Every Sunday, we say a “Gratitude List”: 5 things we are thankful for at the moment. It’s something Greg and I have always done, and now that we have kids, we are getting them involved, too. Yesterday was no different, so we let Penelope start.
Her Gratitude List was as follows:
- Mommy and Daddy
- coffee (apparently she knows how important this is in keeping our household running)
- Rabbit (her stuffed animal main squeeze)
- butter (because DUH)
- syrup (because double DUH)
This small weekly ritual keeps things in perspective and helps us feel grounded. Which matters a lot, because my daily mode of life usually feels like a living, breathing, shit-show.
I try to stay organized and on track but let’s face it: when you are thick in the forest of tending to small children, no matter how many bread crumb trails you leave, you aren’t finding your way out.
And you’ll still have to vacuum those bread crumbs.
Someone recently said to me: “Wow, it seems like you are keeping it all together!”
I wanted to answer, “Yes, I AM! That is of course, if by ‘keeping it all together’ you mean ‘hanging desperately off of the side of a cliff by a single strand of my wiry gray hair.'” (Because like everyone knows, the wiry ones are the strongest ones.)
For me, “keeping it all together” means a few different things.
It means hardly ever making it out of the house.
It means that when I have somewhere to go, I mentally prepare my outfit from days in advance because I won’t have time to go through my closet.
It means that no matter what perfume I choose, my signature scent will still be “regurgitated breast milk mixed with peas and carrots”.
It means I will undoubtedly forget something. Usually it’s a bib, or my deodorant, but sometimes it’s diapers and then WHOOPS, I’m literally up shit’s creek without a rattle.
It means on any given day, I don’t know what day it is. Because it’s Groundhog’s Day, over and over again.
It means my makeup looks like I just arrived to audition for RuPaul’s new reality show. Drunk.
It means catching a glimpse of myself on my way out the door, and discovering that the outfit I mentally put together looked better on me in my head.
It means our sleep deficit is the steepest debt we have at the moment.
It means I forgot the eggs. Again.
But if “keeping it all together” means that we still smile, laugh, and love, and that we are thankful for the important things in life – like each other and butter – then yes. We are keeping it all together very well.
