December 8th, 2010 | Comments Off on time to breathe

I need to learn how to accept the limitations of time.  I find myself, over and again, succumbing to anxiety rooted in the inability to mold my life around the constructs of time.

The hyper awareness of time interferes with my rationale and affects some priorities that I set, decisions that I make, thoughts that I think, and emotions that I manifest.

This is already a broken record.  I can tell, even before I get the words out.

There is only so much time available.  Somehow I have to work, mother, keep my household, foster my friendships and tend to my budding relationship.  I would like to have some self-nurturing or at least recovery time.  I have to multi-task even that, and glean whatever pleasure I can wherever I can.  Rather than choke at yet another chore, I choose to savor the upkeep of my household and the shopping for groceries or other sundries.  It gives me a smidgen of peace.

And what of this budding relationship?  How does it fit in?  How does one have quality adult time and not compromise child time?  Beaten down by logistics.  There’s no time for seeing each other during the week, which leaves only the weekend.  Friday nights are nearly shot.  It’s late by the time any meeting can take place.  Saturday, and part of Sunday constitute the window of opportunity and the dynamics shift dramatically as a function of child visitation arrangements.  How to be relaxed and content when there’s no time for just plain living?

I don’t like juggling.  I don’t like the ‘hurry up and wait’ mentality.  I don’t like not knowing what time I will have with whom and when.  For all I know, I could be dead in five years.  Or tomorrow.  I’m grateful to make it home alive, each and every day that I have to traverse the freeways in the dark, when it’s raining.   It’s harrowing.  I don’t want a future life, I want a now life.

So I am confounded and frustrated.

I don’t know how not to be anxious about the time.  I don’t know how this life balancing act works.

Sometimes I find myself in thought, and realize that I’m not breathing.  Stress.  It’s a stress of some sort.  I have to remind myself to breathe.

Maybe I should ask myself what I want.  Why is the time or lack of it so stressful or so important?  Or did I not just write ad nauseum about it?

After I’ve put the kids to bed, there is a small window of time that I get for myself.  It’s all I have, and there are a thousand and one mentally, physically, spiritually, or emotionally productive or constructive things I could do with that time.   But for whatever reason, the need to decompress and refuel is amplified lately, and I find myself floundering and anguishing, at a loss for doing this with the faculties I have available.

Ideally (this is pure speculation) decompression and refueling could be a symbiotic process with one’s partner, given that there is regular contact.  But there isn’t regular contact, and there’s not likely to be regular contact in the foreseeable future.

So I am confounded and frustrated.  And feeling alone.

I said it was a broken record.

July 9th, 2008 | 4 Comments »

So this morning we got a phone call from Sissy’s mother. Apparently, she has quite a case of head lice.

She said she’s been itching a lot, for about a week. Of course she didn’t mention this to us while she was here.

Never having experienced such a thing, I consulted Doctor Google. And read horrifying things about chemical treatments. And heartening things about dealing with the situation. Thankfully.

I bought a special comb and inspected BB. He seems to be okay. The comb hurts him too much and he won’t hold still long enough to do any sort of reasonable job, but I just cut his hair the other day, and it’s very short. I don’t see anything there.

Similarly, I cut Gadget’s hair very short the other day as well, and don’t see anything there.

I spent an hour and a half in the shower, working through my own hair. And found nits. About six of them. Or maybe ten. I don’t know. It’s very distressing. The comb yanked out handfuls of hair, like a razor blade, and left my scalp feeling raw, so no wonder BB wouldn’t cooperate.

I’m going to go through Gadget’s next, with the comb. He had more contact with his daughter than I did, but he has so much less hair than I do. Hopefully he’s nit free.

Now I have to go through this scalp raking for a while until I am certain I’m nit free. At least I didn’t find anything hatched, which means I might have caught it in time. I hope.

Maybe I’ll just shave BB and Gadget’s heads, for good measure.

For me, I’m not ready for the Sinead O’Connor look.

And I have a lot more laundry to do.