Friday, August 20, 2010

Tricycle Triage

I should be assembly a tricycle right now. I've been at it for the better part of an hour and it's not finished--truth be told, there are still two pieces of hardware from step one that are lying on the floor un-installed. I can't figure out if I need to screw them in (they do have threads) or pound them through the holes. Add to this my paralysis that I will somehow damage the hardware so it is un-installable or that Reese will sit on the tricycle and it will collapse, and I'm taking a break.
Kevin and I decided to let logic rule our game plan for tonight, and we threw gender roles out the window--he went to HEB to get food for tomorrow's birthday party while I attempted assembly of Reese's tricycle. At the time it all made sense--I couldn't haul the 40lbs gas tank for our grill and I didn't want to buy alcohol in my current state of obvious pregnancy, so why make one trip into two? But, since Kevin's been gone longer than I've been at work assembling, maybe we're both failing at this genius approach.

My imminent emotional break-down about my inability to assemble a tricycle is probably multi-pronged. I'd like to blame hormones first and foremost. My brain withers into mush during pregnancy (what Aunt Kim likes to call "placenta brain") and my growing waist line makes pushing large items together difficult. The two in combination definitely slowed me down on this project. Second, is the realization that my 13-year relationship with Kevin has always meant that assembly jobs were done in tandem or with Kevin's expertise only. Yes, Kevin designs and builds things for a living--but at one point I thought I had enough brain power of my own to assemble something independently. Put these two issues in combination and I'm on the verge of tears, thinking to myself, "What if Kevin wasn't around to help?"; "What if I was a single mom?"; "God forbid anything ever happen to Kevin." It's enough to drive me mad.

* * *

Update: Kevin returned from HEB. He didn't forget anything on the list and was only moderately flustered by his wait at the check out line.

He quickly gave me a run down on how the screws I hesitated to install were, in fact, NOT screws, but some kind of molded plastic with grooves referred to as "Christmas trees". It took him seconds to install them correctly. He then proceeded to tighten all the hardware, align the steering wheel properly (apparently I would have had Reese making hard rights all the time), and finish the job in less than ten minutes.

I handed him hardware, fetched tools the instructions didn't call for (did I mention there were no words, just pictures in the instructions?), tried to explain why this all amounted to a near break down, and thanked him profusely.

Oh the behind the scenes action that happens when children go to sleep the night before gift-giving events... I thought it was worth capturing for posterity.

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