At the end of the day, I just want some quiet

Can you hear it? That sound? The "Mommy Mommy Mommy" three kids talking at once ask for something the second I sit down whine whine whine throw self down on floor because Mommy won't let me do ANYTHING I want (ok that last one's mostly the 3 year old).

Yeah, I don't hear it either. Because everyone just went to bed. The house is nice and quiet.

Now, here is my revelation for the day: when that quiet time hits, I need to sit down and soak it in.

I have been feeling guilty that I don't jump into some project immediately after the kids' heads hit their pillows. I feel like I should tidy. Clean something. Look for Things to toss. My house is always a disaster, surely I should be using this time for something productive.

But I just... can't. I want to sit here and listen to nobody ask me for anything.

The thing is, I don't get a lot of time to myself, and as an introvert, I need some quiet time. NEED IT. I have three NOT QUIET children (even if my middle one is an introvert, she is a whiny one!). I homeschool. I am ALWAYS around people.

Not having quiet time gets on my nerves. Makes me edgy and more quick to be annoyed.

So from now on, I refuse to feel guilty that I flop on the couch once the kids go to bed. I will savour the hour of peace.

And only THEN, once I have recharged, will I get up and do something productive.

The Introvert at the Amusement Park

We are headed for the little kid amusement park today. As much as I tried to get out of going, my littlest one is still too little for everyone to be able to get on the rides with proper supervision. So I have to go.

Shudder.

Children everywhere. Rides. Noises. LINE UPS. Crappy food.

Shudder.

I'm bringing a book.

Having people over, even if your house isn't perfect

A friend came over for a visit yesterday. She invited herself over to see my recent home renovations. Now, I say "invited herself over," which usually has negative connotations but seriously, if you want to come to my house, waiting for me to ask you is going to take a long time.

Because just the THOUGHT of asking people to come to my house causes me ginormous gurgles of anxiety in my stomach. So I don't tend to invite people over.

The gurgles are partly anxiety in general and partly because, well, I usually feel my house is a disaster. It is definitely not ever going to win "neatest house on the block." Not by a long shot. The pressure to clean up is completely anxiety-inducing.

And since my favourite solution to anxiety is avoidance, I just... don't invite people over.

Now, because I have decided to embrace the state of the house and not make excuses for it (we'll just call it a work in progress) I decided not to tell her that the contents of my (former) office* are currently hanging out three feet away from my front door.

That was a bit of a surprise. Yay! Surprise! Thankfully she didn't run screaming from the house. I gave her a nice tour of our new kitchen and the finished basement. And showed her how empty the (former) office* is.

My point? I emptied out two boxes from the shelves last night. Got rid of 38 things and put a few more in the donate box (they don't count until they actually LEAVE the house).

* bedroom status pending

OK OK, I'm counting Things again

Yesterday I complained that I missed tallying how many things I get rid of. Last night I figured, what the heck, if I'm grumbling about not counting something when I throw it out/recycle it/donate it/pass it on, I might as well start counting again. Turn that grumble into a tick mark.

Back to living on the edge!

Three things on the list so far, and I have a pile of stuff to take to our Children's Museum - donations for their craft area. I wonder how many things will be on the list at the end of the year?

I'm not counting "things" this year... and it's kind of bugging me

I made the decision at the end of last year not to keep count of the things I removed from the house in 2016. We were gearing up to have our kitchen gutted and I knew the house was going to be chaos and I didn't want the pressure of a List. Then I ended up extremely sick with congestive heart failure and I REALLY knew that monitoring how many things I got rid of would need to be low on the priority list.

So, I haven't been keeping track. Don't get me wrong, it's not that I haven't been getting rid of stuff, but I haven't been tracking. When I was sicker and the house was a construction zone, I was fine with that.

But now construction is done and I'm feeling better and... not having the list is starting to bug me. I tossed a few things the other day and sure, it was good to have the space back but the TRUE thought running through my head was THAT COULD HAVE BEEN A TICK MARK ON MY LIST.

Strange much? (Yeah, I know, don't even go there.)

The other factor is that I'm prepping to paint the bedrooms. I've emptied the office (our third bedroom) because it is slated to become Kid#1's bedroom. That room has held junk for eleven years! It has always been a dumping ground for stuff. And it held two bookcases full of, you know, books. I've also taken the storage shelves out of each bedroom (and the office). Those shelves were temporarily in each bedroom to hold renovation stuff from the rest of the house.

Now all of that stuff is in our previously quite empty and lovely living room. Three sets of storage shelves and, oh, 12 piles of books. Plus the paper shredder and space heater. It all stares at me. It looms. I'm kind of wondering where all that junk from the office is supposed to go? OK, books are one thing. I have a plan for the books (get rid of some and the rest will go in the living room shelves). The rest? Where is it going to go???

OK, I could dump it all in the basement, but I really don't want to. I'm tempted to throw most of it out.

But if I throw it out and don't count it... that's going to bug me.

Do I start keeping track now - at the end of August? What would my goal be? Should I just see what the total is at the end of the year?

I Read It: Open Heart, Open Mind by Clara Hughes

Open Heart, Open Mind, is Clara Hughes' memoir. I was interested in reading this because she has been very open about her depression and, well, I wanted to know what she had to say.

I had a really hard time wrapping my head around the idea that she was so fucking miserable when she won her two bronze medals in Atlanta. I admire the shit out of that! She trained and trained, she made the podium TWICE, and yet... she was not in the least a happy, fulfilled person. Which just goes to show - you never know what is going on in someone's life.

I think one very important point to take from Hughes' story is that if such a strong woman didn’t realize she was depressed, no wonder depression is under-noticed. Hughes didn’t FEEL strong. She felt worthless. But she was a great cyclist! Who had OLYMPIC MEDALS. Of COURSE she was strong. But in her head, she did not feel strong. Point being, depression fucks with your mind.

I really want to thank Clara Hughes for her honesty regarding her depression, because only by talking more about this disease will it become easier to seek help. Remember: being depressed does not make you weak.

I'm not the only disorganized person on the planet!

It's difficult to feel alone. Even as a pretty introverted person, I still value closeness with people. It is always comforting to find people with whom you have something in common.

So here's the thing. I am not a naturally neat person. I procrastinate, telling myself I'll do it later (ummm, title of my blog???). I will put something somewhere "temporarily." Guess how long temporary is around me? Could be days, could be years. You never know.

Organization comes naturally to some people. One of my friend's husbands is a total neat freak, so even if she doesn't clean, HE does, and so their house remains presentable. I know others who are super SUPER organized, labels everywhere.

This is not me. Organization doesn't come easily to me. And I know, I know, there are lots of people out there who say they "aren't organized" and they feel like they are just barely keeping their heads afloat. Yeah, I know, it's all a matter of degree. But they are most likely more organized than I am.

Anyway, my point is that I FOUND SOMEONE ELSE IN INTERNETLAND WHO ADMITS THAT THEY ARE DISORGANIZED. The blog is A Slob Comes Clean. I am not the only disorganized housewife out there (rant about how I hate the term housewife in another post. Also homemaker. Blech. FYI, I like to call myself Retired, if I'm going to go with a label).

I am trying really hard not to just read the whole blog and procrastinate further on battling my house into submission. It is just so comforting to know that not everyone else is living the organized life.

OK, off I go!