Easter morning at Grandma and Grandpa’s
I have many jobs, and am the wearer of many hats. Mama, Wife, CEO of this House, Teacher, Hike leader, bedtime enforcer, quilter, reader, mealmaker, runner, it goes on. I am responsible for many things, feeding my family, clothing my family, making sure everyone has shoes that fit, making sure everyone gets up in time for their day. Making sure everyone is wearing underpants. Making sure schoolwork gets done, and my son can write his alphabet and read before he starts kindergarten next year. I have an online job that I’m have to make sure I get done on top of my other jobs. And somewhere in there I have to find some time for me, to run, to quilt, to make me the centered woman and mama I want to be.
Working on line always sounds like you have a lot of free time, just like folks assume SAHM sit about with their feet up eating chocolate straight from the box…”I would love to have that kind of time!” uh yeah. I love being a WAHM not because of the free time or available chocolate (why am I up at 5am every morning and not going to bed till 10pm if I have all this free time?) but the flexibility. My job allows me to work around fevers, and doctors appointments and trips to the playground, or the bike park because Look! the Sun! My ‘real’ job allows me to put my family first every time.
It allows me to stay in the moment and be with my children in these few years I have with them, before they are no longer my wee ones. It allows me to stop in the middle of the day and read stories, and make mud pies (oh the mud pies) it allows me to make bread, real and not quite real. I can spend hours (oh the hours) constructing Willy Wonka’s costume, from a thrifted purple jacket to a repurposed top hat.
I wasn’t always here, it took awhile for me to stop rankling when people called me ‘lucky’ for staying home with my kids, as if I had won the lottery instead of making a conscious choice and then doing without a lot of things that I wanted (I hear this is the opposite of winning the lottery) but in time I let it go, because that was their stuff not mine.
And it took me a much shorter time to be at peace with “you work at home? I wish I had that kind of free time, you are so lucky”. Now I smile and nod.
I am lucky. I work just as hard as the next person, but I live on my terms, in the life that I have created with my husband in which we raise our children the way we want. And I am very very lucky to have my health, and my husband and my home sprinkled as it it is from day to day with love and laughter and little boys. And yes, chocolate.
1 Comment
Yes!!! I so agree with your thoughts-the questions and remarks from others I can sooo relate too. Like you said -a choice my husband and I made for our family, which has often included doing without some extras because we only have one stable source of income. It’s so worth it though-so worth it.