Oops...I got lost

It's been two months since the last time I posted.  Finding myself before dinner went by the wayside when life got insane.  About the time that I was headed out of town for an extended period, we had water damage in our house.  We had to move into a hotel with two dogs and two teenage boys.  For a month we were in flux.  We finally got back into our house, got most everything unpacked and we got robbed.  Just on the heels of dealing with that we had a barrage of company (that part I enjoyed).  But, it made me take note of something.

Women have put themselves on the back burner forever.  We take care of everything and everyone else before we look at ourselves and say, "what do you need today?"  Is that just how we are programmed?  Is it necessary for us to take that role so that life continues as we know it?  What is wrong with taking an hour or two a day just for ourselves?

Well, in my house that would mean that dinner was eaten out (not good on the waistline), clothes would be dirty, contractors would be unattended, the dogs would never be walked....the list goes on and on.  Some of these things could probably wait until the next day, but then wouldn't everything start to compound and pile up to become unmanageable?  I mean, if you go to an office and choose not to do the work necessary to meet deadlines, wouldn't you eventually be fired?

The thing about being a woman, a caretaker, a wife, a mother, a daughter, a sister and a friend is that there are no set hours.  Our jobs begin the moment our feet hit the floor and don't end until we crawl under the covers.  I would love to say to my family and friends that my hours are 9am-8pm.  I will get as much done during those hours as possible.  If I cannot consistently get these things done, then maybe we need to look at adding staff.

Hmmm....that might not be a reasonable expectation.  I mean, we aren't the Rockefellers.  But, maybe our lives are too full.  Maybe we have to simplify and trim the fat.  I think that is what I will explore over the next few weeks.

Finding Myself in My Home

Yesterday I talked about my time and how much of it is eaten up by running our house.  Every single minute of every day is scheduled to the point of overlapping!  But, there is something here that I am starting to really appreciate and value.  Maybe this is coming as a shock to me because our lives changed so much when we moved back to Charlotte.

For the first time in a very long time it isn't just Mark and I.  Even though the boys don't live here full time, they are here a lot.  And even when they aren't here we do stuff with them and for them.  We are a family.

A family is a group of people united, usually with one head.  Okay, in today's world that doesn't necessarily fly.  So may families have multiple abodes and a couple of heads.  But, if you start to look at this as a business.  Take our house and it is one of the franchises in the Swancy business.  The boy's mother's house is also a franchise in this business.  We each have things that we do to make this business run.  My role is operations, maintenance and creative of this location.

Anyone who has ever worked as the CEO of their own home understands this concept.  It does take two people with very different roles to make this family "business" operate at full capacity.  I will probably get shot for saying this, but I think that one person staying at home and managing that part of the business is the ideal situation.

I don't know when we began to devalue what the person who stayed home did.  I understand that it feels like the person at home should have all the time in the world to sit around and watch daytime tv and eat bon bons.  But, that isn't the case at all.  There is a full day and more in managing a home.  There is tremendous value in the operation of a well run home.

Somewhere along the way someone decided that the stay-at-home parent wasn't as valuable as the person bringing home the bacon.  So those who were at home wanted to go out and get themselves the respect they saw the breadwinner getting.  Gradually most homes became two income families.  Divorces rose...of course they did, who was taking care of the family?  And now two incomes are necessary to support multiple family franchises.

It took decades to get to this point.  It will take a societal uproar and movement to change the way we think about how homes operate.  I wonder if the first step is to have a job description, skills programs and compensation packages for the person at home.  Something to think about!

Household CEO Indeed

I'm not sure how we managed before.  I guess there were a lot of things that we just didn't do in the past.  Since we moved to Charlotte I have spend every day managing our house, running errands and generally managing things for everyone else.  If you've been reading this, you know that I am having an identity crisis because I don't have a "job".

So, thinking that I have all this time on my hands, since I don't have to show up at an office at 8am, I decide to take this journey to find out what is missing.  I keep planning to do things every day and at the end of the day they didn't get done.  All of a sudden I was beating myself up because I was letting time slip away from me.  Without a place to go to do my own thing...it just doesn't get done.  I needed structure...I needed to see in black and white (okay green, orange, purple and red) where I spent my time.

I opened the iCal on my Mac (which I've never used) and started time blocking.  An hour in the morning for exercise, two hours for taxes, an hour to take the dogs to the vet, thirty minutes for a kennel evaluation, thirty minutes for the tree guy, an hour to find contractors to fix the other things that are going wrong in the house, four hours to go to the home show and get ideas for the outdoor space we want to build and an hour for the grocery store.  Each day looks something like this and each day is FULL!

Uh oh, though, I didn't put on the schedule the hour it takes to get ready in the morning, or the time that it takes to make the beds, unload the dishwasher and throw in a load of clothes.  Uh oh, I need to call my mother and see how she is doing...she had a little procedure early this week.  That will take an hour because we never have short conversations.  As long as I am at it I should check on Mark's mother.  I haven't talked to her in awhile and I know she is lonely.  Oops, just got an email from our realtor who is trying to help us resolve some issues.  She asked me to call her.  All of those "off calendar" things added up to another 3 hours.

Okay, so it is a 14 hour day to run this household.  That is just an example of one day but they all seem to be going this way.  As you can see, I didn't even put time to eat, breathe or take care of anything else personal!  That adds another hour to my day all together.

Our lives must have been much simpler in the past.  We didn't have 8 hours a week of kid's ballgames.  Mark's job was demanding but nothing like it is today.  I'm working on making our lives run smoother.  But, in the meantime I wonder where I can pencil in "finding myself".  I also, look at this list and wonder if I have started "finding myself" without even realizing it!!

Taking the Weekend

I've committed to spending an hour a day doing something that is for me...that is for finding my own path and some of my own personality again.  This weekend is a good example of why that is necessary.

This morning at 6:30am we are up and cooking breakfast...or I should say, I'm cooking breakfast.  Today the schedule includes SAT prep course, Lacrosse Jamboree and a Rugby match.  All in different parts of town.  Thank goodness the 17 year old can get himself to the SAT prep before he has to cart himself to his rugby match.  But, we want to send them off with a good breakfast (brain food), lunches and snacks.

In addition to all the boys activities my 21 year old stepson is in town.  His brothers are always thrilled to see him.  We welcome the rare weekends when he comes to visit.  But, he adds an element of chaos.  He lives to rile his brothers up.

Well, it is finally a little before 9 and they have all departed for their various activities.  I am just sitting down to have a cup of tea before I have to rush to get ready.  There isn't an hour here for me to do something for myself.  I've had to really look at this day hard to figure out a time that would work for me.  On top of everything it is our 11 year anniversary.  So, it might sound selfish to want just an hour to do something that makes a difference in my life personally.

But, as a gift to myself, I am going to go to the games in my own car.  I am going to leave after the last game and go to the gym.  I am worth the time that it takes to take care of myself.  That is one of the biggest things that has fallen through the cracks.  So, today will not be about reflection is is purely about me and the body that I need to look after as well as I do everyone else's.