So Much to Do, So Little Time

I've been told by several older women that this is the way it is for middle age. Kids going every different place, trying to get ahead in your career, participating in civic activities, professional organizations and changing roles with your parents.

Whew. That makes me tired just thinking about it. How did we get in this mess?

I think we get into it a little at a time. If you can afford it, no one wants to deprive their child of good experiences, like sports or scouting. So you say only one extracurricular - only one. per kid per person in the house. Okay only one for the kids and two for the adults. Well, really we'll go and do whatever activities the kids get us into and the ones we promised we would do. plus work, plus family, plus friends, plus housekeeping, plus...

Juggling all these things or trying to causes a lot of stress and a lot of sleepless nights. If it seems like you have to be a superhero to do all of this well, you're right. This expectation that we have to do everything and be everything all at once is very damaging to our physical, mental and emotional health. It is imperative that we slim down our busy schedules. And there's the rub. It's easy to say, "I've got to do less" and very hard to actually do less.

So we cope and compensate. Plan our day. Put our make up on in the car. Schedule our time and our children's time. Grab convenience food. Multi-task. Let a few things slip. Buy special treats for the kids. Eat some extra ice cream. Buy an expensive pair of must-have shoes on an impulse. Drink copious amounts of caffeine. Hire a maid. Hire a babysitter. The list can go on.

STOP. Enough already. Sit down. Leave the dishes. Say, "No." Why?

Because we have gotten stuck in the hamster wheel.

I like taking a moment in the fall to reflect on what it is that I am doing with my time and what does my family need. Some people do this at New Year's, but for me it's the fall. I think because I know winter is around the corner and the family can get closer in the winter and also busier. The Fall is a transition time also. So here is the formula I am following at the moment.

1. List what values are important to me

2. List what activities create the most joy/happiness

3. Look at my commitment list and compare it to what I would prefer to be doing

4. Mark the things I am committed to that don't match up

5. Choose a date in the future to bow out of that commitment or change my level of involvement.

6. Let people who are affected know ahead of time that my schedule does not allow me to continue participating after a certain date.

7. Wrap up any loose ends in that area

8. When the date comes, move on

AND DON'T LOOK BACK!

Diggin' Dirt

I love late season deals. Just the other day I was at the Ashland City Mall (those of you who live here know what I mean, the store that starts with W*) looking at all the different Clearance racks that I could and I wondered into the garden center. I had just recently cleared the weeds out of the front flower bed and fixed it up. I thought it needed another color besides green, so I was poking around for a cheap plant. I found one for three dollars which had actually become four plants, well grown, too. Yippee and I liked how it looked. So I bought it. And I brought it home.

There it is, looking just like it's always been there. That's my favorite kind, you know. The kind that's always been there. Or at least looks that way.

But as I was clearing mulch and digging holes for these new additions, I was getting philosophical. I remember reading the Secret Garden over and over again when I was young, trying to connect with how Mary felt when she first discovered the garden and started weeding the early bulbs. To connect with the newness and what I imagined to be the satisfaction of knowing that your actions were helping another living thing thrive. I didn't get that feeling when my mother assigned weeding chores to me and I don't know why, It just never occurred to me that way in the heat of the summer.

Now I know the difference, especially today. It's the rain, the mist and the coolness. Today wasn't exactly early spring cold at 68F this morning but it is a good deal cooler than a couple weeks ago at 96F. It's been drizzling and the mist has come back to the hills. The soil is wet and easy to move without choking on the dust. Getting my hands in the early soil is something that I have always loved doing. It connects me with the land, with creation.

I remember working in computers a few years back and feeling vaguely dissatisfied with work in general. Many of the engineers I worked with felt the same way. It occurred to me one day that this vague dissatisfaction was the result of a general disconnect in our culture. It's the disconnect that happens when what you do for a living has nothing to do with what you need to live. Fixing computers all day is not in any way related to preparing supper or feeding an infant except by money. Money that is not even tangible anymore. Easy come, easy go. And the pundits wonder why there is so much debt in America. How often do others feel unconnected to living? Don't we all long to make an impact in some way - a tangible impact? For me, it is farming, sustainable farming. What is it for you?

I Think I Shocked the Children

My daughter found her dirty clothes from this morning, washed and waiting for her to put them away. Her response,

"I just returned these to laundry and now I got them back!"

"Mom, I put these in the laundry this morning and now they're clean!"

Complete surprise in her voice and lots of giggling, too.

On a farm, the laundry often takes a back seat to more pressing matters, such as, the goat is in the chicken tractor or the dogs have no water. I have been trying a new schedule of work at the house this past week where I actually spend a full uninterrupted hour every day doing housework, regardless of what the four-leggeds are up to. You would think that would be pretty easy and I had been doing it all along, but again the goat in the chicken tractor thing...

I have done a load or two of laundry every day since last Tuesday and when the kids come home from school, it is sorted into piles on my bed for them to put away. I am almost caught up on the laundry as of today. There are still some major dirty items, like bathroom rugs that require "special" handling, but I can get to them tomorrow.

My children now have responsibility and privilege lists on the refrigerator they can reference when their homework is complete or non-existent. This is supposed to save me from trying to remember what they have to do and then arguing about whether it needs to be done or not. One of their responsibilities is to put away their clean clothes. My daughter actually finished her homework with only 10 minutes of complaining today and went to her responsibility list and saw she had to get her clothes put away. She didn't have to be reminded because I was in the middle of a reminder session with her brother.

The comment was completely unexpected and I did not at first even know what she was talking about. It seems that my system is working well. I am on a mission to spend less time doing things I don't care about and more time doing things I love, using tips from Zen Habits.

One very helpful thing I learned was to make changes in your habits slowly. Try 1 new thing a week and don't try to do something new until you have that one new habit down. That advice really helps when you are trying to keep things simple on the farm. And it helps get the laundry done, too.