The Mommy Blog | Adventures from the Wonderbelly of Motherhood

Monday, November 27, 2006

Right now, as of this moment, who is getting the best you have to offer? Your boss? Your better half? Your child? Your pillow? Yourself?

It’s a good question, isn’t it? I ask myself that all the time, though it is a little crazy-making. I do it so that I can try to keep the most important and urgent things on my immediate radar, and let the others marinate until they move up the queue.

Notice that I said important and urgent. It’s a fine art. I can do urgent, and I can do important, but I’m really good at urgent. Urgent, however, may be finding out if that guy in the movie is really the same actor who played whatsisface in a different movie. Its importance is debatable, but I’ll be wondering about it obsessively until I know for sure. Unless it’s the new Bond, in which case I don’t care what his name is or where I’ve seen him before; I’m happy just to be there.

Yesterday I tried something new and bumped myself up the list. I sat and read a lot. I encouraged the kids to bust out their mad toaster skillz and get their own breakfasts. I didn’t jump up and drive to Daddy’s so Annikin could have the proper belt for his tunic. I didn’t run out and get a Slurpee even though one of my children almost expired pining for it. And I sure as shit didn’t move my daughter’s bed over by the windows and her two-ton dresser over to the wall. First you have to sleep in it for a month straight, and then give me a call.

I find I can give my best to lots of people in short bursts. It may be scattershot but sometimes it’s just enough. Some things only take a minute: a reply to an email, a post for another site (oh, crap, that reminds me: I’m late on the Intel Blogger Challenge), or a line of copy for work. And if I can switch the laundry in between, I’ve had a pretty productive thirty minutes.

But for the next hour, I’m going back to my comfy yellow chair to finish the novel I was reading yesterday and hope that the UPS guy shows up with my big box of books so I can sign ‘em and ship ‘em out! (Thanks, everyone, who’s placed an order for

I'll get to everyone in turn