Well it was bound to happen.

I showed up a half hour late to take Chloe to gymnastics.

I’m not defending my absent mindedness but here goes.

The kids now have activities seven days a week. That means all of the days of the week, including weekends, all seven, I have at least one event I need to remember and that doesn’t include stocking the chocolate pretzel bin which obvious takes priority above all else.

For the most part, I have this schedule memorized but Chloe’s gymnastics class changed days and times this session and having eaten nothing but canned corn (while sniffing the pretzels) all day, I was not on my game.

When the kids got home from school we relaxed and killed time before leaving for the gym. I could have left 30 minutes earlier but why would I? She wasn’t starting until 5pm in this new made up corn-infused calendar in my head.

When we walked into the waiting room, I should have noticed the subtle cues telling me something was wrong.

For starters, nobody was lined up at the door to get into the gym, nor were students waving stickers on the backs of their hands while being dismissed and the bathroom that is always locked with a kid screaming that they would rather die than have to wear socks home, was wide open.

What is wrong with the coaches? Can’t they see the clock? It’s now 5:05pm and nobody is coming out of the gym to collect the new group of kids. Why aren’t the other parents spasmodically jerking their heads from clock to clock to watch and then standing up to get their kids their $300 worth of weekly exercise.

I should have known we were late but I didn’t.

I said things to myself like, “What day is it?” Then I said it out loud (also to myself), “What day is it?”

When I realized we were a half hour late, a Mom holding a baby leaned toward me and said, “If it makes you feel any better, I once carried the baby inside my coat to keep her warm and someone thought I had forgotten her at home.”

Why would that make me feel better?

Does me being late even begin to compare to a stranger telling me a weird story about how her coat is probably warmer than mine?

Chloe went into the gym after recognizing her coach and fellow kinder-gymnasts.

She had no idea we were late but did say on the way home, “That was the shortest gymnastics ever, Mom.”