This is a dangerous week for a Mom.

It's this deceivingly slow two weeks in between the action-packed month of October and a national election and right before the impending insanity of the opening ceremonies of the holiday season in which we find ourselves today.

I don't like it. Not one bit.

I don't trust these 14 days at all. Oh sure, logic would dictate that we all should be preparing for the holidays that are lying in wait. We should be doing something productive like cleaning the oven or sharpening the potato peeler. We could even be taking the cursed family photo for the Christmas card.

But no, these are strange days indeed, my co-maternal types. Instead of getting a jump start on what lies ahead, we will be paralyzed at the rare no plan-weekend or that since we don't have a costume to sew or a turkey to stuff, that we have plenty of time for all of the overly-ambitious pursuits we have in mind this year.

We will be so crippled at the nothingness, we will squander this time like an expired 50-percent off Toys-R-Us online coupon or a nationwide recall on that gross of gingerbread we picked up at Costco last weekend. We will straddle these two weeks between fall and winter like Jingle and Jangle trapped between Heat and Snow Miser before Mrs. Claus and Mother Nature get those rascally brothers in line. (As well as pick up the odd habit of making obscure references to childhood television specials.)

It's a dangerous, dangerous time, folks. I suggest we buddy up so no one gets left behind in line at HoneyBaked Ham crying in the fetal position.

Either that, or we all take full advantage of this temporary lull; polish off the rest of the Halloween candy while the kids are at school, watch some Lifetime and steal a precious few minutes in a hot bath. Take just a few minutes this fortnight when no one is looking for yourself, recharging those parental batteries -- you deserve it.

We'll all meet back in the produce section of the grocery store the day before Thanksgiving and resume the collective panic, and no one will be the wiser.

Last one there is a rotten eggnog.

©2008 Tracey Henry

Divamail me!