Toast

There is a rubber band in my toaster.
I don't know why, but this just really struck me today as a metaphor for my life or something.
Here I am, trying to make healthy whole grain toast for my kids but as it's cooking it doesn't smell quite right. I figure it's just some burnt pieces that fell to the bottom, but no. It turns out that smell was burning rubber. So I fed my children rubber-infused cancer toast.

Life feels like that this summer sometimes. I'm trying hard, but it just doesn't always work out. Like taking the boys to the library. It seems like such a good, wholesome, fun activity. We love books. The library has books. They even will give you prizes for reading those books! This should be perfect! But it isn't.
It turns out that the library also has elevators and that your three-year-old is really fast. He can take you on a wild goose chase through the stacks then dive onto the elevator and push the door close button before you can reach him. He can ride that elevator up and down the three floors several times before you can dive in and grab him.
It also turns out that your five-year-old is unable to use an inside voice because he has Can't Whisper Syndrome or CWS.
Your twins, you discover, are so passionate about the graphic novel version of Don Quixote that the argument over who gets to read it first comes to blows.
And the six year old? He's having a melt down because when you said that he could sign up for the library program, he understood that to mean that there would be school-like programming all day long. He is now crying and yelling, "Make summer break go away! I just want to go to school!"
See what I mean?
Rubber-infused cancer toast.
Here's the thing though, that whole wheat toast? It's pretty good, but it doesn't really build any character, you know? The rubber band toast, now that's an immune booster. It's a little more flavorful and you're not sure if you like the flavor or not but it's different. It's an experience.
My boys, they could have gone to the library and behaved perfectly. They could have whispered, walked slowly, picked out books, signed up for the summer reading program and checked out without incident. That would have been great. But they didn't. Instead, they learned about elevator mechanics and what the different buttons do, they experimented with the acoustics in the library, they showed just how passionate they are for reading and for school. And that's pretty great too.
In the end, the toast gets made whether or not there's a rubber band that's been shot into the toaster by a mischievous child. Some days you'll get delicious healthy whole wheat toast and some days you'll get cancer toast. And that's okay.