Less Hustle More Coffee

Good morning! Just a quick pop in. Mom’s friend did not have COVID and so she will be taking her for her Wed and Thurs doc appointments. So that frees me this week to get work done and not have to work Saturday or lose the beloved scheduled PTO day. But I was happy to take her if I needed to. It is my daughterly duty to do so more so than the friend.

Regardless, I was going to have to make decisions on figuring out how to keep everyone happy and get everything done and still not have to give up my beloved PTO day. As a woman, you really need a day off – at least one if not two or three – to get Christmasing done! So I’m trying to hold on to that day. I have 40 hours also I’m holding on to for the grandbaby in Jan. So the PTO days seem scarce these days as we already took one week for Texas and I took a scattering of days here and there as needed during the year.

I hate that I get so caught up in making everything work out that I drive myself and everyone else crazy worrying about trying to make it all work out just right. But that is me. Making sure I get it all in, all done, and still get time to do what I need to do also.

The pic above signifies time! It goes way faster in some respects than we can respond to, and way faster than the things that we want to do in life.

I don’t really know why I have such an issue with time. I protect it and value it as if it were silver. I tried to remember as far as back as I can when this started, my severe protection of my time. And my obsession with trying to make everything fit in a box with a bow on top.

I think it was back in highschool. Everything tried to happen at once. I have worked since age 15. Started early to work my way to take a trip to Hawaii, and have been plowing after career and personal goals ever since. But trying to fit school, church, work, dating, family, friends, studying was always a challenge for me. Back then I thought nothing of it other than scrambling and staying up late. And that is the factor that made the difference as I cannot do that now.

But then I planned my time, and got all the important stuff done in little pockets of time and I started long projects in advance. I was just not a procrastinator. I learned to do things early to conquer it. And nailed it every time. A and B student, dating, working, and fitting it all in. It helped not being the one to maintain a household. That came later. That and parenting, kinda sent me on overload. I really became even more protective over our time. A lot more things to fit into a calendar.

I was told I couldn’t have both career and parenthood by someone. Oh I proved them wrong of course. George was a big help though as he loved to play and loved to cook so together we made a good team of keeping a household, keeping careers, being parents and making a life for ourselves and even having fun. But I remember sitting in church service (yes in church) making to do lists at the same time that I took sermon notes, because that was the one hour where I was sitting still and could do it. I remember having to make decisions that impacted our time. It was always a struggle. There were always so many church events we wanted to do. We took on so much church work that when we moved to Mount Juliet to set up our household we said no church for a month so we could just have a season of rest while we set up this house. Since then our spiritual journey has been much different. We’ve learned that God He is not just in a church building, but wherever we go. But this blog entry is not about my spiritual journey but about my obsession with time and planning. And I’m also very particular about protecting my time at work so there is enough time to get it all done.

God is teaching me that time is important in some realms and not important in others. The devil is definitely in the details. He says we should worry about today as tomorrow has its own trials and troubles. So true. I still think it’s important to plan. I will always be a planner. There are things I’d never get done if I didn’t plan. As I’ve said before I have to learn to be flexible. But when it comes to impacting others with my flexibility I have to take that into considerations and make decisions that impact them too – like work, or Mom’s health. I know without a doubt I will always be one that tries to make everything work out just right. God made me that way to be a balancing act I guess. It really comes down to just accepting the puzzle pieces that are on the table, adjusting it, praying over it. It’s ok to talk about it and wonder about it, but not worry about it. I forget to leave that part off. lol

So those weeks will come when our parents need us. They took care of us and still do sometimes. So we have to be there for them. Sometimes work will have to be patient, sometimes I will have to be patient. Sometimes we all make sacrifices. Time is definitely not making a sacrifice itself. It keeps moving. It’s up to us how we fill the train cars of time with what we do. It’s so important to me to pack the train appropriately with all the right box cars of to do’s so it becomes the Little Train that COULD! 😉 And now it’s TIME to go to WORK!