Last week was absolutely INSANE. Work kept me busy night and
day. My family was lucky I found time to cook for them. I can count on one
finger (that’s right I wrote finger) how many times I showered last week. Do
not try this in the workplace, people. I work from home. I was only able to post once. Although I did
find time to put together the Hey Girl memes.
That was fun and easy, and did I mention fun? But I missed writing. I missed my readers. Weird isn’t it? I mean,
I don’t even know who is reading this or when, but when I write “you” are in my
mind. So many of “you” All different types of “you” But according to my
Facebook stats, most of my readers are women in my age group (go figure, :) )
So when I write, I am especially writing to those “yous.”
You’re the people in power, after all. You have the most influence on how
children and teens are being taken care of and how often your men get to a
dermatologist and wear sunscreen. (This is the one time it is TOTALLY ok to nag,
ladies. Get them to wear that sunscreen!)
So I know that set of “yous” will definitely appreciate
where I am coming from with today’s post.
The more blessings that come into my life, the more
responsibility, and the less patience I have. I feel, most days, with all the
hats I wear, I am just barely reaching an acceptable level of performance at
each. Most days, I feel like I am failing at everything. This would be my
report card right now:
Mom C-
Wife C-
Career C
Housekeeper F
Cook D
Friend D
Self Care F---
Sunday, morning I woke up thinking, wow only 2 days and then
Christmas is over. What have I done? Or more like, what haven’t I done? I managed to do 95% of my shopping two weekends ago on Amazon. I did it virtually of
course, as I do pretty much everything else. I must admit, I did it as close to
the last minute as possible on purpose. Last year, I went completely overboard.
I bought them WAY too many things, which I always said I wouldn’t do. After all,
the reason I love and have always loved Christmas is because of the magic.
At Christmas time, suddenly, most people are happy. They are smiling. Strangers are more pleasant.
We all become more giving. It’s like sometime between the nearly vicious greediness of
Black Friday and the joyous morning of Christmas day, we are all injected with
some super, warm, LOVE. So much love,
that we can’t help but give it out. I remember Christmas time being the happiest
time for my family, always. So naturally, I want my children to feel that
happiness. I don’t want it to be all about the gifts.
So this year, I cut down and back, and for that I get an A
+. But what else have I done? Did I take the kids to see the “snow” falling at
the town center? Did I take them to see
the life-size gingerbread house? Have we
made our play snow? Have we baked our
snowman cookies? As I sat here, reflecting on all the things I didn’t do this
month due to working, I thought about all
the time I have been with my children, but not really with them. This time of year, especially, we are running
around like crazy, trying to make magic and dreams for our children. Are we
focusing too much on the things? Are we trying to cram so much into our lives
for the experience, or are we focusing on the quality time we share? The things
we will all remember the most.
This was something I promised myself when I received the
clear lab reports after my surgery in July.
I promised myself that I would reevaluate my priorities. I know God and
family always come first when I write them down, but is that what’s happening
when I wake up in the morning? Forget my
list. What do my actions show my priorities to be?
Here I am, five months later, and I again have fallen back
into my routine of accomplishing the absolutely necessary for today, and
postponing everything else, usually the most important things, until
tomorrow. My tomorrow list is
unbearable, but lucky for me, tomorrow never really comes, because once it's
here, tomorrow becomes today. And today,
there just isn’t time for much of anything.
So I decided to take some time off, not just from work, but
from stress and from worry and from all the things I spend entirely too much
time on, like social networking sites. I didn’t stay off completely, but it was
nice to take a peek and see I had 32 notifications, rather than waiting for
what seems like hours to have something new post.
On Christmas day, I didn’t post a thousand pictures of my
kids. I didn’t provide everyone with hourly updates of what was going on or
what I was eating. I was not "intexticated" as my mom likes to call me. Instead, I used my phone to take some pictures of my kids
smiling and playing. The rest of the time was spent enjoying everyone around
me. It was definitely a great day.
I encourage all of you to do what I plan on doing in this
next week and into the new year, take a good, long look at what you spend your
time doing. Do your actions reflect your priorities? If someone had to name
your priorities based on what they see you doing, what would come first? Would
it match the priorities you have in your heart?
Regardless of whether we are diagnosed with an awful disease
like cancer or just received a clean bill of health this morning, no one knows
how much time they have left on this earth. Are we living our days the way we
want? I think it is VERY important to stop thinking we will have more time. As
we get older, our time is getting shorter, not longer.
I hope all of you had a wonderful holiday. I will be back
next week, and then back to regular posting the week after.
As always, thank you for reading and until next time,
practice safe sun!
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