I don't care who you are, when you stay home all day wiping noses and butts there are days...weeks...months where you feel like you are living on the edge between boredom and insanity. I know, Michelle Duggar with her Relief Society sweet voice seems as if she's the exception to the rule but I bet some days she's dying to get behind the wheel in that huge bus of theirs and try jumping the grand canyon like a crazy dress-clad Evel Knievel. Or maybe not. She seems pretty sane...oh, except for giving birth to 19 kids!
Some women train for a marathon to have their minds all to themselves for a couple of hours. Some women escape into a career outside of the home. Some women lock the bathroom door and lay down on a beach towel while the shower runs and don sunglasses and pretend they are on a beach somewhere. I highly suggest the third one. Just pretend the kids yelling on the other side of the door are catcalls from passersby.
The point is I am not bored because I have nothing to do. Far from it. There's always another dish to be washed or clothes to be folded or a boo-boo to be kissed. The truth is that the nature of housework is mundane and mind numbing. And all the work we do is undone within minutes which is extraordinarily frustrating to me. I find myself wildly fluctuating between being a nazi with my daughter about keeping things clean to letting things fall apart with little resistance because my efforts will always be futile anyway.
I've found my own ways to cope. I salsa in the kitchen to Conga by Gloria Estefan, shake my booty to
Getting Jiggy With It by Will Smith or tippy toe around to Vivaldi wishing I had a tutu. Last week I found a fake lion tatoo. I've never desired a real tatoo and have always thought those fake tatoos were for the 10 and under set. Not so. I'm hear to tell you that the look on your husband's face when he glimpses a lion tatoo peeking out of the neck of your blouse is priceless. But when your daughter asks what it is you quickly explain that it is a new mole. She'll totally buy it. Not.
This year I made a resolution to do something every day that is unexpected and brings me joy. Sometimes I feel as if the core of myself gets buried beneath the daily grind. The person I was before I was someone's wife and mother seems far away. I'm trying to get back in touch with that person. I realize I will never be the care free girl I was before I grew up, and most days I don't wish to be, but I do miss certain aspects of that girl. She laughed a lot. And peed her pants a lot. Well I guess some things never change.
3 comments:
oh your too funny. a tatoo! who knew you were so wild! ha ha. i guess i need to try that.
I agree about being bored. that's too far out of my comfort zone to do something everyday unexpected. ha ha
Maybe it is just my growing epicenter
but I quite enjoy the Mundane lately and really relish in hibernation! In fact I have a Dr's appt today and the thought of getting showered and dressed up and all that is making me tired in fact I may go back to sleep right now for a 1/2 hour or so ;) Love ya. I go through just what your talking about every year around this time new baby or not....Soon as the sun starts shining and your able to get out and show your baby the sites I'm guessing life will be on an upswing.
Having done it for 30 years now, I know exactly where you are coming from. I have no advice. I just know what you mean. Most days I live in my head with Alan Rickman, and would love to get a real tattoo, but am scared that God would smite me. And if you pee your pants now, just wait until you are 50! And, by the way, I think Michelle Duggar is a twit.
Post a Comment