Well, I'm back. It's been a few days. Sorry if I've left you hanging, wanting to read my next words. Truth is, life intervenes. Most of the time I do my writing late at night and I have been gosh darn tired lately. I actually went to bed a couple of times before 10pm. That is unheard of for me. I am a night owl. Always have been. Suspect I always will be.
Trouble is, when you are a night owl, you pay. So much of the world operates during the day...especially the morning. When I let myself function the way my body wants to function, I am up until all hours and will sleep the morning away. But those silly public schools will not allow my children's classes to start after noon time. I have to get up and get my older children off to school and take care of my little guy.
So I struggle. I don't know how other people fit in everything that they want and need to do in a day. I just don't have time. I often become overwhelmed. I see the pile of unwashed dishes, the dirty laundry and the unpaid bills and I wilt. I look at the home repair projects and sag. I see my dog pawing at the door when it is -7 degrees Farenheit outside and sigh. I look at the phone and think of relatives I haven't spoken to lately, friends I should call and hours I need to work and sigh deeper. I think of writing projects I want to do, books I want to read and recipes I want to try and it feels like a huge weight upon my shoulders. I see the snow in the driveway, unshovelled. I talk to a neighbor and find out that he has congestive heart failure and think to myself how I should be helping him shovel his driveway. My children want me to play with them. They want me to feed them. I need to change diapers. I need to go food shopping. But first I have to clean out the refrigerator.
And don't even get me started about spending time with my husband. I just don't get to. Not at this point in my life anyway. By the time he is home from work he is wiped out tired. He eats dinner, watches tv, and goes to bed. Sometimes, as I have said previously, we lift weights together. But we hardly have time for a good conversation.
I know. Wah wah wah. Stop whining you say. No. I won't. This is my blog and if I want and need to whine, I will and you will just have to suck it up and enjoy the cheese with the wine. It's nice...a brie I think. Try it with the apple whine.
Everyone is busy. I know. I just don't know how everyone juggles all this crap. I'm a fairly simple individual. I like the outdoors. I like books. I enjoy my dog, my children. I have a credit card, but am VERY reluctant to use it due in part to some very large credit problems a few years back. (I think we've learned our lesson). Although my children do not want for anything, I am more inclined to spend my money on experiences for them than stuff. Yes, my daughter has an iPod, but it helps her focus to do her homework in our noisy household. She is an honor student who is interested in becoming a writer someday (or a cattle rancher). She loves all things creative. She paints, she writes, she has done some stop motion animation, she has done some drama. I am hoping that she will be able to participate in Rebel Shakespeare this summer. If you don't know what Rebel Shakespeare is, visit www.rebelshakespeare.org . I'm not sure I will be able to pull it off as we cannot afford the full tuition. I hope I can find a scholarship for her to go, but we will see.
My other two children are talented and smart too. I know that I am bragging, but if you can't brag in your blog, where can you brag? My son Christopher takes karate. He goes twice a week. His teacher says he shows a lot of talent for it. He is focused, strong and disciplined for a five year old. His kindegarten teacher has said he is her top student. She has also said that he is one of the nicest children she has in either of the two classes she teaches (morning or afternoon kindegarten). I feel proud of him for that.
My youngest, Daniel, has an intense imagination and seems to be musically inclined. He likes to sing, although he won't admit it. He takes a music movement class once a week. He likes to pretend he doesn't like it but I catch him singing snatches of the songs during the week. He is sweet, emotional and loving. He is by far the most social of my three children. My brother-in-law's girlfriend came by last week with a friend and in no time he had her down in the basement showing her his train table, his hotwheels and his leggos. He assumes that everyone wants to talk (read listen) to him, everyone wants to play with him and you will of course forgive him if he doesn't allow you a word in edgewise.
So I take care of the kids. I take care of the pets (cat, dog, and at present, some caterpillars that will be butterflies in a few weeks). I take a few half-hearted stabs at taking care of the house. I let my husband know I WANT to take care of him but hope he understands if I don't do a great job, and I have almost nothing left to take care of me. This blog is taking care of me, but I am up at 2:44am writing it, so I will pay on the other end - except that I am writing while I am working, so I will get SOME sleep in between the interruptions from bickering, shouting kids and husband.
How do people really handle all the things that they want and need to handle in their lives? There is so much that I want to do. I am trying to pace myself, but I also feel like my clock is ticking. Not my biological clock in the usual sense, as I have several children. But my mortal clock. I feel like there is so much that I want to do before I am unable to because of age or circumstance. There is volunteering. There is hiking. There is climbing, camping, writing, joking, laughing and communing that I want to do. I want to teach my children, learn from my children and the universe and to just plain experience all that I can before my time is up. I want a sex life back (try having one with three young children underfoot). I want to be a good companion to my husband. He is my best friend and yet he is often expected to wait for my attention. How long can he wait? How long should he wait? Should he wait at all? Will he tire of waiting and turn to someone else eventually? I hope not. I love him with all my heart and soul, but I hardly show him that. I am usually too tired and grumpy to.
I don't really show my friends much attention either. I love them, I really do, but I just find that the pace of life hardly affords me the time to do even an eighth of what I would like to for my friends. I have a few that have offered me a good shoulder to cry on, some laughs, and just a place where I don't feel like such a freak. You know who you are.
And life is passing. Life is speeding by. I won't have these days back. I am always missing opportunities to show people I care about how I feel about them. I really hope that they know I DO care. I hope that even though I am wrapped up in making my daily rounds that my friends and family know that I care about them. I love them. I think about them every day.
We loose touch so easily from those we hold dear. We're always saying, "In a minute." I will call in a minute. I will stop by tomorrow. I will send that card or gift next time I go to the post office. I won't call now. They might be sleeping. Or working. Or out to lunch. Or in a meeting. There's always something that intervenes.
Maybe I shouldn't let it. Maybe I should say, "Too bad if you're sleeping." Or maybe it's too bad if you are working. Or out to lunch. Or in a meeting. I care about you and wanted to let you know now. You are NOT alone. You are NOT forgotten. I DO care. But I will let you know later...at a decent hour.
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