on trying to do all the things

I shouldn't flatter myself by assuming that my gentle readers have noticed how little I've blogged lately.  So, in case you haven't noticed, I haven't been writing much lately.

I don't know if I'm just tired, or a little burned out with life, or truly don't have enough free hours in the day, but it seems hard to find the time to write.  I love to write, I want to write, I daydream in prose while I cook meals and wash dishes -- but at the end of the day, I rarely get time to put fingers to keyboard and record any of the thoughts or experiences I had meant to write.

I'm totally blown away by those women out there that seem to manage it all.  Four or five kids, a beautiful home seemingly always in immaculate condition, craft projects and DIY beautifying going on every day, repainting furniture in the perfect hues, children dressed in designer clothing, homeschooling, cooking from scratch, selling beautiful handmade things on Etsy, managing their start-up businesses, and blogging about all of it with professional-quality photographs.

How in the world...?

There are toys under my couch that haven't seen the light of day in probably a month.  One or more of us has been sick pretty much every day for the past month in an endless cycle of colds and fevers and even a bad bout of the flu {lucky me}.  My baby crawls around picking up bits of yesterday's food from the floor beneath her high chair and trying to eat it while my toddler hasn't had a bath in days.  I cook from scratch, but my kitchen is the worse for the wear because of it.  If the living room is tidy, you can bet the master bedroom isn't.  If the master bedroom is clean, the kids' rooms upstairs will be piled high with laundry waiting to be put away.  If the laundry is all done and put away, I'm dreadfully behind on work-related tasks.  And so on and so forth.

On days when I'm lucky enough to have both children napping simultaneously, or evenings when I get them to bed in a timely fashion and no one wakes up crying for an hour or more, my brain sounds something like this:

"FREEDOM!!!  What should I do?!  I know!  Work on the rag rug I'm making for Nell's room!  Or wait, I could write on my blog!  I could read other peoples' blogs!  No, I should mend Nathan's shirt that's been sitting on top of the mending pile for weeks!  No, perhaps I'll practice my violin!  Or get caught up on work!  Send those emails that have needed to be done for weeks!  No, wait, I could bake some cookies for Nathan!  I could sew something pretty!  Organize the linen closet!  Take down that last Christmas decoration that's still up even though it's March!  Tidy up the kids' toys and rotate out some of the ones they haven't played with lately!  I could go on Pinterest and look for some ideas to make the house look ready for Spring!  Or I could sit down and relax!  Put my feet up, drink a cup of tea, yes, that's what I should do!  Watch an episode of Parenthood!  I'll just turn on the teakettle and----"

Of course, as if on cue, the baby probably wakes up.  Or, if not, I usually end up doing something practical like dishes or laundry, those two most never-ending of all the never-ending tasks of housekeeping.  I use nap time to tidy up for the babysitter, to set out snacks for the afternoon when I'll be working, to sweep the kitchen floor quickly.  Or perhaps in the evening laziness wins out and I watch an episode of Parenthood {I'm late to the party on that one, but I love it!}, telling myself I'll do all the other things! after one episode, but then it's 9:30 pm and I brush my teeth and fall into bed just in time for the baby to wake up.

Maybe someone else out there can relate?  I want to do so many things, to create beauty and do something lasting in between spending meaningful moments with my kids.  Then I get so excited about all the things I could do in the free moments I have, I somehow manage to do nothing.  I'm paralyzed by the possibilities and the time is all too brief.

It probably seems silly to try to fit in time for blogging when there are so many more essential things I could be doing.

I want to write things down in this insignificant little space of mine on the world wide web, not only because I enjoy the process of writing and find that it helps me clear my mind, but also because it somehow seems more tangible than the other things I accomplish.  Sure, I cleaned the dishes only to messy them again only to clean them again.  Yes, I vacuumed today, and will need to do so again by tomorrow no doubt.  The diapers were laundered, and the pail will be overflowing again by the end of the week.  The predictably cyclical nature of housework is enjoyable in its rhythm and pattern, but can also leave one at a bit of a loss.  Am I accomplishing anything?  Have I done anything of value?  There's something about the posts on this blog of mine that lend me a bit of satisfaction: I had a thought, and I wrote it down.  I photographed our lovely children, and I recorded a few memories.  I put it somewhere permanent.  The house will continue to ebb and flow in and out of chaos, but what I wrote and recorded - a tiny snapshot in the timeline of our family life - will remain.

So here's to the idea of making time to write a little more often.  Will it happen?  We shall see.  The dinner dishes are waiting to be done and the baby just woke up crying.  The tyranny of the urgent is real, and it is comfortingly predictable.

{I'm smiling to myself right now.  It's nice to be needed.}