creative.mother.thinking

I went to bed early, slept well and then decided to completely skip my morning routine. Guess who didn’t do much the rest of the day either?

I was totally captivated by reading „All the Rage“ (very good book but it is making me very angry) but it also changed my mood, of course. Add to that my ambivalence about Mother’s Day and the fact that I was completely convinced that both my husband and my son would forget about Mother’s Day and the result was that I basically snapped at my husband first thing in the morning before he had actually said anything.

He had not forgotten about Mother’s Day.

He got hit with my complete tangle of emotions about all the things, including getting flowers (I love flowers, but they are bad for the environment and costly, I could also buy some myself, but…) and that resulted in a conflict that lasted for most of the day.

Lovely.

He then went outside and re-injured his trigger finger for this:

I am also all emotionally bunched up about publishing and the gazillion tasks that brings and was very aware of the fact that Sunday afternoon is basically the only free time I have.

Or at least that is the lie I tell myself. I mean, I’m writing this at 10 on a Monday morning. This is free time. I won’t start teaching until three. And yes, I want to go for a run, take a shower, eat lunch and do some housework before then but still. No free time. Sure.

But yesterday I called my mother on the phone, we only talked briefly (I don’t send my mother flowers either, by the way), then my husband and I talked some more. I planned my week while he was cooking and then there was lunch:

Then I did the traditional, sitting around waiting for the boy to show up and for the perfect point in time to actually tart working on the thing while playing silly games and reading. 

The boy showed up pretty late for only a minute or so and we negotiated an earlier start time for bodyweight training. He is somewhat pressed for time at the moment as well because in addition to his studies he is also taking part in a War Thunder tournament and has been playing a role-playing game on Discord with friends.

So I had a little more than an hour for the actual work I had been wanting to do.

I spent most of that on playing a puzzle game on my iPad and then managed to finally insert a really ugly sign-up form into my author website. ::facepalm::

The boy and I did bodyweight training. I ate dinner while he was taking a shower. We watched episode 2 of the latest season of ‚Doctor Who‘. It was solid and fun, very silly in places.

I watched an episode of ‚Filter‘ after that. That episode was only silly, nothing more. That whole thing with the alpaca didn’t need to be in there. At all. I’m not quite sure if I’ll continue watching. I might also just give up and rewatch ‘Word of Honor‘ for the third time instead.

Then I did that thing where you sit and watch ‚just one more short video‘ on YouTube and went to bed too late.

I’d say I’ll do better today but I already skipped yoga and writing. But still. The day isn’t done yet.

My energy seems to be mostly back and I did yoga and everything but never got around to opening the manuscript.

My husband and I had a lengthy, productive and interesting conversation about teaching, students, guitar playing and such, then I did the dishes, we started a load of laundry and I went for a walk/run:

I might get a little better at running but then I’m endlessly repeating easier parts of the couch to 5K-programm. But still.

When I came back my husband was super busy making lunch and I sat down and cut up a few vegetables. Lunch was pretty late but very tasty:

Afterwards I read, ate chocolate and waited until my husband had taken his shower. I assumed he’d be done by 3 or so but he wasn’t. The boy came downstairs rather late as well, picked up his lunch and vanished again.

So in the end I managed to squeeze my shower in just before my afternoon writer’s meeting on Zoom. I did a lot of knitting, and I decided to abandon the novel I had started reading and start another one.

I had to leave Zoom early to meet with my family for another very good episode of ‚Columbo‘. We have now finished season 3 and decided to watch the next season as well.

In the evening I started doing my evening things, realized I was way too tired, had a cup of tea in bed, fell asleep sitting up, dragged myself out of bed again to brush my teeth and fell asleep.

So today I’m going to do all the things. This time for real. Oh, and it’s Mother’s Day here in Germany.

I went to bed half an hour late again and was mostly back to normal energy levels.

I did my morning routine but then went down a research rabbit hole right away. I still did yoga and meditated for a bit so I was okay with that.

My husband and I talked for some time, he is still very stressed and overwhelmed. Which stresses me as well and drops my energy. He also did have a morning student so after our conversation I opened the manuscript for the first time in days. And realized that I had switched POV without noticing. No wonder my subconscious had prevented me from writing on, I had to fix the mistake first. Which I did.

Then I did the dishes, listened to some wonderful music and then to something on YouTube while I did the weekly cleaning.

My husband met up with a friend for lunch so I made frozen pizza for the boy and myself:

I did not see the boy before teaching, though. I had an early start because of a rescheduled lesson. I think I might have found the reason that student’s motivation has dipped so much. Fingers crossed I found the right way to talk about it.

The next student was a no show but the rest of teaching went as planned.

Then I met with the boy for bodyweight training. Right in the middle the doorbell rang and a neighbor wanted to talk about lessons for his grandson. My husband dealt with that while the boy and I finished training and then it was finally time for dinner. I ate a little too much chocolate again but didn’t overeat quite as much. I’m counting that as progress.

I talked to my husband for a bit, read some webcomics and then started writing this post. I did Duolingo and my foot exercises, watched some C-drama and got ready for bed. The boy told me not only is Duolingo going full on AI, the artificial speech also doesn’t get the sounds right all the time. I already knew that it’s not the best language app ever but was always thinking that the app I use it better than one that I don’t. I’ll see. I did reset my Chinese progress that morning because the course had changed so much that I didn’t recognize a lot of the words and phrases. I am currently speed-running it from the beginning, skipping quite a few lessons.

I should probably focus on TrainChinese instead.

And now the weekend.

Let’s see, I went to bed a little late. Nevertheless I did feel more energetic. Wrote morning pages, my husband showed up to tend to the wood stove so I did yoga in the annex. We talked. Then we talked some more. I finished a sock, and this one actually fits:

And the rainbow stripes make my heart sing.

Then we talked some more. By the end of the conversation we were both very exhausted. We were also feeling better with each other again but, well, all that talking is tiring. In addition to the talking I had not only finished the sock but also ripped the first sock of the pair out (that was too big in all directions), cast on for a mate to this one and had knitted a nice chunk of cuff.

Then it was too late again. My husband offered to do the dishes (huge pile starting with lunch from the day before) while I was biking to the big supermarket at the other end of town.

When I came back with home there was a car parked in front of the garage. Fortunately, it stood far enough back that I could open the garage door and put my bike back. The car belongs to my mother-in-law’s sister and while I was schlepping the bike panniers, a backpack and a pack of toilet paper not only was I talked at constantly („Oh, am I parked too close to the garage door? Should I move the car back? That’s a lot of baggage!“ all while the garage door was opened, bike put away, door closed, groceries picked back up again, everything carried into the house, Then I re-emerged with the key to the mailbox, checked for mail and went back inside. Meanwhile the sister and my mother-in-law carried on a conversation between the sister standing outside the house and my mother-in-law inside in her kitchen on the second floor. From what I heard every second sentence was something like „I can’t understand you, the traffic is too loud,“ but that didn’t prevent them from going on for some time.

Inside our own kitchen my husband was pretty stressed again. He was doing the dishes against the clock while trying to make lunch. The pasta was already done but nothing else was really started yet. He began to tell me how stressed he was and how much there was to do at length. And did I mention how stressful all of this was?

So I put everything away that needed to be in the freezer or fridge, wiped all the surfaces, chopped two carrots and some bell pepper, put the rest of the groceries away, diced some cheese, listened to my husband being stressed some more, found a package of frozen broccoli on the wood stove while putting away the bike panniers, reminded my husband that he had wanted to cook that too, chopped some herbs, put some more groceries away, wiped all the surfaces again, helped to set the table, told the boy lunch was ready and listened some more to my husband.

All the way through lunch. But the food was delicious:

I ate two plates of this and then a whole bag of ‚potato snacks‘. As always the food did help calm me down but I need to find a better strategy long term.

I taught a few students and they were all delightful, then repaired the damage I had done to my author website the other day, decided I was too tired to do anything, came back to a kitchen that was sparkling and pristine because my husband had done another round of washing dishes while I was teaching.

I ate dinner, then decided to ‚just eat a bit of ice cream‘ and finished the whole pint off.

And here I thought I had left binge-eating behind.

Apparently not.

Seems I’m up for another round of building good habits. 

I started writing this post, did Duolingo, watched some C-drama, did my foot exercises and soothed my poor stomach with some chamomile-fennel tea and went to bed.

Today will be another pretty long day with some cleaning, frozen pizza and lots of teaching.

And then the weekend.

For no apparent reason. I did go to bed on time and slept well. Whatever.

I wrote my morning pages and then couldn’t make myself do anything – again. Had a somewhat earlier breakfast than usual and then started talking with my husband. We managed to have a 90-minute conversation that left us both exhausted and cranky and irritated that there had been no space to talk about things like what to have for lunch.

So I went outdoors for a little walk and run:

Yay, sometimes I’m just a ray of sunshine. Moving outdoors did make me feel better, though, and made me realize how much I was spiraling and catastrophizing. You know how it goes, first your fingers hurt and next it’s five years later and you’re completely crippled and unable to make a living. Or all that exhaustion isn’t really about sleep and stress but a tumor or a stroke they just didn’t notice when looking inside my head. Also, all my students will quit and I’ll starve to death. Husband and I will never be on good terms again.

You know, the usual.

As soon as I realize what fun things my brain is making up I’m usually much better. But it often takes me a while to realize.

Lunch was a little strained but very tasty. Well, apart from the lack of salt but that was easy remedied:

Yes, that is kale. And also yes, that is not quite the right kind of sausage but it’s what you can get here. Remind me to buy some the next time I visit my mother. I keep forgetting that I can bring food back that I miss besides licorice.

As I was eating chocolate during my luxurious 15-minute break after lunch my husband showed up again, all sad.

The I took a quick shower before my first student. There was lots of teaching but not for quite as long as the day before. And then I basically became a pile of sloth on the kitchen bench.

I ate dinner, talked with my husband who was in a much better mood, started writing this post, did Duolingo and my foot exercises (not at the same time), wrote a list for today, watched some C-drama and went to bed.

Today should be a little less cramped, fingers crossed.

Which is not unusual, and it will be followed by another very full Wednesday.

I might be getting a little better at going to bed on time but I am getting really bad at doing my morning routine. Morning pages do happen, the rest not so much.

I think there is a part of me that is afraid of hurting my hands when doing yoga. And I am so slow in the mornings that I feel like I don’t have time for opening the manuscript.

I woke the boy up early despite his new alarm clock, we’re working on it. He actually got to the train station in time but the train he wanted to take was canceled. The fact that he showed up a little late didn’t matter, though, because it turned out his lecture didn’t happen as well. So he turned around and came back home.

Anyways, yesterday I did open the manuscript after breakfast, did the dishes while listening to music, then left to mail a return package, get yogurt and buy all the things at the health food store. When I came back home lunch was already ready to be eaten. My husband made pancakes which always means eating in stages:

Since we ate pretty early I did have a nice break before my first student of the day. I used that break to fold laundry and hang up another load.

Then there was teaching. I had another break between students and used that to try and put a newsletter sign-up form on my poor author website. I did not succeed but at least I learned some things.

When I was finished with teaching at 7 I was completely wiped but the boy had asked about bodyweight training some time in the afternoon and I thought doing it on Tuesday might be a better idea than to run and do strength training in the same day again on Wednesday.

So, while I was completely exhausted and hungry – and the boy wasn’t looking much better – we did our hard 40-minute workout.

On the bright side I think the new pair of exercise gloves is actually helping, yeah! The gloves have extra gel pads on the palm that cushion the impact of things like pushups.

I ate dinner, the boy went to take a shower, I did Duolingo and my foot exercises and went to bed with a book and my cup of tea. I turned the lights out right on time, so that’s good.

And now I need to do all the Wednesday things, hurray!