Hours in a Day

It embarrasses me that I am not writing more frequently.  After all, this is my 'job' these days.  It's been nearly a week since I last wrote and I wonder how that happened, beat myself up for allowing it to happen.

I reflected on what I did instead and not surprisingly, and not unlike the rest of you, the hours just sailed by.  I wasn't wasting my time, wasn't surfing the web, twiddling my thumbs, and wasn't in a vegetative coma.  I was busy doing other things.

Linda went out of town last weekend so I was left to watch Max (with help from my mom and aunt).  I had some marathon training runs to fit in.  I managed to stain and polyurethane a new door to the basement.  (I even managed to accurately chisel the relief for the hinges so that the door fits, opens, and closes properly!)  On Monday Linda started her new job, but Max got a case of conjunctivitis and was banned from daycare, leaving me home to care for him.  All of you who have or had a toddler know that this is full time work that leaves little time for errands or chores, to say nothing of tending to personal hygiene.

And so here it is, nearly a week later and I am just now getting back to business.  As a 'house spouse'  I am quickly learning what housewives have long known:  there simply aren't enough hours in the day.  If you tally up all the tasks and goals for a given day, one is lucky to cross half the items off the list. And ironically if one is trying to adopt a simpler lifestyle, it only seems to get more complicated.



To wit:  We want to eat healthy, unprocessed foods.  To do that, we have to go shopping for those foods more frequently, prepare the meals, and wash those dishes - for each and every meal.  (We are not always successful.) There is of course the house cleaning, the bill paying, the cleaning up after the toddler, emptying the kitty litter - the mundanity of daily living.  I know that we could do a better job planning ahead to save time later, but it's hard to find the time to make time to save time.  I know we're not alone in that regard.  Housework aside, there's all the other things I want to do to enrich my life.

I also want to make time to read.  I want to read about current events so I can be well informed about the world in which I live.  I just got a subscription to The Economist using some frequent flyer miles.  When the F am I going to find time to read that on a weekly basis?  I actually had to let my subscription to The New Yorker lapse as I simply couldn't keep up.  Each week it arrived it felt more like homework than leisure. I want to read my book about organic gardening (and also need to find time to turn over last years garden, while also finding time to prepare some new beds NOW for the spring).  I want to read The River of Doubt about Theodore Roosevelt's ill fated trip into the Brazilian Amazon.  And all that reading doesn't factor in the ceaseless and voluminous writings to be found - and enjoyed online.  It's simply too much.

I try to read before I go to bed every night and I try to go to bed at a reasonable hour, knowing how important it is to get a good night's rest.  It's not long before the book slips from my hands as I nod off.  There's so many things that we ought to do that instead of feeling like you're rewarding yourself by leading 'a good life,' it becomes an onus and one begins to wonder why one does them all all.  Eat right.  Sleep well.  Oh, and exercise.

Of course I need to fit in the old exercise regimen.  I am currently training for a marathon which is this Sunday. I've been religious in following the training schedule and know that I'll need to implement a new one soon so that I won't slowly slide back into lazy complacence.  But don't I also deserve to watch an occasional movie or sporting event? Flipping the channels last night I was reminded how brilliant South Park still is.  Family Guy, too.








Then, of course, there's my wife and child (which I fully acknowledge and recognize should come at the top of my list not toward the end). There's planning for the today (register my car), tomorrow (drive to Salem), and retirement (10% of gross income goes toward that). The list goes on, endlessly, forever.  There's all this stuff and I haven't even mention the time I need to carve out to write.

I am keenly aware of how overwhelming the stuff of life is.  For me it's the same feeling I get when I go into a library or bookstore and know that I'll never, ever be able to read all the books I want to.  It's the sense of knowing all that will be absent.  So how will I manage?

One of the things I frequently consider, but have yet to do with any kind of consistency is some form of meditation.  I sometimes try to do it while running and do find moments of the stillness I crave, but then the brain charges in a new direction leaving me both mentally and physically breathless.  I want to try to find those 15 minutes each day to breathe deeply and I want to do it with regularity.  (I also want to wake up and do sets of push-up and sit-ups, but I haven't done that either.)

I've read Deepak Chopra and Eckhart Tolle.  I follow Tony Robbins on Twitter.  Much of what they say and write resonates and makes sense to me.  And in many ways, I incorporate some of the principles they espouse into my days.  Yet, I know that I am not where I want to be while simultaneously recognizing that I don't actually need to 'go anywhere' - that I am already, patently, where I should be.  So as my mind starts to get crowded with all there is to do, all I want to do, should do, must do, I also know that the only thing I really need to do is be present in each and every moment.  It's a second by second effort, but one worth making.

Eric Cartman and Deepak Chopra in the same blog - I didn't see that coming.