The Morning Rush Hour

Word Count:279

The Morning Rush Hour
By Donna Lowich


"Come on, Mom, it's getting late!"

Jeffrey’s voice rang out against the backdrop of the television downstairs blending in an odd fashion with the radio in my room.

Conventional wisdom says that the teenage years are the difficult ones for parents. But long before he became a teenager, Jeffrey was a force to be reckoned with. Third-grade was a year in which many day-to-day events became memorable, because of the input of my eight-year-old son.

Whenever my husband, Walter, was away on a business trip, Jeffrey always took it upon himself to become the man of the house, and as such tried scheduling us into some sort of routine, mornings being as frenetic and frantic here as they are in many households around the globe.

This one particular day, I was already dressed for work, but I still had to brush my hair and put on a little makeup. Time was running short. Jeffrey was downstairs eating breakfast. We were usually outside in my car, at the end of the driveway, waiting for the school bus by 7:10 although the bus didn't usually come by until 7:20 or 7:25.

Because I hadn’t responded to his earlier call, Jeff came running up the stairs, out of breath and very agitated.

“Mom! Hurry! It’s time to go out to the car now!”

"Jeffrey, I'm still getting ready. I'm putting on my makeup."

"You’ve got to hurry! We'll be late! You don't have to look perfect, you know!"

"Oh? Well, how do I have to look?"

"Oh, you know, " he replied, matter-of-factly. "Just regular."

Raising a child can be a very humbling experience!