So here I (still) am – 23 days and counting from my last day of “gainful” employment.
I had intended to blog every day, thinking that I would have nothing but TIME on my hands – time I had previously spent doing a very demanding job…I think I underestimated myself, and my family, who have very quickly sucked me into the vortex of “MOOOOOOOOOM”.
For two and a half years now, we have lived in this house –
this is the house that we moved into when I got a “real” job – our “dream house” that had enough bedrooms for everyone – the house with a dishwasher, a dining room, storage for our stuff, and a big lovely yard. I have gone to work every day, and I’ve put the things that need done on lists – to do after work, on the weekends, and eventually.
Eventually seems to have caught up with me. Here I am, at “eventually” – looking at the ripped out screens, the light fixtures the kids have managed to break, the spots on the carpets, the bent hinges on the cabinets, the blackberries that have taken over the back of our yard, the shed that needs to be organized. I have not enumerated all things on my list, but these are the ones that stand out, because these are the ones I walk by, all day long, between getting my kids off to school, doing my morning job hunt, deciding what I’m making for dinner, before I teach the preschooler today’s letters and review the letters we’ve learned in the last two weeks. I am endlessly making lists – groceries to buy, cleaning products to refill, people to see that I haven’t had time in the last three years to see.
In short? I’m still working. And realizing that in most ways, I was working two jobs before (at least) – by day, a social worker, and by night, the head of my household. I was doing one job all the way – and the other…well, I was doing that MOST of the way…my house was clean enough, the laundry was done – I’d enlisted the kids to help out, and for the most part, our team took care of the details.
This is where I start to struggle with all of my feminist ideals, though – having it “all” – being a partner, a mother, a woman with a career, a friend, a daughter, a mindful member of my community…how did I think that I would have the time to do all of those things the way that I wanted them to be done – PERFECTLY?? I have been fighting an uphill battle to be all I can be in all of the roles I have taken on…and now here I am, one role down, and I feel like I have been stripped of who I am (and worked so hard to be).
So we get to the manifesting piece.
While I’m working in my garden, planting the food my family will eat this summer and beyond, I am thinking about generativity. I am considering what I want my legacy to be – what I want to DO for my community and the people in it. How will I pay the bills and feel like I am doing something meaningful? Do I have it in me to continue to do social work, after the last BEAST of a boss that I had basically told me that I don’t have what it takes? Do I have the energy to help others solve their problems while also tending to my own somewhat complicated family?
I find myself going down this path and I realize that I am not in this moment…I am not revelling in the dirt, and the sunshine, and the MOMENT…and I let that go. I abandon that self-doubt, and remind myself that I am busy manifesting what I most desire – my purpose, and fulfilling it – and I just let it go.
There are so many things that I can worry about right now – the kids’ grades, their social lives, their seeming lack of commitment to their own success, whether or not they are flossing their teeth…or taller order things, like “holy shit, what are we going to do when the money runs out?” Because eventually, our savings will be depleted. And it will be time to go back to school. And they will have a billion things that we need to purchase, and if I am not working, how will I do that?
But there it is again – INSIDIOUS, isn’t it??? – that doubt. It is ludicrous to think that someone with my skill and ability to find an answer will still not be working in September. And in the meantime, holy crap – it’s summer!!! Long days, my garden growing, time for my friends and family and the million projects that will make me feel like I have actually addressed my lists. I will be able to camp with my children this year when we want to – not once a month, considering how much personal time I’ve accrued. It’s ALL personal time right now!!!
No time for this negativity. Sure, this is difficult. Sure, I’m not SURE of what my next step is going to be…or what it will bring for my family. But whatever it is, right now I am building up the cosmic energy that is going to produce my “next”. So with all of the happiness and contentment I can muster, I greet each day – and seek to make it meaningful. I have been handed the opportunity to re-group, to center…to actually interact with my children, and watch them grow.
And when it is time, the right thing for me will be there. I will be handed back my clipboard, and legal pads, and files, and my crazy calendar…and I will start over. Refreshed.
In the meantime – I am washing everyone’s shoes. Cuz I’m a ninja.
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