6:15 wake up and stare into space. I don’t need to be up yet, but my body won’t let me sleep in, no matter how late I go to bed. Read the news on my phone until 6:45 when I expect to hear my 6th grader head downstairs to grab breakfast before school.
6:50 – get out of bed, brush my teeth, put on my workout gear and head down stairs. Not to work out… not yet at least. But to log on to my work computer at 7 am, check my email and get started with work. Hopefully, I can get a good 30 minutes in before the next wave of wakeups.
7:30 wake up my 4th and 3rd graders. They’re really slow in the mornings. Although their bus doesn’t come until 9, they need all the time they can get. I leave the preschooler in bed. I let him sleep until 8. He needs to be ready to go by 9 as well, but he’s 4…we don’t need him awake any longer than necessary.
7:45 say goodbye to my 6th grader as she heads out to school across the street. Try to get a little work done in between the requests from the 3rd and 4th grader for help with breakfast, questions about weather, general chit chat, and the constant reminders my husband and I have to give them about staying on task with the things they need to do.
8:00. Release the kraken… I mean, wake the 4 year old. It’s anybody’s guess how this will go. Sometimes he’s looking forward to school and wakes up in a good mood and is ready to get dressed and get breakfast. Other times, he’s grumpy and has zero interest in leaving the house. Why should he want to leave? For the past 2.5 years (most of his life and really the only part he remembers), he’s been at home. He plays football in the family room, lacrosse in the basement, basketball in the living room and soccer wherever he gets the urge. There’s always an episode of “Bluey” at his fingertips, and an endless supply (at least he thinks) of chocolate milk at his disposal. He knows his boundaries, he knows how to get the things he wants and unless he’s misplaced his lacrosse stick again (for the millionth time), he knows where everything is and how everything works. My husband and I, have been working from home for the past 2.5 years, so we’re always here. At the moment, we’re 2 of his most favorite people. Why would he want to leave all this? But he must. Although it’s comfortable here at home, school offers him the opportunity to get to know new people (especially those his own age), have different experiences and learn new things. Things that his dad and I can’t offer him here. I like to think that we’re 2 smart people, but if we just kept him here at home all the time, he’d miss out on so much and may not reach his full potential. We usually find a way to convince him to go. We’ll remind him of some fun activity he’ll be doing or how he’ll get to play basketball with his friends, or tell his teacher about his soccer game.
8:55. Say goodbye to the 3rd and 4th grader and leave to take the 4 year old to preschool.
9:00. Drop the 4 year old off at pre-school. You’d never know he was hesitant about going. As you walk him into school he has a big smile on his face and is practically leaving you in the dust to get to his class. He left his comfort zone, because he believed school had things to offer him, that were more exciting than the things he left behind. He braved the day because of its potential.
Once I get back home I sit down at my desk and wonder “what am I doing with my life.” November 15th will mark 7 years that I’ve been doing my job. (I’ve been at my agency for 11.5 years, but doing the same job for the last 7). It’s comfortable. It’s flexible. I know my boundaries, I know know how to get the things I want and I know where everything is and how everything works. But this is not my full potential. This is not the apex of my career and yet I’ve been treating it as such. I work with people who are retirement eligible and have somehow convinced myself, that although I have over 20 years of work left, I’m already at a level people retire from, so I shouldn’t be in a rush to leave. But I should. I know I can make a bigger impact. I won’t allow my 4 year old to waste away at home, but I’ve allowed myself to do it at my job. Even after deciding to finish this degree I was still on the fence about actually using it. Not anymore. I need to leave my comfort zone. There are opportunities out there better for me than the one I’ll leave behind. If my 4 year old can face the uncertainties of change for his betterment, so can I. So should I.
