I am very crabby and ungrateful this morning, and irritated at myself for feeling this way because I have so much that is good in my life. What a ridiculous way to start out the week, with fresh complaints. Well, nonetheless, I am feeling this way and maybe I can write my way out of it.

Perhaps I should list the (many) things in my life to be grateful for. That can be a soothing and mood-lifting strategy. However, being TOLD to count my blessings, even by my own brain, often has the effect of further entrenching the ingratitude. Stubborn thing, crankiness.

Or perhaps I can list the ways that things could be WORSE. Well. That can sometimes provide much-needed perspective, but it can also open the door to despair.

So, instead, let’s list some of the primary sources of the grouchiness and see if a good ol’ venting session helps ease the mind.

1. The neighborhood deer seem to view our yard as some sort of nature preserve that has been designated to them and them alone. Each morning when I wake up, it seems as though the deer have multiplied in the dark. They are absolutely devastating the arborvitae that borders our yard. They have been using Carla’s swingset as an itching post. They have upset the table and chairs in the corner of the yard (to be fair to the deer, although why should I be fair to these pests that I hate, it could have been the wind in this particular case). And they are MUSSING the beautiful carpet of snow in unmentionable ways. The lovely fresh white of a new snowfall is the only really pleasant thing about winter and they are TAKING IT AWAY. These deer are completely resistant to threats. We have tried banging on the windows, yelling at them, throwing sticks and snow in their general direction, and have even played wolf sounds at them (Carla’s idea; it worked once and then never again). They merely regard you with baleful disdain and continue on with their tree-munching and snow-soiling behavior.

(Yes I KNOW they have no place else to go. Yes I KNOW humans have encroached on their land. Yes I KNOW it is sad and unfair and that we need to share the limited space we have. And yet they STILL make me cranky.)

2. I have to accompany Carla on a field trip. Let us put aside the fact that I volunteered to do this. And let us also put aside the fact that Carla is DELIGHTED that I will be with her. Instead, let us consider being on a bus for thirty minutes with a million first graders and trying not to get carsick and/or worry too hard about a million first graders getting carsick. Field trips in general make my stomach hurt; I don’t like the idea of Carla a) traveling on a bus driven by someone I don’t know or b) wandering around a crowded Public Attraction in our enormous and frightening mid-sized city. I imagine all sorts of catastrophes, from bus crashes to kidnappings and every day she goes on a field trip is a day I spend in fretful suspense. You would think the best solution to all this anxiety would be to join her, and yet THAT just adds new worries to the mix. Especially because other parents have noted that the teachers assign groups of kids to each volunteer and I am deeply anxious about being responsible for OTHER CHILDREN, my GOD what if something happens ON MY WATCH?

2. Each week, I dread Wednesday. It’s the busiest day, with – as I’ve whined before – back-to-back activities in the afternoon. Two of the other moms at our Thursday activity last week were commiserating about how busy they are with after-school activities, and each of them has THREE school-age children, so I really can’t complain. But I AM complaining, because Wednesdays are very stressful. And I’m irritated with myself for worrying about Wednesdays pre-emptively, because they are bad enough on the day. Why EXTEND the dread? Such is the wonder and delight of my particular brain.

4. Girl Scout Cookie sales. This is the part of Girl Scouts that I hate with every fiber of my being. And it is kind of a key part of being a Girl Scout. Carla is good at selling cookies when she gets out and does it. But I have to do so much prodding and cajoling to get her out the door and I just hate it. I also hate lurking a few feet away as she asks our neighbors to buy cookies. I hate asking people to spend money. I hate tromping around our neighborhood in the raw wet cold. I hate our troop leader’s cheery emails with cheery reminders that we are way behind in our sales from last year.

5. Making phone calls on my husband’s behalf. Yes, I KNOW he is at work and cannot make the calls himself. Yes I KNOW that he hates making phone calls even MORE than I do, so I am Doing a Kindness when I make calls for him. But I hate them. Especially when they are calls about things I have not been involved in. Right now, the call I have to make is to one of the credit reporting companies. I forget which one. You get one free credit report from each of the big credit report companies each year, so my husband has a system where, every four months, he reaches out to one of the companies and checks our credit report. He went online to get a credit report yesterday and got some sort of error message. And then when he tried it again, later, the company claimed he had already gotten the report, and so would have to pay to get another one or wait four months to get the next free one. SO ANNOYING. And of course there is no easy way to contact this company, so I have to research it and then call and persuade someone to give us the report that we never actually got in the first place. And I don’t know what he was doing or when or why the report failed to come through, because I wasn’t the one doing it, so I will have to explain things I have no knowledge of and that makes me edgy and uncomfortable. I am crabby that the computer system didn’t work. And I am crabby that there is no easy way to correct the mistake. I am crabby that * I * am the one who has to figure it out. And I am crabby that identity thieves make it necessary to do this period credit reporting. A domino effect of crabbiness!

6. I have to go BACK to an out-of-the-way store to pick up picture frames. Here is another domino effect of crabbiness, but a dumber one: We got a gift card to West Elm for Christmas. We are going to use it to buy two picture frames that will then go on the gallery wall that is still not yet up. We went online to buy the picture frames and, lo and behold, our purchase was $1 under the threshold for free shipping. That annoys me on principle. So we tried to do the Pick Up In Store option, but there was some sort of glitch: the website kept saying there were two frames in stock until we put them in our cart and then typed in all our credit card and gift card information and then would say “Items not in stock.” Fine. This was weeks ago. Yesterday, we were in the area and went into the store and – voila! – two of the very frames we wanted. But – DAMMIT – we didn’t have the gift card with us. (We hadn’t planned on going to the store, we just ended up in the neighborhood.) So I put the frames on hold and now have to go back to the store to pick them up. The store is COMPLETELY out of the way and will require a special trip AND I have to go today because the frames are on sale through today only.

7. There are so very many things to worry about. All of my gripes are so small and insignificant compared to the horror and loss and fear that SO MANY are suffering right now. All the worldly awfulness – plane crashes and spreading diseases and devastating fires and political unrest and and and – is a constant painful throbbing in my chest. I feel like I should be Cherishing Every Moment more vigorously than ever right now, and yet all the worry makes it impossible to do so. AND I am safe and shielded from many of these horrors and should be GRATEFUL and not whining about stupid deer pooping all over my snowy yard.

There. I am leaving all of my ungrateful and petty grouchiness right here and taking none of it with me. HEAR THAT, CRABBINESS? You are locked here in this blog post and may not escape. Feel free to lock up your own complaints as well.