Last night, just like the night before, my drive home from work took me a bit more time than usual because some inconsiderate asshole decided to have a wreck in downtown Birmingham. Even worse, this was only a fender bender—no blood, no motionless bodies beneath a sheet on the side of the road—just some broken glass, a flat tire, and an ambulance screaming down the median for no good reason. So, yet again, all traffic was diverted to a single lane on the side of the road and, when each of us was finally able to inch our way to the site where the emergency vehicles had gathered, where the lights were flashing like beacons for the rubbernecker in all of us, there was nothing to see except some guy with his tie loosened and some kid with a push broom, shoving broken glass towards the side of the road. Damn.

I called my son once I’d gotten past the highway pseudo-drama. “I’m running late. Again. I’m sorry. I’ll make it up to you—we’ll go to Oz tonight, get a cd or something.”

His predictable reply: “Cool.” And then I heard the click on the other end. He’d heard what he needed to hear and the conversation was over.

I don’t know why I apologized because, well, my son doesn’t care that I’m late. In fact he's likely grateful for my prolonged absence because, well, he's a teenager and I'm the unrealistic mom (who asks the tough questions likes "Is wearing deodorant really too much to ask?"). That said, I do know why I offered to go to Oz: we both like wandering around a music store...but then we hate that we’re limited in what we can actually take home. Damn this whole morality thing about stealing because I’m fairly certain that we’re both faster than that kid who is usually working behind the counter.

Anyway, last night, the goal was to celebrate my son’s unexpectedly good report card. It was unexpected, not because his report cards usually suck (they don’t), but because his honors algebra class was kicking his butt. And mine too. I’d given up on helping him since our every studying session ended in either tears or a shouting match. But he’d pulled it off: a high B on his semester exam, a B for the semester. Reason to celebrate.

When I finally made it home, he loaded into the car and we went to his favorite Mexican restaurant, which, coincidentally, is my second favorite Mexican restaurant. Because they were so busy, there was only one table open and thus, we were seated in the pedophile booth over in the darkened corner, beneath the oversized, fake tree, in the shadows of the big screen tv. We had a decent view of the goings-on beneath every other table in the restaurant. And there was plenty to see, I tell you, plenty to see.

And such watching is always enhanced by the consumption of a refreshing, adult beverage. Now I do usually limit myself to two drinks when I’m out with my son and last night was no different. I swear. The issue was that there were forces beyond me that were working and, well, I was sucking the ice cubes from the bottom of my second margarita when my food finally arrived. And they’d gotten my order wrong.

“I wanted the vegetable quesadillas. On the vegetarian menu. This has beef—I don’t eat beef.” The waiter smiled, pretending to know what I was saying. He hustled off and, seconds later, reappeared with a margarita, presumably to make up for the mistake in the kitchen.

I watched my son eat and wondered about the logic behind giving someone free, cheap tequila to make things better. Where I’m from, cheap tequila induces anger instead of assuaging it. That thought kept me busy for a while, well, that thought and the process of sucking down that free margarita, and I had just found my way to the bottom of the glass when food was put in front of me. “Hot plate. No touch. Hot plate.”

“Thanks,” I said, and before I could look at the food, the waiter scurried off, perhaps because he knew, yet again, they’d gotten my order wrong. Minutes later, I was under the up-turned glass that had contained my fourth margarita, my second free one, and I still had eaten nothing but a few chips with salsa. And I was in an unreasonably good mood. And I mean a damn good mood.

I gulped down my food when they finally got my order right and, as I was searching for my purse (shit, who would think to look right next to me?!), Dylan reminded me, “I don’t care how much you’ve had to drink—you promised we’d go to Oz.” Again, that whole morality thing, that part about promising your kids something and not coming through, served as an impediment to what I really wanted to do: go home and go to bed.

We went to Oz with no real problems until we were checking out. It was then that I felt the undulations of the ground beneath me. I looked around quickly and saw everyone busily pretending not to have noticed…but there was no mistaking the seismic phenomena I’d just experienced: the earth was spinning.

We left there and headed straight for the house. Once there, I launched myself into bed just before the earth spun me from her surface. The bed was spinning too, but I was being logical about it: if I just got beneath the covers, I’d be safe there because, you know, blankets are kind of like seatbelts, keeping you from being tossed about during such circumstances.

I woke up once, in the middle of the night, startled awake by a terrible dream: I’d missed the (upcoming) Todd Snider show by being tied up in traffic. I comforted myself by remembering that the show isn’t until Thursday night, that I hadn’t missed it (yet), and then forced myself to get out of bed and wandered off to get some water.

Along the way, I noticed that the earth had stopped spinning, and that, strangely enough, the things around me seemed to be in order, still in their places, just like they'd been right before earth had so violently been thrashing about just hours before. But alas, I know that something happened last night. I haven’t found it yet, but I know something must have fallen. And hit me quite forcefully in the head. It is the only explanation I can come up with to explain this headache that has been with me all day.