New routines

The days have been a lot quieter around here with two kids off to college and only five at home.  How did we come to this stage so quickly?  The sense that I am missing something or someone is constantly gnawing at me. Five seems like a small number, but I still can't quite keep track of everything. I was late to pick up the baby at the sitters after an appointment because I thought I had time to run a quick errand.  And I completely forgot to pick up the fifth grader on Tuesday. She got left in aftercare for an hour. An hour. I didn't remember I had to go pick her up until her brother asked where she was when he came home from practice. Bad mom moment. Granted she had only had one full day of school because last week she had a week of half days, but I was in la-la land organizing photographs on the computer and trying to figure out some of our new technology (a new printer and an old laptop left behind by one of the college kids who upgraded his device).

Despite those lapses, for the most part we are resuming order around here.  When we returned from summer vacation and dropping the college kids off at school, the youngers quickly rearranged the bedrooms to establish a new layout in which three of them now have their own rooms. Yes, we have five bedrooms, a luxury. When the college kids come home, they will get their spaces back, but despite the clouds of dust the moving around kicked up, I'm happy about the arrangement myself. Everyone filled at least one bag of give away clothes and toys. Piles of dust and hairballs from under the bed spaces were swept out for the first time in a long time. No one can blame someone else for the mess on the floor. I cleaned out some of my clothes that have been hanging around for fifteen years, and gave away some of the baby's things that she didn't really wear at all because she grew a lot all of a sudden, and now we are feeling all tidied up and ready for the fresh start that fall brings.

New school and activity schedules are posted on the calendar. New folders and binders are organized for assignments. My desk is cleaned out and a large stack of papers has been either filed (i.e. stashed in a box in the basement) or recycled. I even posted a couple of a change of address forms for some financial documents that I hadn't yet sent in even though we have been in this house for a year.

I have this feeling that I need to tidy up a lot more than desks and closets.  The busy busy summer resulted in short tempers, gray hairs, five extra pounds, and a constant gnawing sense of loss.  Time, time, I need more time! The baby talks in complete sentences. The second child is off to college. The fourth child is in high school. What happened to the long days of summer spent lolling around the neighborhood pool or some playground while pudgy kids splashed and climbed, and it seemed that all we had was time?

I am still feeling thankful for vacation, for the opportunity to reset and refocus. We at least had a few days of nothing to do. Trying to work, albeit from home online, and keep up with the kids left me wrung out and anxious from all that I was failing to do.

Now that the house is quiet for a moment (the baby - I should say toddler - is napping and the kids are at school), and my class load has shrunk from four to one course, I can hear thoughts rattling around again. I made it to morning Mass one day last week. The toddler looked at picture books, and I listened, instead of listing. I missed having our big kids at Sunday Mass, but I was full of gratitude and happiness for them to be in their world.  I was grateful to see the other kids happy to be heading back to school.  Things are good.  I can think of a million little ways to improve upon their school, their faith formation, our routines at home, etc, but things are good.  For the moment: relief.  Praise and thanksgiving are again in the routine.