Turn the tears off, I said not another peep, listen to me: I'm a mom. Period.

Today is the day I officially felt like a nutcase mom.

It was Alice's and my first outing with just the two of us -- we were going to pick up milk from our favorite farmer.  Hearing my daughter whimper in the backseat while I'm stuck in the front seat is a new, rather uncomfortable feeling.  I figured the whimpers were likely due to evil sun-blinding (I still remember that feeling as a kid), so at a stoplight, I reached into the back seat to drape a blanket over her carseat.  Only a few seconds had gone by when the light turned green and the car behind me gave a big HONK.  It was rather startling, and in the midst of my awkward position and rush to get my child comfortable, my mouth instinctually opened and I heard myself yell, "Deal with it, I've got a baby in this car!!" 

Wow. 

It was an eye-opening moment.  A scary moment.  I'm a mom, and I'm going to do weird, momish things that I thought I would never do.  I'm going to say weird, momish things I thought I'd never say.  Yes, I could probably ask my friends and sisters to notify me when they see the mom flowing out of me.  I could try really, really hard to avoid weird phrases and colloquialisms.  I could even avoid stores like TJ Maxx and New York and Company.  But in the end, it's unavoidable -- I am going to, for the sake of my child, scold cars who can't even hear me.  Lesson learned.  Lesson heartily learned, world.  And when one day I look at Alice's crayon art all over the wall and call her "young lady," I'll learn that lesson all over again.