balancing roles and goals. beyond a mere variable...

i have had wads of crumpled up pieces of paper around me all day today as i calculate and weigh and try to balance the life that lays ahead of me and my family...but i think there are too many variables for me to capture it. it isn't like doing the books, where things are calculable and usually balance out in the end, or they just don't balance out and thus we need more money. this has to do with time...with love...with values...with priority...with the gifts and curses that have been bestowed on my life. things things are hard to weigh balance and calculate. they are immeasurable. they are beyond a mere variable.

i have been offered a job. one that is from a source other than my husband, who has been my employer, desite the difficulty of he and i working together, for almost two straight years. best of all it is a creative job for someone i admire. the creation and design of a book. a creative cookbook which incorporates the poetry and art of the person's family mingled with the recipes that have been passed down through generations...a family history through the exploration of the family's creations.

and i can work from home. i have everything i need to do it. everything, that is, except a clear slot of time daily...

i am planning to home school my children...the two older ones. it will take up about 4 hours of my day. and then some extra curricular stuff. i am trying to scrounge 5 hours a day to work...but it isn't easy as a mom and wife...sharing a world with a dad/husband that works 80+ hours a week running and nurturing a construction company. i do all the house stuff pretty much alone as it is. right now i work about 3-4 hours a day for him doing the accounting. but i loathe it. i am constantly thinking of what there is to eat when i do that work...when i am creating and making art or writing i forget that i need food. it is who i am. it is what i should be doing...and we have already planned to fill my job with a new person...when we find someone.

but there is something within me that tells me i should be a mom and that that should be enough. our school system here on the craggy coast of maine where i live is great as far as public school goes. but the budget isn't allowing for special programs...things for kids who need extra help are getting cut and things for kids needing more challenges are also getting cut. i have one of each type of kid. there are 21-24 kids per teacher without aids...and well, i know i can do a better job than the teachers can with that many students. neither of my kids felt successful this year and they are both good kids, with talents and brains and wits. the teachers are so overwhelmed, in my opinion, that they cannot individualize the education. and i suppose they aren't supposed to.

i want to teach my kids. and i want five hours to do some work to make some $$ of my own and gain some new experience. i am thinking i will have to take a break from creating my own art to do this book, which has been estimated at taking about a year to complete...i won't take the metal class i had planned on squeezing in even in order to focus more clearing on it.

i am just trying to find the time to work amongst all of the things i will need to do as a homeschooling parent/wife/homemaker. a homeschooling parent that can't rely on the other parent to take over...is there a way to balance schooling my kids, and fulfilling my needs as a creative person, as well as making some money of my own? i mean, i make art now, but i literally need to steal the time to make art. this will be someone else's art, but it will be an actual income. one that i can count on and calculate. art sales are few and far between...i could feasibly pay off a lot of my student debt and art material debt that i've collected over the years. if i focus. it would relieve so much stress on me.

but will there be a yummy home cooked meal on the table like there is now? will i get the stupid laundry and dishes done? will i focus on my kids enough? when will i find the time to do everything i need to do? i can't chart it on paper. i don't know what the f'n'a to do.

sigh.

a few thought on thighs.

yes, thighs.

i admit it. i have cellulite. i kickbox like mohammad ali (in my own mind) and i do yoga and can fit back into my pre-pregnancy clothes, but i have an asston of cellulite and funky veins on the backs of my legs. they are not pretty. well, at least what mainstream media and the society affected by it would consider pretty.

one of my kids teachers is having a pool party to end the school year this week. i just was part of an email with a few of the moms from the class...moms who i admire and think of as being healthily involved in their children's lives. but, they were talking about not swimming at the party because of what they look like in bathing suits! my jaw hit the floor. i just have to write on this because it is way too early in the morning to be brewing up such feminist irk inside without an outlet for it.

our children will never remember the cellulite or the veins on our legs when they are grown up. they will not be disturbed by it. what they will remember is us hopping in the pool unabashed to play marco polo, or to be in the shallow end starting a game with the Not-So Good swimmers who may be feeling intimidated by the kids that swan dive. or they'll remember us hopping in to give a little pointer or two to teach them to swim better. that's a good memory...one that is a shame to throw away just to bolster a meaningless insecurity in ourselves.

if we get out there, feeling like we have the right to be, no matter what we may look like in a bathing suit, our children will be way less likely to question their own looks when they go to put on a swimsuit. way more likely to feel entitled to live happily and love their bodies. hell, when they're older with their own children, they'll be more likely to be an active participant in their children's lives rather than sitting on the sidelines because they have a chubby belly or orange peel textured thighs.

isn't this how our daughters have developed these hyper-exaggerated needs to look like super models all the bloody time? isn't it part of why they are not happy with their bodies? because we model that for them with our own insecurities? isn't it time we decided to throw all that beauty-biz hogwash away and realize that we have as much right to live life to the fullest no matter what we look like??? isn't it time we learn that life is too short to not love ourselves?

enough ranting. love yourself. and those around you will learn from it.

peace.

oh, issues.

sometimes it is so hard to to see straight when there is a problem with my kids...they make a bad choice or two and otherwise steady adults are swaying back and forth trying to determine what to say and how to aproach the situation.

this is when i used to find myself opening up about situations really helps find a good solution. in my own life that is. it is why when i was younger people found it hard to gossip about me...i was always doing it about myself. :) but do i really want to put my children's issues out in the world for all to see? not so sure about that one. i guess that's what close knit networks of unconditional friendship is for.

peace.

i've been finding it hard to come up with something to write about...a problem i don't encounter too often. i think it is because my husband and i had a conversation about blogs...the internet and how odd it is truly is to put words out into the universe not knowing where they are going, who they are going to hit and how they may come back at you.

well, since the third grade i have kept a journal. i'd write in it to clear my head, make sense of my thoughts and well...i find it natural to put my thoughts down in words...i'll just try to keep it a bit anonymous. (yea right.:))