Husband's away, the mice will play...or clean...

Ted left yesterday for his golf trip. He's not far, but he'll be gone until Sunday morning. It's funny, because, my house is cleaner when Ted is gone. It's not because he's a messy person. I think he is neater than me...it's because I clean like a maniac when he is gone. Why do I do this?It doesn't happen when he is gone for one night...it happens any time he's gone for a longer period..which doesn't happen often. I think I've figured it out why. I can feel overwhelmed with all the responsibilities when Ted is gone, so if I control the one thing I can (the house), I automatically feel that much better. So everything I pass, get's picked up, put away, folded, thrown away, etc. And I feel a little more in control.

Back to Work! and Curse to the Big Hangers!

My blogging days are fewer and farther between now. It's easier for me to update my "Twitter". Plus, I'm having computer problems that makes it hard to type. Windows Vista DOES NOT agree with me...or my computer. In about two weeks, Ted will blow it away and go back to Windows XP. Until then, my laptop occasionally acts possessed and starts backspacing at lightening speed.

Much has changed since the last time I wrote. I have a part time job! Because I am a lazy person, I copied an e-mail I sent to my Women's Group after getting the job. But before you read it, I have to say that I've been volunteering once a week at a Crisis Intervention Agency started by our parish about 25 years ago, called the Care Service. I wanted to get my foot in the door, so that, down the road, I might be able to get a paying job there:

"You know how I’ve been complaining about money lately? I guess God was preparing me. Sometimes I look back and wonder how many things he allowed to happen to me to just get me in the right frame of mind. Anyway, the concerns of paying for private high school in the future and how poor of a job we have done at saving, made me really consider working part time when Mary went to school full time (in 2 years). But just recently, I was entertaining the idea of being able to do something NOW. How great it would be to get a head start on saving that money. Funny how God works…the Administrative Director left her position just last Friday. My friend Jackie, who works at the Care Service told me she immediately thought of me and felt I should consider it, especially since they were talking about doing a job share. Wow! I told her I was interested, she wrote a nice e-mail to the Care Service Executive Director (Miriam), recommending me for the job. Miriam calls me 30 minutes after receiving the e-mail and asks me if I could send in my resume as soon as possible. I wrote one THAT NIGHT (Monday) and sent it to her. We played phone tag until she caught me yesterday at Abby’s volleyball practice. Sam was home watching the kids so it was perfect when she said, “When can we meet?”. I walked over there (our Care Service is on the school campus) and we met for an hour and a half! She told me that they had the 24 hour person and needed 16 more hours, that I could do much of it from home and the pay was more than I hoped for. At the end of her long explanation of the job, I asked if they were looking at anyone else and she said No. I accepted the job! I can’t believe all of this happened in less than a week. It doesn't usually work that way. I remember when I said I wanted to volunteer for the Care Service in hopes to have a paying job some day…and one month later I have that paying job. It’s definitely God.

Thank you for your prayers. This is a big change for me and my family, but I think one that fits us well."

Have you ever done something really quickly and then woken up the morning saying, "What did I DO?" Well, that never happened. I feel such a peace about this job and the sudden change in my life. I KNOW it was what I was supposed to do and not many things happen that clearly in my life. I'm often wondering if I'm doing the right thing or saying yes to too many things. It doesn't mean that this change has all happened with no difficulty at all. I'm adjusting to the needs of a job and the needs of home and trying to do them all well. 16 hours doesn't sound like much, but it's enough to take some time adjusting.

Since the job happened about the same time the kids went back to school, it hasn't felt too bad because my load at home has gotten lighter during the day anyway. It's just Mary at home with me now. This is how I worked out the care of Mary. Mary was already enrolled in a Mom's Day Out program 2 days a week. The days were Monday and Friday. My work days are Wed, Thur and Fri. My sister Becky watches kids in her home Monday-Wednesday. So this is what I did: I switched Mary's "Mom's Day Out" days to Thur and Fri, and Becky now watches Mary on Wednesdays! It's perfect! If I have a meeting to attend on Mon or Tuesday, I just switch out my Wednesday with the other day. The only problem is that my sister lives 30 minutes away in the opposite direction, but I'll do anything for free babysitting...and it's only one day a week. And I watch her daughter for a year and a half...so I don't feel guilty. I work with my fellow carpool lady, Jackie, the one that got me the job...so if either of us has a conflict we can easily communicate and have the other one drive home.

I love my job. I love being in a place that you feel like you are doing something meaningful and contributing to a worthy cause. I love the idea of being in an environment where you get to know a variety of people and you work together to make things better. A workplace really helps in the friendship category. I missed the social aspect and found my social life lacking during the day. However, for a long time I didn't mind because I felt I had enough to do at home raising my children. But recently, when I was working one day a week at the Care Service, I was longing to be a bigger part of it all...And now I am. Of course...not really...I don't know anything and I'm learning a lot as I go. I feel more like an encumbrance than an asset. But I'm soaking it all up like a sponge and it has reminded me how much I love to learn. It will take me a while to be an actual contributor...but that is my goal.

Moving on to other topics...10 years ago today I gave birth to my baby girl...Abby. We celebrated this weekend, so there wasn't much time to pause and let it soak in. But today I sit and think about my girl. I think about her energetic, positive nature, her ability to get to the point (sometimes too quickly), her smart mind that constantly amazes me, her strength at coordinating people and getting them all to do what she wants (some call that bossy...I like to think that she will be a good manager some day...or teacher), the glaze over her eyes when she "checks out" in front of the TV, the way she learned my digital scrapbook software in a matter of minutes, her skinny, tan body, her green eyes and blond hair, her awkward body that does amazing things on the soccer field. My baby. My girl. My tween...WHAT??

Today, when doing the wash, I took one of her shirts and thought, "Do I need a big hanger on this?" And that scared me. Big hangers scare me. I like little hangers. It means the clothes hung on them are small...that my child is still small. Big hangers mean they are growing and getting as big as me. Big hangers mean time is passing and gone are the days when their little clothes would get lost in the big clothes and barely add anything to a load of laundry. But grow they must...and everything that comes with it, must come. I see images flying across my mind: me fighting with my mom, crying in my pillow, mom smelling the smoke on my fingers as I awaited her response with dread, feeling misunderstood, lost in the middle. Does it have to be like that? Can I help her through these confusing years? Will she fly through much more easily than I did? When will she want a cell phone? When will she want a Facebook page? When will she meet her first boyfriend? For now...I don't want to worry about that. I'll just move those clothes over to bigger hangers and take one thing at a time.