The Dawkter's Wife

This is the warmest January on record in Minnesota. (Thumbs up to global warming!) Ordinarily, by this time of year I am starting to feel over winter.  This year, I almost miss it.  I have actually caught myself complaining about how warm it is.  I guess the evil I know is better than waiting for the shoe to drop.  I have this sense of impending weather doom … when will it hit? How bad will it be?  Now that we are approaching mid-January though, I’ve started to relax and enjoy it.  Last year at this time we had been under more than a foot of snow for 2 months.  Right now, we have a dusting outside.  I’m not sure if it is an inch or not, but it is the first time all winter that snow has actually stayed on the ground for more than a day.The way I have it figured, we have escaped the worst of winter.  Whatever comes now, I can handle it.

Which brings me to Amanda.

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Do not lean back … lean in.

So here I was feeling sorry for myself tonight …and then I ran across a video of Sheryl Sandberg’s Barnard College commencement address.

How can I set the scene for you?

Aidan and Zoe head back to school tomorrow after their winter break and I laid in bed worrying about oversleeping until I reached the tipping point.  For me … that time is 4:30am. I came downstairs, turned on the fireplace, grabbed my 17 year old’s sweatshirt off of the back of my living room chair to wrap it around me until things warmed up, fired up my Keurig, and turned to Google for some online time.  My internet usage has been drastically reduced over the last month or so.  My mil’s visit sort of kicked off my virtual hiatus.  After she left I flew to TX to visit my mom for a few days.  When I got back, I was in a race to finish getting ready for Christmas…something I barely managed to do, if I’m honest.  This year I scaled down our celebration quite a bit.  My mom flew out to ring in the new year with us and is here through Wednesday.

It was a craptastic December.  Frankly, it was a craptastic Fall, but I think we might have covered that a few times here already!
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Catching up:  MIL has already come and gone.  Two weeks kind of flew by and here we are staring down Andrew’s birthday on Sunday and Christmas. This was actually one of the best visits with my mil to date because I think we’ve both accepted each others’ strengths and weaknesses.  That doesn’t mean that the comments weren’t there from her regarding my parenting, housekeeping and general poor organizational skills, but … it was better.

I … am a people person, and it was nice having family here, but I can only do people in doses. It is very hard for me to get together with people IRL no matter how much I care about them. It actually provokes a lot of anxiety in me and consequently, I end up feeling really exhausted after a couple of hours. There are very few people who I get together with regularly and those who have actually spent nights at my home, with me in a hotel, or with whom I share a vacation slush fund …. well….that’s deep….and also anxiety provoking, but I get over myself because I value the together time.  This means that I was more exhausted than usual.  I am still so tired that I feel like something is physically wrong with me.

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I was on a bike ride with iMSN members.  I had my bike trailer attached and somehow had managed to squeeze all of my children as well as the children of some of the members in the trailer. Note to self: I was so skinny in my dream!  We were approaching a covered footbridge that spanned a large body of water.  As I carefully approached, one of the moms yelled something at me.  This startled me and I lost control of my bike. The trailer flew through the air and we could hear splashes in the water. The sun had set and we were all racing to the shore in the dark.  I was crying hysterically in my dream.  I looked everywhere for my children … for anyone’s children … but came out of the water empty handed.  I realized that I was alone.
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It’s that time of year again.  My mother-in-law is arriving from Germany in exactly one week. Mental calculations tell me that means I have 7 days to finish getting this place ship-shape. What better way to procrastinate than to blog about it.  In honor of her visit this year, I’ve been working on a plan to keep myself sane. I love my mother-in-law, I really do, but her criticisms drive me nuts. Enter: Operation Paperclip Panties.

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