling us the daycare was closing on Wednesday while the puppy went in for surgery… Which meant ….

Wednesday, Kates and I had to figure out how we would split our work shifts and still take care of Phoebe; both of us needed to be at our jobs Wednesday for varying reasons … I ended up going in at 5 a.m. and coming home at 7 so Kates could go to work and I stayed with Phoebe for the morning. Then Kates came home at noon to finish out the afternoon and I went to work.

Thursday was the toughest day yet. Phoebe hadn’t given us a good night of sleep, and once I got to work the action came like an avalanche … First, a scaffolding accident injured a man who fell at a construction site. Then a car crash with injuries that was blocking a major road … And then, just an hour before I was supposed to leave for the day, a tactical unit moved into a neighborhood, blocked off streets and surrounded a home with guns drawn in search of two murder suspects. When I got to that scene, I was bombarded with neighbors who either wanted to know what was happening or who wanted to complain about the authorities sudden sweep and no-nonsense takeover of the neighborhood … When I got back to the office, some of my cohorts were just as bad. Clearly, I was working on a breaking news story, on a deadline, on overtime. Yet, some of them couldn't resist nosing around and crowded over my shoulder as I wrote my story. It was like their first day in a newsroom. You don't do that! … I left work two hours later than usual and was so tensed-up when I left, I could only lie on the couch when I got home and decompress ... Oh, and our daycare provider had to take her son to the emergency room with some weird pain in his side.

Friday I spent following up once more on everything that had transpired during the week. Compared to the rest of the week, it was a fairly light day. And I was thankful for that. I also got to leave the office early … I had a productive afternoon working other projects at home, and then Kates tapped me to pick up Phoebe … But as I was slowing down and preparing to make the left turn into the driveway, I suddenly heard screeching tires and looked to see the side of an SUV just inches from the left side of my car. The driver of the SUV and I exchanged What the hell!? looks and then he sped off. I caught my breath and proceeded into the driveway before finding Phoebe. Inside I met our daycare person who heard the screech and saw the aftermath. As we talked about it, I could think of nothing I had done wrong. He'd come behind me from out of nowhere. Clearly, I thought, the other guy was going to try passing me illegally on my left side …

As I scooped up Phoebe and got her ready to go, I sighed and grumbled about what a crazy week this has been. Our friends at the daycare sighed and agreed …

Let’s hope next week is smoother.