Serious whine-fest

Posted On January 21, 2010

Cranky. That’s the best word to describe me today. Like nails on a chalkboard… everything. I’m going to have to get some recharging time once J gets home. Must be pregnancy hormones. Or the whining that I’ve been hearing ALL. DAY. LONG. from two of my favorite little girls. Or the dog begging me to go out and in and out and in and back out… Perhaps it’s that my house never seems to get clean. Maybe it’s that for the past two weeks Vera’s nap has only been around an hour long, sometimes less- and at least a quarter of that time is spent nursing her. I feel robbed by it. Maybe I need to surrender. 

Whatever it is, I think the solution (for this moment) is to have the last piece of cake in the fridge, a hot cup of coffee (I just love that stuff), and do a little whining myself here while the girls watch a cartoon (I don’t know if I mentioned it here before but I’m watching my niece a few afternoons a week now). Later tonight I’ll do some yoga, take a bath, and finish a movie with my knitting. Wow, I’m feeling better already just typing that. What’s strange is that this day looks good, really. I’m afraid I’ll miss it. It’s really sunny and I’m actually crossing off most of my "to-dos". The kitchen is clean, the laundry is moving, a load of diapers is put away and another is in the dryer, dinner is being prepped and will be a breeze to throw together, menu is planned, beans for the week are cooking, garden planning is well underway… What the hell is my problem today?

It’s amazing to me that so much can be dependent on your state of mind. Life can be a big mess, but with the right attitude it can look beautiful. That’s usually my life, I think. Messy messy busy messy doing too much… I love it. Today, everything is so in place and I’m just a grump. Wah wah. Although I think this coffee is helping.

Something I mentioned to a friend the other day is that I absolutely LOVE being a mother. The good, the bad, all of it. But the thing that sometimes gets me feeling unreasonable about it? Overstimulation. Being touched so much by little hands… Every task calling your name, every diaper change being a battle of wills… it gets kind of noisy (both literally and otherwise). On the other hand, when I get about 20 minutes of free body space (usually I take the dog for a walk when Jeff gets home on those days), I’ll find myself actually missing my baby’s little hands and her sweet face. It doesn’t take much at all to recharge, thankfully.
I know I am not alone in this. I talk to my mama-friends and they sometimes don’t even have to tell me. I can just sense it sometimes. This overstimulation can make a perfectly normal situation feel like a zoo. And I wonder if our culture has anything to do with this. Once upon a time families lived together and worked together much more closely. Now the responsibility falls on a much more specific set of people. I’ll often find that even when there are swarms of kids and messes all around me- if there are a couple other mamas I just feel more peaceful. 
The more I think about it the more important community is to me. I have a great community of people, but it’s all within the context of this civilization and this way of life. I value privacy and individual family life, but I yearn for a community of people that I know because we help each other with the most basic of things. The work of life. I especially want this community since Jeff and I are only having two kids. I want Vera to have a large family that is involved in her life- biological or not. I want her to know that she is a valuable part of their lives, too. Anyway. I’m rambling. Jeff and I have just been talking a lot on the intentional community front, so it’s always got me thinking.

Garden update coming soon. 🙂