By Terry J. Ward

I think I'm going through a phase of "mommy meltdown." If I hear one of my kids tell me to "calm down" one more time when I ask them to do their chore (after they haven't done it for days, of course), I'm not sure that I can be responsible for my actions.

I'll admit, I'm probably partially to blame. I've been going through a bit of that Supermom syndrome that we all know I'm not up to. Look, it's a bird, it's a plane, it's Supermom! It's not that I have illusions about leaping tall buildings at a single bound, but almost as good. I think that I can handle every family problem there is - drug abuse, marriage on the rocks, tight finances, demanding job - and still sail through life being NICE. I have obviously lived vicariously through The Andy Griffith

Show once too often. My kids don't even look remotely like Opie.

I think I must be in real trouble because chocolate doesn't even interest me. My friend Anne will occasionally remind me about an article that I wrote a while ago about Raoul the beach boy.

Maybe it's time to dust old Raoul off. Although, I have to admit, I'm to the point right now where my favorite grey-matter cinema consists mostly of not turning into my driveway on my way home, heading straight for the airport, and buying a single one way ticket to London (this from a woman who REFUSES to fly). But, of course, now I can't do that, because the best part of the fantasy is that no one is supposed to know where you are.

Well, I'm not sure where I'm going with this. Is there a place to go with it? Prince Charming isn't going to come busting through my door tomorrow morning handing me the keys to a new Jeep Cherokee (inside joke), I will not be forty pounds thinner when I wake up, and as far as I know, my in-basket at work will be overflowing. But I will say this . . . my kid DID take the garbage out. I'm not sure if he recognized just how close to the edge I was and felt that it was better to live, or if it's just a sign of the respect and love he feels for me. The world may never know. But . . . my garbage is no longer overflowing and Channel 34 doesn't have to come to my house tonight for exclusive story coverage. Good enough.