Building Busy

So the last time I wrote, a long-long time ago, I talked about how not busy I was.

Then the summer came, and my kids came home. And then I still wasn't so much busy, but I was occupied. There were camps, sure, but those few hours each day seemed to be just enough to get some grocery shopping done and the little bit of work I have in the pipeline. So the summer went past and I wasn't forced to face my un-busyness problem.

But then the kids went back to school. And the days stretched out. And a girl can only do so much yoga. And so much laundry.

Apparently there aren't limits on how much you can stalk around on Facebook and Twitter. But there probably should be.

So I started to volunteer for things. I signed up to help in the school library for 1/2 day each week. They are hugely impressed with my grasp of the alphabet.

I signed up to help at a local charity that I love and adore. I am helping them with web site updates. I have been praised for my competence.

Volunteering is good for the ego, if not the pocketbook. So much appreciation. A little structure in the schedule. Somewhere to be at a set time to make some kind of contribution.

I'm not busy yet. But I am not floundering around in nothing-to-do land either. And I still, 2 years later, have yet to sit on the couch and watch soaps. So that's something.

What now?

I am not busy.

Everyone in the world (well, the people I know anyway) seems to be enormously busy. But I am not.

I can fill a day with things to do. I go to yoga. I run errands. I haul my kids from place to place. I cook dinner. I clean (some). I even work a bit here and there.

I do stuff. I just don't do nearly as much stuff as I used to do.

I am never afraid I can't get it all done. Unless, of course, I have to be in two places at once. Still haven't figured that one out. But besides that, my to-dos are all to-do-able.

I am reasonably balanced. I am not under very much stress. I have very few deadlines. Very few demands on my time during the day.

When the teacher calls me and says "I know you must be very busy..." I don't know what to say. Do I go along with the ruse that I am, in fact, busy? Or do I offer up the truth...that I have nothing planned for the day. I am utterly available. Not at all busy.

I fear that that confession could lead to commitments and busyness. Or at least raised eyebrows - not busy?? Incomprehensible! Everyone is busy!

When I run into people and they say "What have you been up to?" and the standard answer, the one everyone gives is, "You know, keeping busy." That doesn't work for me.

Of course, now I am getting used to the unbusy pace. So now busy is starting to sound scary. Which is, in and of itself, frightening. Soon I will be the kind of person who has to block out an entire day for a dentist appointment. Grocery shopping will turn into a destination event.

And then maybe I will start to feel busy. Even though - still not.

Yard Work

One of the side-effects of my current state of SAHM-ness is that I feel guilty about outsourcing things that I used to be completely comfortable with pawning off on others. For example, yardwork.

Oh, we still have someone come and mow. I don't feel THAT guilty. But the rest of it, the fertilizing, seeding, mulching, weeding (getting lightheaded just thinking about it) - it seems like I should be able to put down the bon-bons and go outside and do that stuff.

Or, you know, walk away from the computer briefly. Facebook can probably survive a few hours without me.

So - yesterday I went out to work on the fertilizing. Put the stuff in the spreader thing and push it around. How hard can that be, right?

Hard.

Sweaty, exhausting, legs cramping up hard.

I got myself all rigged up with my iPod and jacket (it was windy) and hauled the 50 pound (!) bag of lawn feeding stuff out into the driveway. After hacking the bag open with some inappropriate implement and nearly slicing the earphone cord (which would have been TRAGIC!) I finally got the spreader loaded up. And I pushed the thing back along the side of the house and back to the curb.

Sweating.

Take the jacket off. Reconfigure the iPod arrangement.

Push down the hill and back up. Legs cramping, sweat pouring.

Down the hill, up the hill. Down the hill, up the hill. Down. Up. (Repeat about 30 times).

Whew...the side yard was done. Time for a drink and rest - my legs were shaking.

And it had been 35 minutes.

Crap. Lots more time to work. Drink a Diet Coke. Catch my breath.

Then I did the back yard - which thank goodness is flatter than the side. Then the front.

Hmmm...the spreader is still more than half full. Am I doing this wrong?

So I shook it and broke up the clumps with a shovel - and did it all over again. And again. And again. Until the thing was finally empty.

And then I had to go drink 2 Diet Cokes. And sit down. And wait for the sweating to stop.

Then I went back out and pulled out all of the evil dandelions. And shoveled some Holly Tone around the bushes.

And - I bet you are thinking I had some great realization that I love manual labor, right?

Nope. I realized that I still have to get grass seed - and figure out how to kill Japanese Beetles - and mulch.

And I am thinking that maybe outsourcing wouldn't make me feel ALL that guilty after all. And maybe Facebook requires more of my attention than I previously thought.

Starting Now

I never really thought I'd be a SAHM (that's a stay-at-home-Mom for those unfamiliar with the lingo).

Not that I was all that committed to my career - I wasn't.

Not that I was worried about taking a step backward for feminism - I wasn't.

Not that I have a designer closet to support - I don't.

But I do like living in a nice neighborhood, in a house, with food. And it seemed like the only way to make all of that happen was to go to work.

My husband, Mike, has a great job and works hard. And I suppose if we scrimped and saved and actually used the coupons I sometimes cut out of the paper, we could have squeezed by on his salary. But I am not a huge fan of the squeezing.

And also, the idea of being home one-on-one with a screaming hunk of baby all day every day never held all that much appeal.

My kids were daycare kids - my daughter, Sprout, now 9 and in 4th grade, started in daycare at 5 months and loved it. She is a social creature and being around other kids is what she needs. My son, Tater, is now 6 and in 1st grade. He was in daycare starting at 3 months and also had a great time at "school" every day.

It was good for us to have time apart and then come back together and catch up on our days. I was a better mom because I had other things to do so that I didn't spend all day obsessing about whether I was doing it right. I was just too busy.

After Tater was born, I cut back my work schedule to 4 days a week - but spread out across 5. So instead of 9-5 I worked 9:30-3:30 each day. This sounds good in theory, but the reality was that the powers that be at SuperCorp didn't really work their schedules around me and I frequently had to juggle things around to get kids picked up and be where I needed to be.

When Tater was about 1, I moved into an official job-share position. Now I worked 3 days a week, spread across 4. Thursdays off. Short days the other days. And then I was able to work it so that I worked from home 2 of those days. Sounds complicated, but it was really good. I kept the kids home with me on Thursdays and was able to get things done. All seemed nicely balanced.

Then SuperCorp seemed to run out of things to do with me. And I spent many hours staring at a computer hoping someone would ask me to do something. Anything. And I got bored. Really bored.

I had been working on this side project, developing a line of skin care products. It was fun, but I didn't think of it as a job. But it was taking more time and seeming to have some potential. So, when SuperCorp announced that they were downsizing, I offered myself up on the altar of severance and cut my ties with the corporate world. And phew - THAT felt good!!

That was in November of 2007. Since then I spent about a year working on the skin care line. Got it launched. Spent a ton of money. And then decided that it was in everyone's best interest to sell it and move on.

In February 2009 the sale was complete and I was officially unemployed. I guess I have been unemployed since 2007, but it really started to feel like it once there was no illusion of "work" to hide behind.

So now I am a SAHM. Or a not-sure-how-I-got-here-unemployed Mom. I am trying to figure out whether there is a good work option for me. Seeking freelance work if I can find it. And hanging around trying to make myself useful in between.

I can't remember how I got all of the STUFF around here done when I had a "real" job and the idea of trying to jam one back into my life is daunting. My kids are at school all day, my dog wishes I would spend more time with him, and I have a to-do list a mile long. Every day.

All I know for sure is that I can't watch daytime TV, I don't put my feet up much, and there are no bon-bons.