A Full Life

Nothing to sip as I post, the sound of J taking a shower and the wind gusting outside for my nighttime music. The day started with a drive to Commerce to meet Bill and Elaine to finalize our new designs for the Buyer's Market show. I left at 7:40 this morning and got back just after 3:00 pm. The rest of the day in the studio was spent pulling, packing and shipping a supplies order for a new KGRC customer in Ohio, talking to Amy at Bullseye, and... And that's about it! It amazes me how little I can get done in so much time anymore.

Dave also left at dawn's first light this morning for a meeting in Alpharetta and he didn't get home till a little after 9:00--stopping at Publix to get fresh lettuce and carrots for the bunnies on his way home. I did the dinner, cello and homework thing. Mom took J to school and picked her up today and let the cleaning people in. Why, you might ask am I listing a whole bunch of non-glass things that made up today in my post on Glass Incarnate? I list them because more and more I am woven into the web of life and can no longer separate--not only the strands of work and home, but also the strands of me and the others in my household. We seem to be all becoming one entity with intertwining yet not necessarily complementary strands of needing and doing.

Right now I am having a hard time even remembering what it felt like before Dave and Jessie and a house and a business. Back then I had a job and a condo (with an on-property maintenance man). I ate whatever I ate wherever I was when I was ready to eat, and it was just me--or maybe me and my bird or me and my dog and my bird. When I had a project to do,  I immersed myself for days on end during every non-working, waking hour. I could focus and power through massive projects in short amounts of time. Now it's seems to take all my time just to live a normal day. Face time with every member of my household on a daily basis is very important to everyone's (mine included) well-being and happiness. Time for hugs, time for snuggles, time to teach a little piano, play a little Race for the Galaxy, watch an old episode of The Greatest American Hero, play with the bunnies--all this time is no longer optional: It's life, it's now, it's every day, and it takes time--a surprising lot of time.

Am I whining? Complaining? Wishing things were different? Not a bit, well, not much. Sometimes I do look back on the Other Life with nostalgia, but it's nostalgia like you get for the 50's watching Happy Days (I think Dave just went "Nyah!" and stuck a fork in his eye--not a fan of Happy Days is our Dave.) The 50's weren't really like that--nor was high school (my turn for a Nyah! moment). Nor, if I am honest, was my earlier, simpler life. Simpler lives are for lesser women.*



(*Though I would like to end the post on that seemingly infinitely wise pronouncement, I have to give credit where credit is due: The original phrase is "Simpler wives are for lesser husbands", said by my spouse about me. :-)