balance
Life during the week is a blur of activities around here. School. Work. Soccer. Cheer. Band. Play practice. Dance class. Emails. Housework. Homework. Meetings. Prep work for preschool. Workouts at the gym. Errands. Volunteer time in Kate's class. Dogs. Meals.
And laundry. Always the laundry.
I don't share in an aren't-you-impressed-with-the-busy-schedule-I-keep-up-with way. I am sharing our life as it is right now in fall 2017 as a family with a first grader, third grader, middle-schooler, very active high schooler, two dogs, and two working adults. It's a lot some days. But it's mostly all good. Really.
I never want to be a person who glorifies busy. I see these women around. I overhear their conversations. I read their posts on Facebook. "It's just sooooo hard!" they say in a pretend-whiny voice even though the look on their faces say they secretly love playing this martyr role. It's a fun game to them, this I-keep-everything-running-and-my-life-is-so-hard game. "The kids have hockey and piano and karate and Irish dancing and Spanish lessons and a private math tutor. We eat dinner almost every night in the drive-through. I had to change the cleaning lady to come twice a week instead of once because who has the time for housework?!?" (You want to think that I am exaggerating for effect. Nope. Really overheard this, basically word for word, last week.) One woman near me at a game last summer went so far as to "complain" to a friend that she had to hire an "errand man" to help her get all of her tasks done. The friend inquired what sorts of things the errand man was needed for. The woman answered something like, "Well, like last week it was our turn to bring snack to summer camp, so Carl ran to Costco for me to buy the juice boxes and cupcakes. And then I needed a pinata for Kaitlyn's birthday party, so I had Carl run and buy the pinata and fill it with candy for me." The entire conversation was the very definition of privilege. I told Ben I was embarrassed to be sitting near them because I didn't want anyone to associate me with this woman.
I am not going to lie- sometimes the wealthy, privileged community we live in has me a little worried. There are real problems in the world, problems that make me sick to my stomach to think about. There are reasons that I can not watch the news. The horrific things I see make it hard for me to sleep at night. Any story with a child being hurt, neglected, or sick almost brings me to tears. In our little corner of the world, the "problems" that I overhear most are not actual problems at all but rather the result of our own choices.
So my struggles, the fact that I have to constantly check us as a family to keep us in the right balance of being active and trying new things without being over-scheduled... the fact that it is important to me to make sure we have down-time and family-time, even if it means we turn down invitations or do not take as many weekend trips as we used to.... are just struggles and are not problems. This mindset helps me often.
We live in a comfortable house with food in the kitchen. We are healthy. We have safe cars to get us where we need to go. We live in a wonderful school district. We can pay all of our bills.
So when I consider these things compared to how most of the world lives, I feel ridiculous to even think about complaining because we are busy.
So I guess the point of this post is this- and I don't mean to preach but simply to process some things on my mind- the days sometimes feel as if they are flying by at a too-fast-to-keep-up pace. I get overwhelmed trying to balance getting all of the "stuff" of our life done while still seeking out calmness and stillness and happiness and fulfillment in at least some parts of each day. When I start to let myself overreact or to create stress when there needn't be, I am working on shifting my perspective.
And while there is just so much more on my mind about this, bedtime stories with my favorite first grade girl are much more pressing and important at this moment.
And laundry. Always the laundry.
I don't share in an aren't-you-impressed-with-the-busy-schedule-I-keep-up-with way. I am sharing our life as it is right now in fall 2017 as a family with a first grader, third grader, middle-schooler, very active high schooler, two dogs, and two working adults. It's a lot some days. But it's mostly all good. Really.
I never want to be a person who glorifies busy. I see these women around. I overhear their conversations. I read their posts on Facebook. "It's just sooooo hard!" they say in a pretend-whiny voice even though the look on their faces say they secretly love playing this martyr role. It's a fun game to them, this I-keep-everything-running-and-my-life-is-so-hard game. "The kids have hockey and piano and karate and Irish dancing and Spanish lessons and a private math tutor. We eat dinner almost every night in the drive-through. I had to change the cleaning lady to come twice a week instead of once because who has the time for housework?!?" (You want to think that I am exaggerating for effect. Nope. Really overheard this, basically word for word, last week.) One woman near me at a game last summer went so far as to "complain" to a friend that she had to hire an "errand man" to help her get all of her tasks done. The friend inquired what sorts of things the errand man was needed for. The woman answered something like, "Well, like last week it was our turn to bring snack to summer camp, so Carl ran to Costco for me to buy the juice boxes and cupcakes. And then I needed a pinata for Kaitlyn's birthday party, so I had Carl run and buy the pinata and fill it with candy for me." The entire conversation was the very definition of privilege. I told Ben I was embarrassed to be sitting near them because I didn't want anyone to associate me with this woman.
I am not going to lie- sometimes the wealthy, privileged community we live in has me a little worried. There are real problems in the world, problems that make me sick to my stomach to think about. There are reasons that I can not watch the news. The horrific things I see make it hard for me to sleep at night. Any story with a child being hurt, neglected, or sick almost brings me to tears. In our little corner of the world, the "problems" that I overhear most are not actual problems at all but rather the result of our own choices.
So my struggles, the fact that I have to constantly check us as a family to keep us in the right balance of being active and trying new things without being over-scheduled... the fact that it is important to me to make sure we have down-time and family-time, even if it means we turn down invitations or do not take as many weekend trips as we used to.... are just struggles and are not problems. This mindset helps me often.
We live in a comfortable house with food in the kitchen. We are healthy. We have safe cars to get us where we need to go. We live in a wonderful school district. We can pay all of our bills.
So when I consider these things compared to how most of the world lives, I feel ridiculous to even think about complaining because we are busy.
So I guess the point of this post is this- and I don't mean to preach but simply to process some things on my mind- the days sometimes feel as if they are flying by at a too-fast-to-keep-up pace. I get overwhelmed trying to balance getting all of the "stuff" of our life done while still seeking out calmness and stillness and happiness and fulfillment in at least some parts of each day. When I start to let myself overreact or to create stress when there needn't be, I am working on shifting my perspective.
And while there is just so much more on my mind about this, bedtime stories with my favorite first grade girl are much more pressing and important at this moment.
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