Having a day

Do you ever wake up one day, after having not slept much, (because your 3 year old was up half the night, and thrashing around in your bed for the rest of it), and then you see the dishes, piles of laundry (clean & dirty), and mess of toys you didn't have the time or energy to finish the night before? Not to mention 2 sick kids with runny noses, sneezing their heads off and coughing. What does it make you want to do? Some might say they'd want to lock the doors, turn the lights off, and crawl back into bed, but I'm not even asking that much. On those days I just wish for a nice, quiet desk job, where some one paid me to accomplish everything I did. This is why.

At least if I had a desk job I could have an excuse to get up and get dressed (for one thing), and leave the mess, because you don't have the time to worry about it, and then go to work and get paid to do what's expected. On the other hand, when you're the mom it is your job to stay up all night with the kids, wipe runny noses, and try to entertain, all while cleaning the house and doing the laundry so it doesn't pile up. Surely with a full 24 hours in a day we should have enough time to get all of that done. We women are built to multi-task.

When I worked at my nice quiet desk job I had a little radio on my desk playing music to tune out any chaos I didn't want to hear, while I, still multi-tasking, worked on my responsibilities. Then when my 8-9 hours was up, I simply piled up all that I didn't get done and tucked in neatly away for tomorrow. (How I wish I could scoop all of the unfinished work from my days now into a neat little pile each night, but that's hard to do with a sink full of dishes and 4 loads of laundry.) I'd love to have that radio now, and the 8-9 hour schedule that I used to have instead of the 24 hour, whether you like it or not, type of thing I've got going now.

It's days like these I decide that instead of forcing myself to jump into the mountains of mess right away, I take the morning to pay myself some overtime. I snuggle my sick kids, or play "cooking" with them, or watch Sesame Street and Curious George with them. This is my way of "spending my earnings". I used to go out and buy myself a new outfit, or a new cd when I'd had a hard day. Now, I spend some mom/kid time with my boys and I remember that, even though it's the hardest job I ever have done, or will do, the rewards are far greater.

No matter what kind of day you're having, whether it's in an office, or in the home, and no matter what kind of shape your house is in, pay yourself the best kind of salary. Pay yourself with family time.