Playing Catch up

Ever since school started this year, I have been about four days behind on everything. The laundry. The e-mails. The library books that are now overdue. The forms I was supposed to have signed and turned in at school. The phone calls I was supposed to make. The prescription that ran out. The meeting I was supposed to be at on Tuesday that I remembered on Friday. The cleaning. Oh, the cleaning. I don't know what it is with me, but I just seem to be having trouble shifting from 'three months of summer with nothing to do' into 'being at five different places in one day'.

Today started out as one of those hurry-to-catch-up days, and I rushed the kids to get dressed, hurried them in and out of the car to run errands, barked at them to get away from the laundry so I could fold it, and otherwise ignored them so I could get some work done.

I didn't notice that today was a perfectly autumn, sunny, 73-degree day. My husband did. His boss gave him the afternoon off and he called with a magnificent pronouncement: "I'm off work, it's a beautiful day, and I'm taking the kids to play putt-putt."

It took a moment for my mind to process the implications...it was two o'clock...I need to pick up Grace at 3:30...could it mean....was it possible....

An hour and a half of UN-OBLIGATED TIME! (cue the choir singing: 'Gloria! Gloria!')

Unobligated Time! My dear long-lost friend! How I have missed you. You have been gone for so long! And now you have returned, if but for a fleeting hour and a half, and I thank you.

What should one do with such an unexpected gift? The possibilities, the freedom, the pure joy of being alone for an hour and a half with no obligations was scrumptious. Now don't get me wrong, I do get some time away from my kids, but it's usually for a meeting or a doctor appointment, so this was an exciting thing for me.

I'd like to say I had some 'me' time, got a manicure, read a book, played tennis, whatever, but I didn't. I cleaned my house. Not very glamorous, I know. But you hadn't seen my house. It had been nagging at me for two weeks, and I just hate that feeling of being nagged by a house. So I actually cleaned the entire living room, kitchen, and dining room, and folded about three loads of laundry. It's amazing how much faster work gets done when it is uninterrupted by little ones. There was no one coming behind me taking out the toys I'd just put away or walking on the wet kitchen floor. I didn't have to stop to break up a fight or give a timeout or fix a snack.

So the obligations that were gone for that brief time inevitably came back to stay. I'm feeling better about them, though, more caught up. I ended up having such a productive day, now I'm maybe only two days behind on everything I need to do. Who knew an hour and a half could be such a gift?