I have been in a really lousy mood this week, like really lousy.

Like bring other folks down with me, lousy!

I know it is not the weather, but the weather certainly has helped anchor this mood in my heart.

Truly, what happened is that frustration turned to anger and self-pity…turned to procrastination and defiance, which made me emotionally vulnerable and tired…Way to mess myself up!

So here I sit writing to you about it – two days behind on chores, two days behind on homework, months behind on projects and days behind on ETSY and other related chores! I feel this huge pressure to get it all done, to get caught up THIS INSTANT! 

THIS INSTANT! ALL OF IT NEEDS TO BE DONE, NOW!

Does it really? No…but it feels like it. I feel like I am losing every bit of the success I have had in the past month in just 3 or 4 days.

How can I be in a bad mood with this cutey around?

And that feels bad, real bad.

I am not sure which feels worse – not having the things done or feeling badly about it. As I sat upstairs rocking Jackson for the two seconds he will snuggle before nap, the song that came to mind was Alabama’s  I’m in a Hurry and Don’t know Why.

I'm in a hurry to get things done
Oh I rush and rush until life's no fun
All I really gotta do is live and die
But I'm in a hurry and don't know why

Don't know why I have to drive so fast
My car has nothing to prove
It's not new
But it'll do zero to sixty in five point two

I'm in a hurry to get things done
Oh I rush and rush until life's no fun
All I really gotta do is live and die
But I'm in a hurry and don't know why

Can't be late, I leave in plenty of time
Shakin' hands with the clock
I can't stop
I'm on a roll and I'm ready to rock

I'm in a hurry to get things done
Oh I rush and rush until life's no fun
All I really gotta do is live and die
But I'm in a hurry and don't know why

Oh, I hear a voice
That says I'm running behind
Better pick up my pace
It's a race and there ain't no room for someone in second place

I'm in a hurry to get things done
Oh I rush and rush until life's no fun
All I really gotta do is live and die
But I'm in a hurry and don't know why

All he wants to do is ride the horse all day!
Maybe this is God's way of telling me to "hold my horses"?

That voice is my voice. No one else is saying I am behind. I am in a hurry, and I don’t know why. I mean, I know, but it is silly, and it is making me miserable. And it is no one but me doing this to myself!

Honestly, Thursday’s chores are quick and Friday is usually chore free, so there is time to make things up there.  The rain will pass and I will get pictures taken for all my new etsy listings.

But Grace won’t be 4 years 5 months 16 days old ever again and Jackson won’t be 1 year 1 month and 28 days old ever, ever again…And my husband won’t ever been in week 3 of his third year of law school ever again, and this time next year we may not live in this house or this town..There are so many things I should be savoring.

So this Wednesday, I am going to slow down, both literally and figuratively. I am going to get some things done, but I am going to do the best I can to let all the rest roll off my back…

Are you going to slow down? What hurries you? Who is that voice for you – yourself or someone or something else?

Friday

I was on Facebook the other day and somehow got to a view of my friendship with someone. There was no picture of my and this friend. I looked at another of my friendships, and again no picture.

Again, and again, and again.

Finally I found one with a picture, but it wasn’t of my friend and me. It was a picture of our kids.

And then another, but the picture was at least 2 decades old!

I don’t have all the friends in the world…especially not on Facebook. I have always been a quality over quantity kind of girl, probably a symptom of shyness (my mother would say it has to do more with my high standards, but that is for another day.).

Regardless of how many friends I have or where I have them, it made me sad that there is no proof…there are no pictures, not even on Facebook.

But why?

Is one of us always the photographer? Do we only take pictures when the kids are around? Why aren’t we in those?  Have we gotten to the point where life is no longer worthy of being captured in photographs? There are still memories to be made, right?

I don’t want to be one of those moms who are never in the picture because I am not perfect. I want my kids to remember what I looked like when they thought I was beautiful – even if I don’t think I am beautiful.

I want them to know that I had friends, not as a matter of conquest or popularity, but as a token of who supported me and who I supported, a reminder of who loved them, too, a chronicle of the places and people in their lives, of what shaped our family, of who I am as person.

Maybe, it is rooted in my being an only child, so there are not family or sibling pictures either. But I want my kids to know that friendship and support are important, that things like distance and time and life are surmountable – because of, with the help of, and worth the effort for – Friends.

I am not sure how to get pictures of me with friends without seeming a little creepy. I don’t want over posed portraits, just candid moments in time and you can’t force that. 

So, I suppose I need to be better about bringing my camera along. I need to be better about asking someone to take a picture. I need to be better about making time for friends – time that is meaningful and picture worthy.

And that is Friday.