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11/2/2016 1 Comment How Do You Do It All?“You have three kids?!” The question falls out of the mouth of an acquaintance and rings out across the table of a crowded bar. “How do you have time to hang out?!” It’s a question I’m not unfamiliar with. Even when I was “happily” married, people often inquired about how I managed to do anything with three kids. Since my divorce came with sole custody of my children, the question comes more frequently. I respond now, as I did pre-divorce, with a simple shrug and a joke or two about never sleeping. The reality is that I don’t do it all. My life happens, just as it always had, because I prioritize what’s important to me versus what I or my family wants or needs. How do I have time to run? How do I have time to see friends? Teach my kids? Work? Brush my teeth? Sleep? Get laid? I prioritize what I can do, accept that which I can’t do, and buy stock in Energizer.  Truth be told, we can’t do it all. None of us. “Doing it all” is a lie sold to us to keep us too busy to enjoy this one little life we have. We’re inundated with planners, Pinterest organization ideas, and books about creating a 25th hour in our day. While some of it can be useful, and I utilize a number of tips and tricks to make the most of my time, at the end of my day I still only had 24 hours to use. Those 24 hours are precious. They are little lives inside our minuscule existence. So, what do I do with my 24 hours to give the illusion of “doing it all”? I trade doing the dishes for a pizza and beer with friends. Sure, I could put having an immaculate house over my friends but, when I’m on my deathbed those dishes won’t mean shit to me. The relationships I have and maintain will, though. Why should I put dishes before connecting with friends in person? I swap teaching time for meetings and arrange meetings around appointments. School can happen at any time of the day, it’s one of the perks of homeschooling, most businesses operate during traditional business hours. I acknowledge that and adjust our schedule accordingly when needed. My grass hasn’t been cut in two weeks. It’s not a priority and eventually the autumn leaves will overtake my yard and after the boys and I have shared a fun day of rolling in the piles I’ll care because who the hell wants to bag all that shit up? I plan weekly runs and refuse to do anything else during that time that isn’t crucial to the health and well-being of my family because my health and well-being are important too. I delegate chores to my children. I can’t afford to have someone come in and clean my home, cut my grass, or run my errands. But I have three healthy kids who can pick up after themselves, make meals, scrub a toilet, and put the groceries away when I get home from the store. It builds character, plus my pee goes in the toilet bowl so why should I scrub that crude on the bottom?  I’m constantly negotiating with Me, Myself, and I. We’re always having discussions about what’s important and why. There are plenty of people who would, and do, tell me I don’t prioritize properly. In their opinion, the clothes should be folded, my car should be clean, and every single deadline I have should be met ahead of schedule before I plop my ass on the couch and binge watch Netflix while plowing through my kids’ Halloween candy. I wager there are plenty of people in your life who will have something to say about the way you prioritize your 24 hours. To those people, I say Fuck You! Yes, a big giant fuck you. Why? Because our 24 hours belong to us and we are free to make of them what we wish. Ask yourself, are my kids fed and cared for to the best of my ability? Are my bills paid? Do I still have a job? If the answer is yes, who the hell cares if you put the dishes off one more night? No, your house won’t be picture perfect, you won’t always get to say yes to that night out with friends, or that second bedtime story but, you’ll be sane and connected to yourself and those who matter most which is far more fucking important than a spotless kitchen. As someone who has danced with the depression devil her whole life, I’m far more interested in doing what I need to feel human over “doing it all” to appear superhuman to people whose opinions don’t matter in the long run. “All” is an unrealistic goal that no one human can reach on their own. And who of us has the funds for the team of people needed to do it all and do it well? No damn body I know. So say fuck it, prioritize your life based on what you and your family need and in the immortal words of Elsa when it comes to everything else “Let it go”.  Let that shit go.
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12/1/2015 1 Comment The Pen Is Mightier It all started with a boy. Well, that’s not entirely true. It started with a long hot summer in the time before smartphones, wifi, or even a desktop with dial-up. My children compare this time to the dark ages, it was simply 1994 to me. During the sticky summer of ‘94, my acquiescent neighbor and I sat on his bedroom floor debating the possibilities of our day. Watch television? No, his mother’s soaps were on. Go for a bike ride? Ugh, much too hot for that. Being military brats, our homes were filled with random knickknacks from around the world. As we ticked through the list, and our options faded, I observed the knickknacks in his room. My eyes eventually landed on the large Japanese glass float that rested in the corner of his bedroom. “Let’s put on a play", the words danced from my lips as my brain began to piece together bits of dialogue. An hour later, we were calling his mother and sisters into his room to watch our play. That’s how a good chunk of our summer went before my parents decided that boys and girls our age were no longer allowed to play alone in rooms and his mother reluctantly agreed with them. Those moments of freedom and creativity were the catalyst to my writing desires. I don’t remember any of the plays we created that summer, but I remember how they made me feel. We rivaled Shakespeare and brought our tiny audience to their feet every time. I learned in those moments that the words that lived in my head had a place in the world.  I want that too, Ryan. I want that too. When the playwriting stopped, I turned to a spiral notebook. I kept it hidden under a pile stuff in my dresser drawer. It contained sections of my life. Moments of pain, joy, and fear. It flowed from me and brought me peace. It also hid my fantasy world largely concocted around crushes I had. Romantic comedies were my forte in the mid-90s. While my writing has changed as I’ve aged and become a bit darker, working in a variety of heavy themes, I still enjoy reliving my hormonally charged youth every once in awhile. In middle school, my notebooks and diaries were taken because my father didn’t agree with the subject matter and fearing further retribution I stopped writing unless required to for school. Unfortunately, or fortunately depending on how you look at it, the best laid plans often go awry. My 8th-grade poetry landed me a one-on-one session with my teacher. She was concerned. It was clear to her that I was struggling with depression and my orientation. What was the purpose to life? Was there really more beyond my current existence? Would I ever know love? And could I love boys and girls? And what if I only loved girls, then what? She assured me there was nothing wrong with me and she was available if I wanted to talk. I chose to write. It felt safe to write again and not the fluff, but the nitty gritty of who I was and who I wanted to be. I don’t know what she did with my writings, judging by the fact that my father never left a parent-teacher conference in a rage it’s safe to say she didn’t show them to him. A year later I had the teacher who would make me a better writer. So, naturally, I hated her class. I understand now why she was so hard on us, I really do. But Ms. Eagles, if you’re reading this, I still believe there is absolutely nothing wrong with doodling during class. I still do it. In meetings, at conferences, and at the doctor’s office. You can’t stop the doodling, but you can make the doodlers better writers. Which you did, so thank you. For the next four years, my writing life was a blur of research papers, essays, and an occasional creative writing piece that brought me freedom from the world I lived in. Then, one brisk afternoon, a friend sat me down at his computer and introduced me to LiveJournal. He said it was just what I needed, and it was. I longed for a safe space to bear my soul and LiveJournal offered that. Over the next ten years, I posted there, on various social media platforms as they came into existence, and eventually on blogger.   Creatively, though, the stories rarely found themselves on paper or a computer hard drive. Instead, they found their way to my children’s ears. Stories of far off places, knights, friendly dragons, and daring adventures in which they were the heroes. Beautiful stories meant only for them. Over the years, I found great joy in writing about our schooling efforts, secular parenting, a variety of social justice issues, and the few creative pieces that found their way to ink. Then, one morning I awoke to find that joy was gone, stolen by a thief in the night. Depression is a bitch without a care or concern for the life you wish to live. I’ve spent the last four years struggling to find the will to write. I doubted myself and allowed the negativity of a select few to impact the one thing that has always been an act of freedom for me. I realized not too long ago, as ideas rolled through my mind, that the will to write will never be given back to me; I would have to take it back. With each keystroke, with each scribble in a notebook or on a wall, I would have to take back my freedom. You know you've found your passion when you fear never trying more than you fear failing. This craft has been in my blood since the day they placed a pen in my hand. I’ve attempted to silence it, ignore it, and neglected it out of fear because the pen is mighty. The pen cares not about the thoughts, opinions, and feelings of others or even the writer. The pen simply wants to tell a story. When you’re the one holding the pen that’s a scary and liberating place to be, especially when the story is your own. As I've moved through this journey we call life, I’ve always known the pen is mighty, but now I’m no longer afraid to hold it. “Writing is a dangerous profession. There is no telling what hole you may rip in society’s carefully woven master narrative.” - Danielle Orner |
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