Born This Way

Just as I suspected, and recently confirmed, I was born late - 21 days late to be exact. I'm convinced that this is why I'm late for everything and why my parents dubbed me "last-minute Manda" at a very early age. It's in my genetic code. I was born this way.

At the office, I was notorious for missing my deadlines, and for my consistent tardiness, which came to be tolerated because of the length of my commute and because I always more than made up the time. In my defense, submitting late manuscripts wasn't always my fault. There were a few exceptions, a few common, absolutely legitimate explanations for what appeared to be my complete disregard for schedules: "I'm still waiting for the author to review my edits"; "I still have to code the manuscript for formatting"; "We haven't received permission for all of the photos"; "The author still hasn't supplied any of the photos"; or, my favourite, "The author has decided to take an impromptu vacation" (less than a week before his deadline, without even so much as mentioning it to me, for obvious reasons).

I don't think anyone really likes deadlines, and I'm guessing that anyone who says they do is lying. I can't think of a compound noun prefixed by the word dead that's ever carried a positive connotation: deadlock, deadwood, deadbeat; why should deadline be any different? In my opinion, deadlines are a lot like alarm clocks, and I can't say that I love either of them (except, of course, the alarm that really gets me out of bed these days). I guess you could say that I like the excitement of beginnings more than the finality of endings, but you can see where this is destined to be problematic.

Yesterday morning, to commemorate what would have been my first day back at work, I set my alarm for 6:30 a.m. (This may come across as sadistic, but back in the day, this is what time I would've had to pull my car out of the driveway to arrive at work half an hour late!)

My motivation was simple: I wanted to get up and scrub up before Elizabeth woke up; that way, instead of using her nap-times to cram in having a shower, blow-drying my hair, sweeping the floor, folding the laundry, doing the dishes, grabbing a bite to eat, and preparing something for dinner, I could write.

Forty-one minutes after my alarm went off, or six or seven snoozes later for those of you who prefer units of time measured in snooze-speak, I heard my daughter stirring, and I leapt out of bed, quickly washed my face, put on my make-up, forgot to put my contacts in before I put on my make-up, threw on my jeans (if you must know, they're still maternity), shimmied into a tank-top and sweater and, just like old times, was jolted into starting the day at the very last minute.

My daughter was born 10 days late, and even then, she was removed involuntarily via C-section after not one, not two, not three, but four failed inductions. I have to wonder if she'll be like me, late for everything, or like her dad, perfectly on-time for everything (and who, I might add, was born exactly on his due date)!