When it rains...

May is definitely a month when the old adage holds true...three boys' birthdays being the rain that draws in all kinds of wild weather. In addition to "Second Christmas" as it's known around here, we have a house guest coming and our annual birthdays-in-the-rain camping trip. We've been invited to at least three different things that same weekend, including the next budget meeting for our still budget-less school district. Baseball games every Tuesday and Thursday night. M got tickets to a Seadogs game on his birthday, only I have a very important meeting at work and C doesn't want to fall any further behind in his work and I have to figure out how to be two places at once. Kindergarten screening is scheduled for the same day as the game and the meeting and the following day, which is when we leave for camping (and instead of being weepy and nostalgic about my boys turning five--FIVE!--I'm mainly looking forward to sticking them on the bus and not having to contend with the preschool drop-off/pickup next year).

This past Saturday we had three things scheduled which all got cancelled (rain, illness and birth of a baby) and should have freed me from the prospect of spending Mother's Day cleaning house, in anticipation of my mom coming to spend a couple of weeks, except I just couldn't seem to find traction and spent the day spinning my wheels on one project after another. Maybe that's just how that type of cleaning goes--trying to get the piles under control, when you try to pick anything out by itself you find it's hitched to everything else in the Universe (with apologies to John Muir).

I seem to have forgotten my Epiphanies--especially the ones about taking care of myself and being mindful of the tasks before me--and the principle of Underdo.

And lest you start feeling sorry for me that I spent Mother's Day mopping floors and cleaning bathrooms and cooking dinner, that's not all I did on Sunday. I read in bed a bit before breakfast (which I did NOT cook, even though it was Sunday and my day to cook breakfast), I did a little writing--trying to put together my column for the summer issue of The Motherhood Muse, which I am struggling with for some reason, and trying to write something about my son who is going to turn nine next week. Only I didn't get too far with that, either, because that same son kept distracting me with requests to play card games and Monopoly (we played a 2 1/2 hour game on Saturday, so I didn't feel too bad saying "no." Did you know that the harder you try to spend all your money and go bankrupt, the more money you make and the longer the game goes on? I am totally going to buy a new couch on that principle.)

We also took a family hike down to the river. It had cooled down from the previous week's amazing 80 degree weather and was windy, so there wasn't a black fly in sight, although I was dismayed to see poison ivy growing up in our spot. I took my binoculars and tried to hunt down some of the birds I heard in the woods, but they proved elusive (I can't believe how early it's leafed out here!), until we neared our house and I laid eyes on the chestnut-sided warbler I've been hearing outside of our window in the morning.

A fine Mother's Day, all-in-all. Now, for the rest of the month, a little more living in the moment and a little less getting overwhelmed by life.