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Finding Time

"It is good to appreciate that life is now.
Whatever it offers, little or much,
life is now -
this day -
this hour."
~Charles Macomb Flandrau

I was able to take a personal day on Tuesday.  It was a long time coming.  I had previously scheduled it for back in March, but it was a busy time at work (well let's be honest, it's always a busy time at work) but the kids had been sick, and I had been missing a couple days here and there for them, so I felt like I shouldn't miss another day, even though this time the day was for me.  And since I was trying to schedule it on a Tuesday (because the twins are at daycare and Connor has school/does errands with MIL on Tuesdays), it got pushed until the end of April.  Even this week wasn't the best, because Colin got tubes on Thursday, so that meant I was missing two days of work in one week, but I didn't care.  I needed a day to myself.  Do you know I haven't been alone in my house for more than 30 minutes since January 1, 2009???  That's a loooong time. So I made myself keep the day off.  And then the only real plans I made for my personal day was to clean out my closet and switch out my winter clothes for springy/summery ones.  Which, since I keep my off-season clothes in tubs, tubs which are both in our crawl space and garage, tubs which are filled with tons of clothes that no longer fit me because I had babies, actually took a good portion of the day.  But I was able to clean out lots of clothes that I no longer wanted/needed, and packed up THREE garbage bags of clothes to donate.  My closet looks nice and pretty too. ;)

At one point though, I was out in the garage and was headed back into the house.  Keith and his dad had put our gazebo up, so the patio chairs were just sitting there on our deck empty.  I decided to take a break and just enjoy the outside for a bit.  As I was sitting there, watching a robin on the fence, I thought to myself, why am I sitting out here when I have so much to finish up inside?  I was reminded of a part of a book I'm reading, written by a mom of twins.  She said a fellow MoM went to get a facial and then called her to complain that the person doing the facial didn't maximize her time very well.  The MoM went on to say that if the girl would have multi-tasked better, the 45 minute facial would have only taken 20 minutes.  The author tried to explain to her friend that the point of a facial is that it's supposed to take a long time!  It's supposed to be a relaxing experience, where you aren't supposed to keep thinking how long it will last, but rather you should just sit there and enjoy it. 

I realized that I was being her friend.  I mean, when else can I sit on my deck, in silence, just watching the birds?  Um, let's see.  The last time was about the time I was home on maternity leave with Connor.  Way back in the summer of 2006.  WHAT?!?!  That was almost four years ago.  That was the last time I sat on my deck and enjoyed the view.  And now I finally had the chance again, and I was fretting about how it wasn't the best use of my time. 

I realized that I may never get a quiet chance like this again until the kids are all in school.  So I continued to sit outside, watching the robins, forcing myself not to worry about all that was left to do before everyone came home.  For a full TEN minutes.  Hey, it's a start.

Comments

Twincerely,Olga said…
Good for you!!!I enjoyed your post!!I know what you mean about being alone in your own house!!It is actually weird to me when I am!!(it isn't very often though!!LOL
Annie said…
Good for you, and I think sometimes is wonderful spend some tim alone.

Happy Friday and great weekend.

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