Ripples in the pond

Do you remember the movie “Awakenings”? The doctor, Robin Williams, described Robert DeNiro’s character as having so many ticks and twitches that he (DeNiro) was paralyzed. That description describes my blog writing as of late. I’ve had many stops and starts, but I’ve been pulled in so many directions, I have not finished any of them.

The source the craziness - I got a job. About two weeks ago, I accepted some contract work. It’s nothing glamorous; I'm reviewing thousands of pages of documents for litigation. It is good work and reasonably interesting. Of course, accepting this job is the equivalent of throwing a pebble into the cosmic pool of life, and we are dealing with the ripple effects.

Naturally, now that I have time commitments, my husband’s contract work has picked up as well. That means we need a babysitter for the kids, and our primary sitters are out of town for the next couple of weeks. With our regular sitters out of town, we have needed filler babysitters for this week. Life should get easier next week when PeachyKids 1 and 2 (PK1 and PK2) start school on Monday. (Hooray!) I now need daycare for PeachyKid 3 (PK3), which means I need to research daycare options. A new preschool opened up the street from us, and I’m hoping it has an opening.

In addition to finding childcare, I also need to adjust my stay-at-home-mom schedule to a working mom schedule. All the chores I saved for when the kids were at school now have become my evening chores. Unfortunately, I still need to take time during the day to complete some tasks, such as going to the tailor to alter my new suits. However, this may have to wait a few weeks until I finish this job. In the meantime, I need to figure out how late I can call my insurance company. We have had several health insurance companies in the last 17 years, and I have never spent so much time dealing with any of my insurance companies. I’m going to start billing this one for my time, and, unlike my doctors, I don’t accept discounted reimbursements.

I’m also trying to balance professional development with contract work. I’ve networked with several people and need to follow up with a lunch or coffee. On one hand, these meetings are important to helping me identify my next job. On the other hand, I have a lot of documents to review in the next couple of weeks.

As if those issues weren’t enough to occupy my mind, we just returned from a fantastic trip visiting relatives. We visited with my DH’s sister, her husband and children at my in-law’s house in Flordia. I finally met my Scottish nieces and nephew, and they are wonderful. (I’ll tell you more about this trip later.) My SIL and her family extended their visit in the US through August, and they would like to visit our house in Georgia. I suspect that their travel plans will be last minute, and I want to make sure that I am far enough along in my work to enjoy a visit from them.

My big concern is that working has had a detrimental impact on my knitting. I used to do all of my CEO (Chief Everything Officer) work during the day and knit at night. Now, I’m doing my contract work during the day, CEO work at night, and knitting only if I do not collapse from exhaustion. I need to figure out how I can squeeze more knitting time into the day. I think I have a few free minutes between 1:30 and 2 am . . .

I am excited about what I am making. I am knitting Debbie Bliss’s Zippered Vest from her Essential Knits for Kids. Originally, I planned to knit the vest for PK2. After measuring the bottom half of the back on both PK1 and PK2, I decided that the vest probably will fit PK1 better. I’ll knit one for PK2 next.

Although the knitting is slow, I have adopted Kelley’s habit of listening to audiobooks while I knit. I’m listening to two books right now – Ken Follett’s the Pillars of the Earth, and Philippa Gregory’s The Other Boleyn Girl. I started the Follett book first, then realized I needed to “read” Gregory’s book for book club next Sunday. The last book I audio-read for my book club was The Brief Wondrous Life of Oscar Wao. I was so inspired by the book, I actually wrote most of a book review. I hope to finish and publish the review in the near future.

In the meantime, it's off to bed with me. I have a full workday tomorrow.