I have not read blogs or comments since my first day in Denver. In fact, I’ve hardly had time to sit at the computer. Most of these blogs are being hand written in a notebook during quiet spaces at the booth and being typed in later. (You know you’re really a blogger when you hand write blog entries.) I had to stop reading stuff on the internet. The convention is providing so much food for thought that I’m having trouble processing it all. Adding information from blogs to my brain would result in a total overload. I wouldn’t be able to retain it all. Fortunately blogs are patient. They will wait for my brain to be quiet again.
I haven’t been calling the kids daily. I did on the first couple of days, but they were having too much fun to come talk to me. After that, the quiet spaces in my day were either before the kid got up or after they’d gone to bed. In some ways that was easier on all of us. today I finally got the meltdown phone call. Gleek was crying that she just wanted to go home and have me there. I spent 20 minutes on the phone talking with her, being sympathetic. After she wound down a little bit, she told me that my aunt, who raises pigeons, wouldn’t let her keep an egg. Then Gleek lay out plans for building a cage around our spruce tree so that the pigeons could build nests and raise babies. Then we could make scrambled eggs with the extra eggs. After detailing her plans, Gleek was happy again and tripped off to watch a movie. It took me a little longer to pull myself back together. I’ll be glad to get home too.
People keep asking me why I don’t just bring the kids with me to the convention. I know I could. There is on site child care. The kids would love to come. I’m fully capable of managing the logistics. The primary reason I don’t is that I get stressed by having to wear multiple hats simultaneously. I can’t be full-on business woman if I have kids nearby. I end up fractured, feeling like time spent on the kids is wasted for business and time spent on the business feels stolen from the kids.