After several weeks of chasing my tail (almost caught it once), I realized that I have neglected my writing. So easy to put aside those things that we do for ourselves. Whether it is writing or exercising, it is too often the first thing cut. I need to stop doing that. It is the mental equivalent of balancing your budget by cutting the essentials first.
I shouldn't be surprised things have been busy. It is spring (at least, my calendar swears it is) and everyone comes out of their winter sleep to pack my calendar with activities. Add on to that my husband's return (only 60ish days left!) and moving and the end of school.....yeah. I'm going to need a vacation for sure.
I made the foolish error of putting some items on my calendar in pen. Big stuff- like last day of school. Some things are in pencil, either because they were tentative or I couldn't find a pen. I will confess to one item written in crayon, but I have since found all of my pens, so that shouldn't happen again. But from now on, I will ONLY write in pencil. I learned to do that in my address book years ago (only the names are in ink).
One expects a deployment date and travel dates to bounce around (like a high bounce ball :) ), but other things one expects to stay firm. And that is where I went wrong.
Today, I got a call from my kids' school about recess monitor volunteers. I hate doing it in the cold, but it is a great way to see what my kids are up too. The secretary said something about there only being five weeks left in the year (I am only counting down to my husband's return, could care less about school). It went right past me. Then I said Fridays were good, but I couldn't do May 27. She said it wasn't a problem because there was no school that day. I (still clueless) asked if it was a four day weekend and she replied, "No, the last day of school is the 25th." I started to feel the early symptoms of shock. "I thought school ended 3 June?" I asked hopefully. (Like making her say it again would change the answer) "No," she said in her cheerful I'm-not-moving-so-I-think-it's-great voice. "It was changed."
Note the passive voice. Way to cover some one's rear.
ARE YOU KIDDING ME?????
My kids just got an extra week of vacation and I lost a week of unpacking without their "help". It is a kid's dream and has wreaked complete havoc on my schedule.
Can I move everything back 10 calendar days? Can I possibly do half the stuff I was going to do now that I lost 6 school days to vacation? Does anyone owe me a favor/ feel sorry for me and will help me unpack and watch kids? If so, is their calendar full? Would anyone else like to reschedule anything else before I misplace the white-out again?
The moral of this story is NEVER use pen on your calendar, because it isn't just the Army that will jerk you around.
