Hours in the Day

I often hear people (with older children, or without children) say that there are not enough hours in the day. Their missing hours have been added to my life. As mentioned in my "fun with fish" post, for some of us, time is like an enemy. My days are completely structured around activities designed to WASTE TIME. For example, today is a Wednesday which is a glorious day because it is playgroup day. It is the day we magically leap from breakfast to afternoon rest time without awkward fillers. On this day, I meet up with my time wasting mom friends and sip coffee and chat while we provide collective and shoddy childcare to the masses swarming at our feet.

Playgroup and other cherished outofhouse activities like grocery shopping (with additional adult) provide milestones in my week that bring fleeting awareness that time is indeed moving and that we are inching forward with it, toward some ultimate relief. Yes, you are all thinking "that's death, stupid". Well, yes, I suppose that is the ultimate end, but I have a vague, wavering sense that between now and death lives an elusive period of time during which I will greet my remaining mornings with joy. Surely my children cannot linger in their current state forever. And yet, in the seeming 25 years I have set aside all else to care for her, Claire has progressed from laying helplessly on her back hoping I will notice her diaper needs changing to yelling "MOMMY .... I POOOOOING (in my diaper)" in restaurants. If that bit of progress took 25 parenting years, I will be crying at her wedding in 2609. She is 75 in Parenting Years and I am something like 379 years by that measure. Yet still, I think rather miraculously, I am able to behave like I am 14 (John's favorite accusation; "what?! Are you 14 years old??"). Yes, 14 going on 380.

Back to cherished activities ... the foundation of my day is nap time. My babies spend alarming amounts of time sleeping and yelling at each other in the nursery while penned in cribs (see Nap post). I wonder if I am stunting their intellectual growth by allowing them so much time away from me. No, probably not. When they are not napping, during the cold months, you are likely to find us either a) eating or b) "room hopping". We live in house with all kinds of rooms (see some earlier post, not sure which) and I've learned that changing scenery is as good as a new toy. The entertainment value of the nursery is so threadbare that I count five minutes spent in there playing as a wildly successful five minutes gone.

Then, unfortunately, it's often on to my bedroom where we alternately take baths and fondle and drop electronic items like cameras, remote controls and various charging devices found by "daddy's side of the bed". The TV in this particular room, has magnetic allure because it is sitting on the floor as it waits in a decades long line to find its place on a wall (paintings, framed photos, other misc. all share this fate while John works on his anxiety re "putting holes in the walls"). It is possible to get so close to this special television that one can actually place one's greasy little paws right on the screen until directed to stop.

After that, we head downstairs to the living room where I fear I am losing my battle to keep toys OUT. See previous post re my great pride in ability to limit toys to certain designated areas. Or don't. The living room is now home to a kiddy kitchen, a toy that shoots balls into the air while making vacuum cleaner sounds, and a toy barn. My plans to thin out that crowd are giving way to complacency. The living room also is home to coasters which are hit toys. Who knew?! Yes, stone coasters ... great toys. Also, after one brief training session, my girls both know to use a coaster before setting sippy cups down. Even Ava, at one and a half, knows just what to do with a coaster (other than making stone coaster towers).

The living room is often followed by the "Great Room" where I vainly try to get those two hooked on TV watching. When they were younger, I'd get up on the couch and watch consecutive episodes of "What Not to Wear" while they crawled around on the floor. These days, the three of us cozy up on a couch and watch two minutes of Baby Einstein before leaving for the kitchen. Why is it that MY children are not the ones getting fat from sitting in front of the TV all day long?

Desperately long days call for visits to places like the game cupboard (this is always a mistake ... when playing Clue at my house, you can either kill someone with a candlestick or the game board itself as other dangerous objects have disappeared). Another choice time wasting locale for desperate days is C&A's bedroom which is full of older kid toys with little parts. If you are craving a marble or a jack, go there! Our little theater will hold endless opportunities for wasting away time and minds in another 150 years. So far, they have only shown interest in the rope lights on the floor.

Reporting from my planet,
lisa