Make the Time

Proud parents of 6th graders, watching their child select a shiny new instrument for the first time. You’re smiling big, glowing even. And learning an instrument in such a wonderful skill! I’m not knocking that. But if I knew then what I know now…band and the band calendar will rule your life for the rest of your kid’s school days until college. Not only have we gotten right back to where we were with busyness before Covid, we’ve surpassed it. Adding more and more to the calendar, weekends gone, family time almost nil. And if you have other children, which I do, God help them if they have something they want to pursue. You’re stretched thin and it starts to wear on you. “Sorry. We have football this weekend. Nope. We can’t come, band competition.” What are we teaching our little musicians? When I see the parents of younger children coming into band, I want to tell them, “Run. Don’t do this. Your life is over as you know it.” But you hold on, keep your mouth shut, hoping for a full ride to college for your protégé.

This is NOT what I wanted to write about this month. Well, it is and it isn’t. I like the quiet. I like things to be neat and tidy. Life and schedules are rarely so. I try to keep it all together, making a master calendar at the start of each month, usually getting a headache in the process. Everyone has their own color. My color and the family time color are the least used in the pack. I’ve been so frazzled lately that I’ve dropped the ball twice in the last month as far as remembering who needs to be where and when. I also forgot my debit pin number getting groceries last week and that hasn’t happened in 16 years since the week before I had my twins and was suffering from pregnancy brain. Now I guess it's menopause brain. That’s the horror of my reality. Menopause, I was not prepared. An inconvenient truth, another fly in the ointment.

I like structure. I have a difficult time writing if things are in disarray or I have other stuff to do. I’ve tried to start writing for 2-3 hours a day and it feels incredibly selfish. Nothing is ever going to be perfect. I’m adjusting, having growing pains. I think back to my original idea for this post and it has nothing to do with horror. On an episode of Friends, Ross is dating a girl who is extremely messy, I mean, her place is totally gross. And Joey says to him, “You like this girl? You’re gonna have to do it in the mess.”

I’ve been thinking about that line a lot. I’m getting better at shifting. Sometimes my block of writing time comes in the morning (I like this best.) Sometimes it comes after lunch. And it even comes at night. That’s when I feel really guilty for shutting myself off from everyone. There is never going to be the perfect circumstance though unless you live alone. And then I think, I’d really be missing out.

I’ve been leafing through Daily Rituals, How Artists Work by Mason Curry. It is a compilation of varied processes practiced by artists, writers, scientists, filmmakers describing how they create. There are those with 9-5 jobs, those raising children, those in love with the drink, and those with staff. There are colorful anecdotes on what some of them get up to in the evening and how a lot of them avoid work. There are as many ways to schedule or not schedule yourself as there are people in the world. We all operate differently.

Calendars fill up. Life is imperfect. There’s a reason pencils have erasers on one end. If I don’t make time to write, I won’t get to write. Things will slow down soon enough and my house will be too quiet. Still, I think the speed at which we all run is insane. For a real picture of American crazy, check out the new Thanksgiving movie. The Black Friday scene? That's some real life scary mess right there! It's over the top, but is it? There has to be a way to want less, do less. If you figure it out, please fill me in. For now, I’ll just be over here doing it in the mess.

Book recommendation

Daily Rituals by Mason Currey

My guilty pleasure

Ok. I have this habit of smelling candles everywhere I go. I like to coordinate the smells in my house to correspond with the season. This is my time of year for cinnamon, vanilla, apples, and pumpkin. This bit me in the ass over Thanksgiving. We were staying at an apartment out of town, and they had this cute little red apple on the windowsill. I picked it up thinking it was an air freshener and proceeded to dump insect carcasses and some sort of apple cider concoction all over my chin and my sweater. Then, cut to me running a load of laundry at 10pm. A mess of my own making.

Batty forever,

Greta