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The LDS (Mormon) church to which I belong does not employ clergy. All of the leadership positions in the congregation and auxiliaries are filled by volunteers. Because people tend not to jump up and down shouting “pick me” for the hard jobs, the volunteers are usually called in and asked to take on the responsibilities rather than waiting for someone to step forward of themselves. There is mild social pressure to say yes to one of these assignments, but there are no consequences for rejecting an assignment.

Two weeks ago I was asked to become the den leader for our congregation’s Webelos boy scout den. This is a group of boys aged 10. Right now there are only three, but by September when Link turns 10 there will be eight boys. I said yes to the assignment because I could see that this would be a good thing for me and for Link. I will get to spend time with my boy doing cool stuff. I’ll get to know most of the boys in our neighborhood who are his age. I’ll have a chance to build relationships with all of these boys. In addition, I believe that I am blessed every time I stretch myself to undertake one of these church assignments. The volunteer work enriches my life in ways that I don’t always expect. Saying yes was obviously the right answer. So I said yes even though I didn’t want the assignment.

It took me more than a week to sort out why logic and emotion were speaking to me so differently about this particular assignment. Everything logical told me it was good. I acted on the logic and took steps to acquire my materials and get oriented by the former leader. But in the back of my brain, emotion was jumping up and down while stamping her feet and shouting “I don’t wanna!”

At first I thought my emotional defiance was because of problems I have with the Boy Scouts of America, like their insistence on uniforms. I don’t mind if other people want to wear uniforms, but I hate to wear them myself. I’m going to have to wear an ugly shirt with patches all over it. This does not excite me. I also worried about the focus on earning badges. I’ve seen parents turn themselves inside out to make sure that their boy earns his badges. But the badges are supposed to represent an achievement by the boy, not piles of work done by the parents. Some of these concerns sorted themselves out as I thought about them. I realized that the badges provide a framework to motivate parents to spend time with their boys. So long as the parents don’t turn earning badges into a stress-fest, the boy will gain from the time and attention. The core point of boy scouts is for responsible adults to spend time with young boys, imparting values and building relationships. Everything else is window dressing. As a den leader I’ll have power to make sure that the emphasis is in the right place. It was another logical reason to accept the assignment, but didn’t solve the emotional issues.

I finally realized that the core of my emotional defiance was that in order to do “Webelos Den Leader” really right, I’m going to have to commit to 3-5 hours per week of work and I’m going to have to care about these boys. Both my time and my emotional resources are limited. I did not want to give up any of them. Taking the Den Leader position probably means less writing and a messier house, because I can’t afford to cut back on the business stuff and I won’t short change my kids.

My emotional turn-around came when I thought about how often I depend on the help of others to meet my kids’ needs. I depend on school teachers, and youth leaders, and Sunday school teachers, and friends’ parents to help me teach my kids the lessons they need; to keep them safe. For the safety net to be strong, the dependence can not flow all one way. The unspoken contract is that I must be willing to extend the same help and nurturing to the children of others. How many of the mothers of these boys are sitting at home praying that their boy gets a really good Den Leader? How can I not answer that prayer when the opportunity is handed to me? And so I will dive into this assignment. I will wear the ugly shirt. I will help boys and parents earn badges. I will spend the 3-5 hours per week. And I will grow to love these boys. I will do it all in the hope that somehow something I do will make a difference for one of them; that something I teach will stay with them and answer a future need. I will do it because I hope that others are out there doing the same thing for my kids when they are away from me.

…And tonight I didn’t get the parenting right. I used up all of my energy getting stuff done in the first half of the day. Then I recharged a little in the afternoon. Then came dinner and homework and toy pick up. Then I was all used up. I wanted nothing more than all my kids to just leave me alone so I could vegetate in front of a show. But Gleek was afraid of monsters under the bed and Link was hungry and Patches always fights bedtime. And it got to be 10 pm and none of them were asleep yet. They may still be awake, but at least they’re in beds behind closed doors and not needing things from me.

“Snapped” is such a good description of the exerience. I’m like a rubberband. I stretch to manage all the things that need done. Then something new gets added and I think “well it’s only a little bit more. I can do it.” so I stretch just a little bit more. Sometimes I’m aware that I’m near my limit, sometimes I’m not. But I’m always stingingly aware when I’ve gone beyond the limit and I’m over reacting to minor issues. Some days I have more stretch than others.

The good news is that a good night’s rest restores my elasticity.

I intended to post yesterday. I even had a space of time allotted to sitting at the computer composing an entry. Scheduling the time is critical to any task I want to get done because I’m scheduled down to the minute for most of this week. But then Link wanted to do a whittling project with the pocket knife he got for Christmas. This required my help in finding the knife. The Christmas knife is still awol, but I did find a different knife he could use. Then we reviewed the cub scout rules for safe knife usage. I turned him loose on a bar of soap. All was well for 20 minutes. Then he cut himself. Who would have known so much trauma would come to pass from such a small injury. As we treated the small nick, Link lamented the existence of the whittling section of the cub scout book, and the existence of whittling, and the existence of knives. Later in the evening he tried to tell me he couldn’t read a book like I’d asked, because he might get a paper cut. A mixture of sympathy and firmness got us through.

Then Kiki had a major (for her) emotional event which required my full attention for 90 minutes and Howard’s full attention for 20 minutes. This time what got us through was faith, prayer, and scriptures.

In both cases the cause of the emotional upset seemed so small to me. Too small to be worth all the uproar. But to Link and Kiki, their various emotions were very real and very huge. If I laugh at the emotions or dismiss them, then my children will stop sharing with me. So I sit for 10 minutes helping Link think through why the risk of getting a paper cut might be worth it to be able to enjoy reading. And I sit for an hour carefully helping Kiki along a path to where she has found her own solution; the same solution I could have handed her within 5 minutes. But if I handed her the solution, she would likely reject it and declare that I just don’t understand.

At the end of it all I had all of the kids in bed and a sense that I’d done parenting really right. For once, I lived up to my own expectations. I was glad, and totally drained of anything resembling energy. So, no entry yesterday because I did something more important instead.

In this pas couple of weeks I have had one friend whose father died abruptly, another friend whose father was diagnosed with incurable cancer and sent home to die, a third friend’s father was hospitalized for unexplained internal bleeding. The good news is that my own father is just fine, although I should probably call him.

I feel sympathy and sorrow for the pain of these three friends. I just wish I knew what to say. They are going through something profound with which I have limited direct experience. In the face of so much pain, I fear to say the wrong thing and thus inflict more pain. So I end up saying nothing, which is certainly the wrong choice. My silence may seem to be indifference or abandonment.

Howard has been through this. Both of his parents died just as he was entering adulthood. I’ve listened to him council people about grief. He says that when faced with death, you first have to learn how to breathe even though you loved one does not. Then bit by bit you learn how to eat, sleep, laugh, and live even though the person is gone. Howard speaks with the voice of experience. He knows what to say to the grief stricken because he has been there. I don’t want to be there, but I wish I knew what to say.

In person I can express sympathy through a look or a touch. But two of these friends are online friends. It is harder to convey a hug through electronic media. Electronic communication requires words. Words are powerful. I fear to use the wrong ones.

Gleek’s birthday was on Wednesday, but she assured me that she can’t actually be six until she has a cake. Fortunately we’d schedule a birthday party with cake for today, so now she is actually six. Running a child’s birthday party with six guests turned out to be not that hard. When I was first parenting such a task was daunting. But I ran a home preschool during last year, so whipping together a couple of hours of activities wasn’t too bad. Also, Looney Tunes are always a big hit with kids. Yay for Sylvester and Tweety.

Even though actually running the party wasn’t all that hard, I found myself wiped out afterwards. This could be because last Saturday morning I forgot to take my thryoid medication and the delayed reaction hit me today. It could also be that I’m trying to eat healthy and my body is complaining about the lack of refined sugars. It could also be that I spent all morning moving really fast to get the house all cleaned up for the party. Whatever the reason I’ve gotten nothing done since the party ended. Unless you count watching Back to the Future on my portable DVD player as a productive activity. Back to the Future is still a really fun movie, but I can’t count it as productive.

This of course brings up the ever reoccuring issue of downtime. I’m a mother who runs a small business. I always have a huge list of things to do. If I try to get everything done before I relax, I will never relax or sleep. At least not until I go completely crazy and stop caring about anything. So there has to be a line. I have to find a place on the never ending to-do list to draw a line and say “that’s enough for today.” Theoretically it is easy. I just decide in the morning which things I have to accomplish before I can relax. Only those morning assignments never include the unexpected tantrum that sucks 30 minutes and piles of energy right out of the day. They also never include changing soiled pants, conflict resolution between two kids, the hour long phone call with the insurance company to discover why the hospital bill wasn’t paid, and all the other oodles of things which just pop into existence at a moment’s notice. There are some days where I am busy with important things all day long and yet I’ve not crossed of a single thing on my to-do list.

I think the line was in a good place today. There are some days that I relax before I should. There are others when I don’t get to relax at all. I guess it all evens out. At least today my house is clean, my Gleek had a good birthday party, and the Netflix DVDs already arrived so we have fun shows to watch after the kids are abed.

The Queen said “The rule is, jam tomorrow and jam yesterday–but never jam today.”
“It must come sometimes to ‘jam today.'” Alice objected.
“No, it can’t,” said the Queen. “It’s jam every other day: today isn’t any other day, you know.”
–Alice through the Looking Glass by Lewis Carroll.

Each Sunday I stare at my calender to mentally prepare for the week ahead. I note when events are happening and how the occurrence of various events require me to shift my schedule to accommodate them. Last Sunday I looked at the eventful week ahead and noted that the next week on the calendar was pretty empty. I thought “If I can just survive this week, then next week will be relaxing.” The only trouble is that the relaxing empty calendar week is a mirage. I had this exact same thought last Sunday and the Sunday before that and the Sunday before that. As I approach those empty spaces on the calendar, they inevitably begin to fill up with events and Things To Be Done.

The continual filling of my schedule is frustrating because I was supposed to spend this month being support personnel for Howard so he could work on the book. I was going to keep the house clean so that mess would not intrude on his brainspace. Instead I find my days full of things which I did not schedule, but which I am required to attend. I could skip out on some of them, but only at the expense of disappointing children. Today Gleek’s class has a Kindergarten Nursery Rhyme Party. I get to go and sit to listen to 26 kindergarteners lisp their way through nursery rhymes. As a reward I’ll be handed sugary treats that I neither want nor need. Next Friday Kiki’s class is going cross country skiing and she desperately wants me to go as a chaperon. I’ve never been on a field trip with Kiki, ever. Next year she’ll be in Junior High with many fewer field trips. I’m running out of chances. Besides cross country skiing is outdoor exercise. I should go. Then there are cub scout events, and art club, and business meetings and family coming into town…

Don’t get me wrong, all of these things are worth doing. I am deciding to do them rather than skip them because they are worth doing. I just wish that there wasn’t this unending pile of events which I didn’t schedule.

Can’t I ever get to the empty week this week? I want jam right now.

I just cancelled our membership to Blockbuster Online. We signed up several months ago because it seemed like a good deal and it allowed us to watch videos that simply aren’t in stock at the local stores. I greatly enjoyed watching the original Star Trek series with Kiki. At first everything was fine. But then Blockbuster began consistently sending us discs that were #5-8 in our queue even when #1-5 were all available. I understand that they practice something that is called “throttling” on high volume renters, but I did not think that 1-2 discs per week should qualify us as high volume. The other thing that really bugged me was their handling of discs that had waits on them. We were members for 5 months and we never reached the top of the “Short Wait” queue. How long is short?

All of this would not have bugged me so much, except that we were members at netflix back in 2004. I had none of these problems with netflix. The reason that we chose to go with Blockbuster this time was the in-store rentals that were included with the membership. Netflix can’t offer that. Unfortunately even that incentive has been removed since they’ll be closing our neighborhood Blockbuster store by the end of this month. There were apparently problems with the lease.

This means that Blockbuster will be completely losing our business. Unfortunately they’re so huge I doubt they’ll notice.

When I filled out the cancellation form, there was a large white box for comments. They even had text claiming how important my comments were to them. I obliged by explaining exactly why we were leaving. Then I hit submit and the system barked at me because my comment was too long. Yeah. They really care to hear what I have to say. We’ve been Blockbuster customers for 10 years, but no more.

Today is Gleek’s birthday. She has been counting down in anticipation ever since Christmas ended. As of today she is now 6 years old. It makes me want to snuggle her close because I’m running out of time for her to be little. Fortunately she was in a snuggly mood this morning so I got some of those extra snuggles. She was very agreeable about getting ready for school today. She wanted to be there on time because they announce birthdays over the loud speaker and she didn’t want to miss hearing her name. While she was at school I took Patches to buy supplies for her birthday party on Saturday. Then Patches and I arrived at the Kindergarten class with a couple dozen donuts to share with all of Gleek’s classmates. I loved getting to watch her feel special and important as she handed out the donuts.

The next item on our birthday agenda was a trip to the shoe store. Gleek is by nature a barefoot child. She will shed her shoes at the slightest provocation. This means that her shoes need to be so comfortable that she doesn’t think about them. If she thinks about her shoes, she’ll kick them off. It seems like we’ve gone through dozens of pairs of hand-me-down tennis shoes and we’ve only found a couple that truly fit her. Part of the problem is that I keep thinking her feet are bigger than they are. We had them measured at the store. She’s size 10 1/2. Most of her shoes are size 11-12. Size 10 1/2 is still in the toddler section which seems wrong for a six year old, but she’s tiny for her age. Anyway she needed shoes for church and shoes for school. I decided to make her birthday the occasion for buying brand new shoes.

Gleek loves the shoe store. Within moments of entering she found the sparkliest, most bead-encrusted set of flip flops that the store had to offer. She declared her undying love for these shoes. The school does not allow flip flops. None of the elementary schools in our area do. Flip flops just aren’t safe footwear for kids who will spend recess playing tag around and on top of a jungle gym. Flip flops have become acceptable dress shoes these days. I see them at church all the time. Only these particular flip flops were absolutely gaudy. I decided not to argue about the flip flops and set about selecting church shoes for her to try on. Then Gleek found big floppy, fuzzy, rainbowed slippers with hair two inches long. Gleek declared her urgent need to own these slippers. The slippers were a women’s size 8, but Gleek kept declaring that they fit perfectly as she shuffled up and down the aisle to keep them on her feet. I didn’t argue about the slippers either. Instead I had her put on various church shoes and run up and down the aisle to see if they would work for her. She liked that part. We picked out shoes that will work for church. Then we repeated the process for tennis shoes.

We had reached the point where it was time to leave the store. I had no intention of taking home the gaudy flip flops or the fuzzy slippers. Fortunately Gleek found a rack full of inexpensive tastefully sparkly flip flops. I consented to let her have a pair of these on the condition that the fuzzy slippers and the gaudy flip flops stay at the store. When I sweetened the deal with some colorful rainbow striped socks, she agreed. She wore her shiny silver flip flops home.

Later tonight we’ll have dinner and family gifts. She’s getting a pair of fairy wings from Howard. I can just picture her now in her pink clothes, rainbow fairy wings, and silver flip flops. That’s my Gleek age six.