A little slice of my morning for you:

Through the open door, we can hear the girls waking up.  The baby, in her insistent little voice, chanting, "Mama!  Mama!  Mama!"  Her big sister, in her talking-to-baby voice, responding, "Nooo, not 'Mama.'  'Addie.'"  This repeats for awhile and then, to our surprise, Ben and I hear the baby repeat, "Ad-die!  Ad-die!"  Ben and I lay side by side, just listening, laughing to ourselves, and waiting for them to get out of hand.  Their shrieks will eventually sound less like fun and more like frustration, and that will pull us out of bed at last.
A breeze floats through our open window, just cool enough, scented with last night's rain.  I've been noticing something strange and wonderful since we've been here.  For the past few years, I've struggled, not only to write, but to want to write, to choose, in a rare moment of free time, to make the effort to open myself to words.  Time and time again, I've discovered that the writing will leave me happier and more carefree than I was before, but even knowing that, I've struggled even to want to do it.
I think now, that it's because I hadn't been taking the time to enjoy much of anything.  I don't know why that part is easier here - maybe because this is where I lived before I was married, before we had children, when my time was all my own?  But I love these morning breezes.  I love the trees, some of them enormous, that shadow us on our little walks through the neighborhood.
Last night, at a mutual - youth - activity, I found myself gazing at the sky.  I probably should have been taking greater pains to socialize, but it was just such a pretty sky, and such a peaceful moment, to watch the clouds going about their business, catching and releasing the sunlight.  After the activity ended and everyone went home, I drove around for a bit, just because I hadn't had enough of seeing and smelling.
That's how it's been, living in Utah again.  And when I get to that quiet time in the evenings, after the kids are in bed and before I'm ready to turn in myself, I can't seem to settle down until I've taken a few minutes to splay my thoughts on a page or screen.  I'm grabbing as many of those moments as I can, because I know that this might all come as a result of the novelty of once again living somewhere new.  New, but not new.  The energy to write is very much in danger of succumbing to old, bad habits, or just to the mundane rhythm of passive living.
It's funny because this is the most urban place we've lived - and Ben and I often said that we wanted to be somewhere rural.  Small towns and seclusion have always attracted us, but here something is awake in me that has been dormant for years.  Here, I feel that, for the moment, I am just where I need to be, notwithstanding the scents of cigarette smoke and dog food that sometimes ride the breeze.

Me Again

Hi friends.  This time, I've got my hair up in a towel.  Baby is taking an exceptionally long morning nap, and I really ought to seize this opportunity to do my hair, brush on some make-up and clean up the breakfast dishes before lunchtime - all things that happen too seldom.

But I happened to have my computer on my lap and my kids are distracted doing something other than climbing on mom - but not making trouble quite yet.  The window there is about three to five minutes.  So while my hair is drying itself into a frizzy mop, I'm here instead.  Because I'm beginning to think that writing is something that has to be stolen, and that makes me feel more like a thief - the cool, ninja kind, not the kind in a ski mask who holds up a convenience store - than a mom in a messy house with a lopsided towel turban.

Then again, when I've gotten the kids to bed tonight and wonder what I should do with that hour of freedom, the thought will cross my mind, I should write something.  That thought will be promptly trampled by a stampede of easier, less worthwhile activities, which I will not disclose here...though really bad netflix movies or sappy kindle freebies might be involved....

Wasting Time

It's a chilly morning, mid-February.  I'm on my couch in my silky pajama pants and a fraying hoodie while my kids, dressed about the same, but with shoes, are running around in the yard.  Snow was enough to keep them inside for a few weeks, but frozen mud?  They're undaunted.  If you can see the dirt, you can eat it.  That satisfies their requirements for a play-outside day.

I'm kidding!  Only one of them eats dirt.......and gets caught.

The baby just went down for her morning nap, which usually isn't a long one.  That means that I am now in my window of opportunity.  If I hurry, I can work out now.  If I really hurry, I can even shower before 2:00 this afternoon.  So, obviously, I'm here, instead, typing up a semi-coherent, irregular blog post.

?????????????

I should mention that, athletic ineptitude aside, I really do like to work out, when I can manage it.  The question marks make more sense if you know that.  And me sitting on the couch, typing this makes less.  But here I am.

Over the days of stay-at-home-parenting, I'm learning a lot about myself.  One of those things is that I'm either rather lazy, or not very good at managing time.  I prefer to believe the latter.  Something I miss from my former life - the one without children - is having clear tasks and expectations before me, and having someone to make sure that I do them, and to evaluate how I did.

Yes!  I miss having a boss!

Because with external criteria and external critics to define them, and to define me, I could take the very objective list of things I had done on a given day, and easily decide: I did well today.  I am efficient, productive, competent -- other days, not so much.  A big 'A' on my paper or a 'C+' on my exam allowed me to bypass the need for all this introspective evaluation.  This is how I did.  This is what kind of a student/employee/person I am.  See?  It says so right there in red sharpie.

Child-rearing is a different creature.  I have three small people to nurture, a house to maintain, and any number of tasks, defined and otherwise to accomplish with various, rarely established due dates - if any at all.  I'm learning some tricks to it, of course.  Some things can be sorted into check-lists and charts.  Some things can be scheduled and regulated, if I will take the time to mastermind that scheduling, regulating, sorting, listing and charting.

Time is something that I want desperately to catch and tame.  If I could just grapple that wily whatever-it-is to the ground, get onto its back and establish a good, white-knuckle grip, then maybe things would be different.  Maybe then I could dance to the zany music that has become my life, rather than always stumbling a step behind it.

I've begun to ask myself, when I have a free evening, 'what do you want?  All you need to do is decide what will make you happy.  You have the ability, the resources, even, yes, the time to make it happen, if only you will.  So what do you want?'  And my answer if always the same - I don't know.

*****

I should add a disclaimer here: this post is acting like kind of a downer.  I know that I come off as pessimistic more often than I actually am, and usually, I try to end with some redeeming perspective in my posts to counter that.  Today I'm not going to.  I'm just going to say that in the biggest, most important things, I am happy.  I know that.  Not for an instant do I regret the life I have chosen.  My little people are delightful and so much more, and you should see the things they're teaching me!  I have everything I need and everything I want, really.  The only thing I lack is me.  I want vibrancy, color in my life, and I know it's there.  It's all around me.  The only deficiency is my will, my ability to look up or reach out at just the right moment - there's that time thing again - to seize it.

Carpe diem - how cliche am I?  But many, even most cliches have their foundations rooted in more truth than we comprehend.  That's how they got to be so annoyingly well known.   That's how it is according to Caitlin, anyway.

Ahem.  My point is that I'm not sad right now.  I'm not wallowing in all the things and experiences I don't have.  I'm just sitting thoughtfully, even bemusedly on my couch, observing my life for a few moments, and gauging whether or not I still have time for that workout.