Trying to play catch up

Whew! I finally have about 20 or so minutes to sit down and write my column.
See, my kids are out of school today (yet again). It makes me wonder how I ever accomplished anything when they were small and I was trying to work and maintain a clean house; and by that I mean reasonably clean; laundry that isn't piled up so bad we have to dig our way out and floors that don't turn white socks black.

As most of you know, I am working on starting another weekly paper in Towns County. Let me give you a few details:
We are aiming for our first issue to be published the first week in March. We are hoping to have an office set up and running (reasonably) smooth mid February. Currently, we are working on the name registration, web site and gaining advertising clients. Most of this, I can do from home. It just slows the process a bit when you are amist tying shoes and breaking up fights at the same time.

I am not any different than other working mothers or really mothers in general. I used to long for the days when I would be able to stay home, clean my house spotless (yeah, right) and not flop into the bed at midnight from total exhaustion. After being home for the past couple of weeks, I have learned that none of that is realistic. I have managed to keep the house cleaner but not quite as clean as I imagined. I am still flopping in bed at night from exhaustion and now, I have a ting of guilt to go with all of the above.

It made me feel guilty when my husband rose from the bed at 5a.m. to go to work and I knew that I could sleep longer. It bothered me when we had to stay home a lot more this weekend instead of taking in a movie or go bowling because I didn't bring home my paycheck. But, in the end, I know it will all be worthwhile for all of us. Very soon, I will be able to sling that guilt to the side and rise every morning and get back to doing what I love.

Let me just give you an example of what my weekend has been like:
Saturday, we got up and went to my daughter's and then my son's basketball games (We won one and lost one by the way), so we were only gone about 4 hours. During that time, the two little dogs we keep inside, decided for whatever reason, to chew holes in two different pieces of our living room furniture. That furniture was relatively new, we had only had it paid off for about 6 months. Now, it is all covered with slip covers until we can buy more. Then, last night, I went to write this column and discovered the battery was dead in my laptop, which I got for my birthday in September. I went to plug it in to the charger, to discover that too, had been chewed. Now, I am awaiting a new charger. (Although I am thankful we have a desktop as well). Needless to say, a lot has been going on and not all of it good.

Until the day comes when we open the door to our new business, I will continue to tie shoes and vaccum a little more often than I once did. That title is being a mom and I love that job too.