an apology/not an apology

I wish I had more time to write here. I wish I had more time to undertake creative endeavors.

Why has it been harder to write blog posts for the past six months or so?

• Overseeing the education of five people requires a LOT of effort.
  
• The teenage years provide a plethora of fodder for blog posts but so very little of it is shareable since they are older kids with bigger feelings and stories of their own. Let’s just say, the parenting of teens is a FULL TIME task that hits at the most unexpected hours and in all sorts of dramatic must-respond-immediately sort of ways.
• My part time work at TRH has really turned into full time work but I still only have a part time slot of life to dedicate to it.
• Teaching a literature and writing class takes time to prep and time to grade.
• Food purchasing and food prepping and food clean up should really have its own dedicated job title in our house. I’m incredibly thankful kids are so capable and willing to help in this area, but it’s still a significant task to juggle, let alone pay for.
• Parenting is exhausting. And time consuming.
• Parenting alone is extra exhausting. And extra time consuming.
• With all of the above, the space for creative thinking has shrunk dramatically. Maybe it’ll return one day. Maybe not.

This was not supposed to be a post about time or writing, but it seems I am always feeling like I’m letting someone somewhere down so half of my conversations feel as if they begin with me offering some sort of apology.

And, apparently, they all sound sort of whiny because when I read over my own words right here that’s what I’m hearing. A low grade complaining and a woe is me.

So – I’m sorry?

But also – I saw a bumper sticker on a car this week that read:

IT IS WHAT IT IS.

And that is also true.

The kids and I have regular Sunday Morning Meetings at our weekly brunch. And this week I had what I jokingly referred to as a Come to Jesus Session.

Our sleeping schedule and waking schedule, our nighttime routine and our commitment to taking care of ourselves physically had waned over the holiday season and it had never quite recovered into the new year.

It was a firm re-establishment of a more strict bedtime and no screen time on school nights and I understand that the majority of that all lands square in my lap since I set the guidelines and I’m the enforcer and that’s a large part of the problem because IT IS HARD.

I set the rules. I offered some incentives. And I am playing within the guidelines myself as well. When it’s time for bed, it’s time for bed, regardless of whether I checked off all the items on the to-do list. (There’s a real strong chance that I have not.)

This is a needed change but change is still a challenge.

The other day I was sharing my schedule with a friend, explaining my tendency to stay up very very late into the night to try to get more work done and then to get up and start over again in the morning, sleep-deprived and lacking in resources to handle problems with grace or kindness.

She straight forward said, “Sounds like a good way to die young.”

Which maybe was the kick in the pants I needed.

I’m working on it, you guys. I’m trying.

Currently that means going to bed on time. Stopping what I’m doing, even if it remains undone.

I’ve got a couple more goals I’d like to accomplish. More routine exercise, for one. But I’m starting with sleep. Good old fashioned sleep. Rest. In the bed, eyes closed, sleep.

We’re giving ourselves six weeks to set this routine up. To see if it helps. To put it into practice and to retrain our bodies and to allow those bodies to recover and to be their best.

Let’s hope that counts for something more than a tidy and completed to-do list.