Time Waits for No One

Blogroll Me!

Along with keeping a journal for so many years, I also kept date books/calendars with a brief note for each square. And as time passed I liked to look back to what I did, for example, on the 24th of each month of a particular year, or what I'd done on the same date a year or two earlier.

I didn't always know why I was recording little tidbits, but I felt the pull to do so.

Keeping a blog works in a similar fashion; I can look back a year ago, and see my entry for the equivalent day, but last year, Wednesday being the 23rd of February.

Wednesday, February 23, 2005

A Working Mother's Woes
Woe is me...I'm a working mom. Okay, so I bring home a few shekels, and I help pay for the mortgage, the second car, the insurance, the household bills, the day care, the schooling, the day camp, the extra-curricular lessons, shul membership, the dog food, the-- Oh wait, I said I bring home a few shekels, and I help pay for... the dog food. Yup, that's about it. So why am I out there, rushing to and from work, leaving my husband to deal with chauffeuring and meal preps and homework till I get home. I'm not the main breadwinner in this family by any means, but I do help out a bit.

Recently hubby and I looked at my checkbook to see if there was a pattern to my spending habits -- oh, ya, the pattern is THE KIDS. I pay for swimming, for hockey, for chess, for other mind-expanding, brain-enlightening courses they pursue, for school expenses (of course, those are on top of tuition, on top of school uniforms, on top of supply lists) such as trips and food programs and Scholastic book orders.Yes, we spend on THE KIDS, but the rewards are plentiful. My kids will swim/skate up to me, and in a loud and clear voice one of them will ask me to join him in a game of chess. I'll refuse, reminding him that it is in fact I who needs to take chess lessons, and tell him to play with his father, while I suggest his sister read the Scholastic book I ordered. In the meantime, I'll do the laundry and wash my daughter's school jumper and her brother's zippered school logo jacket.

And littlest child, not yet in school, will look at me, and with pleading eyes ask, "Can I have a brownie?" "Sure," I say. After all, it's only a brownie, and not a cataloged list of Scholastic books he wants me to buy for him, or an after-school program he wants to take, or a knapsack he insists on having because it's the latest schoolyard look.

Thank G-d for small blessings...

Okay, so it's now a year later...hmm. Let me see what, if anything, has changed.

Yes, I'm still a working mom. And yes, I still manage to bring in a few shekels. Okay, youngest child is now in school, so he too has become of of "them" -- those school kids who has needs: needs supplies, needs to be included in the optional lunch program, needs trip money, needs his tuition paid. And instead of a brownie, he now needs to have a cream-cheese sandwich as a snack.

Okay, and there's no chess, but there's a performance class a la Broadway musicals; there's still swimming, and hockey team, and now Karate to help round out some already well-rounded-out kids.

Oh, and the dog is a different one. He also has needs -- he needs different pet food, he needs different toys, he needs to get "altered" and he needs puppy classes. I'm beginning to think that his needs will cost me more than those of my kids.

You know what I need? Nothing. 'Cause even a year later, I can still thank G-d for my small...and large...blessings!