Guilt

I had a real bout of guilt last night. I think there was a bit of stress as a contributing factor but most was plain old guilt. Firstly, my son's feet really stank so being the good mother that I am, I nagged him about it. Nagged from outside of the room mind you, that's how bad they were. I brought him up better then that but he was at some 'social' at school on Saturday night then was up all night and came home after chapel on Sunday lunch time to fall asleep on the sofa. He said he'd showered but who knows, he sure didn't wash his feet! Then I sent him to bed early sighting the need for sleep pre GSCE's and such and that sleeping on the couch infront of the football didn't count. He got really grumpy with me and then I felt guilty for being such a nag.
  
  Then during all this, one of my lovely new girls decided to have a sleep over somewhere in the neighbourhood last night. I had cut their wings that afternoon as I only just got them and well, 'Pancake', the white one, obviously thought I was such a bully for manhandling her, that she took off. When I went to lock all the girls up last night, she was gone! I searched high and low for the stupid hen and finally after 45 minutes, went inside in a foul (ha ha) mood. I felt so guilty for not clipping the wing properly and thought how awful it would be to be so new and then get eaten by a fox or the huge cat that lives up the road. I'm pretty sure that's why I sent my son to bed early, I wanted him safe and tucked up in bed. He is nearly 16 as he not so kindly told me last night but I still wanted safety and comfort in the home.
 
  To top it all off, My mother is due to fly over here from the East Coast of America tomorrow and the bloody volcano is messing up everyone. I gave her a hard time about it though because she wanted to cancel the trip. I told her at worst she would only get delayed a few hours or so but probably not re-routed as parts of Europe were closed anyway. Well that didn't go down very well. She is 70 and sleeping in an airport really wouldn't be great for her. So in the end I told her it had to be her decision. Then I felt like a bad daughter for being pushy and wanting her to visit. Guilt.

   So a new day started with volcanic ash all over the news, a still grumpy son, though a big bowl of hot cereal with brown sugar fixed that, and only 3 hens in the hen house.  But it got better. My son told me to 'have a nice day' in a good way, my mother has decided to fly over in September instead of tomorrow and hopefully it will be warmer (49f today and it's MAY what is that all about), and while I was on the treadmill-too cold to run outside- I looked out and there were 4 chickens in the run!! She came home. Whoever said chickens were dumb was wrong.
 So now I am feeling guilt free until the next time.