Lemon Sucker Scrunchy Face

You know that face your kids make when they taste something really bad? That scrunchy nose, furrowed brow, squinted eyes, lemon sucker face?

That pretty much sums up today for me.

Today was a lemon. If today was a used car, I would have returned it. Which is SUCH a waste of a beautiful, clear, sunny Spring day.

Part of it was out of my control, but most of it was a result of my stress level and poor choices.

Waking up to Terri Schiavo's death was misery - I am enormously sensitive and this has affected me to an unhealthy degree. While praying for the family and the nation and Terri, I also was praying for my own self to release this into God's hands and stop carrying it as such a personal, heavy burden on my heart.

Having dh work for 16 hours away from home - leaving before the kids were up and coming home long after they were asleep - was not fantastic.

Having more work than I could do even if I worked 12 hours straight without breaking for any reason was disheartening and daunting.

Cats vomiting all over the garage was just plain disgusting and took time to deal with. I consoled myself that I was not alone in dealing with a substantial gross factor today: one of my girlfriends woke up to her children spreading a carton of raw egg yolks and yogurt all over her kitchen floor. Surely that was worse, but I't not sure what the judging criteria is: cat vomit and raw eggs are just about equal on my Richter Scale of Hurl.

A load of white laundry in which a blue crayon evidently crept in was a delightful discovery in the washing machine this morning.

On the plus side, being home all day with my precious kids was fabulous.

But being home with my precious kids all day while also working all day and juggling the electrician, waterfall installation guys, Fed Ex delivery, our tenant, seven escrows, two home inspections, a pet inspection, Counter Offers and geotechnical engineering report, Home Warranty orders, a refinance lender who sent me no less than 8 emails and called three times, client phone calls and faxes up the wazoo... not so fun. In fact, straight out miserable.

My babies were so neglected today. My work took precedence. All day. I fought against it - I did only the very bare minimum to maximize my unhindered availability to LaLa and Joyboy. But even at the stripped-bare level, I was unable to complete all of my work which MUST be done before tomorrow. I really stank as a Mom and as a Realtor, and as a human being today. I missed attempted hugs from LaLa because I was on the phone, faxing, and racing to finish disclosures at the same time all done during Joyboy's nap because it is my only uninterrupted work time. After I was done with all of that I just put my head in my hands and cried, realizing how ridiiculous this all is if it means my children are being neglected and I still can't even put a substantial dent in my workload.

My baby girl was left sitting alone, by herself, with a distracted and completely otherwise-engaged mother working not 10 feet away, but unavailable, for too much of today. What message am I sending my child when this happens? What the heck am I DOING?

This "Super Mom, Super Realtor" thing is a nice two-dimensional concept. I certainly have the energy and intelligence to make it happen - especially when viewed from the outside in. I am professionally sucessful and somehow manage, by the grace of God alone, to miraculously pull this infernal juggling act off every day. But what about my kids? What about my conscience? What about my own soul thirsting for my kids every night as I drift off to sleep, knowing I did my best and it still was not nearly what they deserved? No one can straddle being a full time Mom and full time self-employment for very long before something must, by lack of human capacity, be set aside in favor of something else. And today, like so many days, my kids bore the brunt of my overwhelming stress. It is not fair to them. It is just plain not worth it. My kids need their Mama. ALL of their Mama, not the stressed out, tattered shell of me that is left over everyone else takes their bite.

I was a miserable excuse for a Mom today. I felt it all day long. I was desperately trying to give of myself to them completely, carving precious time to roll around on the carpet, throw balls, do puzzles, read books, cook lunch, and find butterflies outside. But those moments should have been the text of my day, not the punctuation marks. And they were interrupted by the phone, the fax, the cell phone, the pager, the doorbell, and the paperwork. Ah, the paperwork. My kids don;t care what takes their Mom's attention away from them - they just want their Mama.

And rightfully so.

A ridiculous element of all this is that, even with my dedication to work to the very extent of my ability, I still did not finish everything I need to accomplish. I sit here at 11:00 pm, working after starting my day at 7:00 am. And I will be up long after this, since I took this "break" to post to my blog. My life is tilting out of balance again. Do you just ever have days like this when you can actually, tangibly FEEL your priorities tiling precariously? I REFUSE to let this become normal. I will not surrender these sacred days with my babies to ANY cause, however "important" it is. At the end of my life, I will not remember what disclosures I completed today, how many financing documents I faxed, and what my listing fliers looked like.

But I will always remember the pleading look on my daughter's face and the hopeful sadness in her sweet voice when she came to me imploringly, saying, "Mom, I'm lonely", and begging to spend time with me. I embraced her and left my work undone on the computer to cuddle with my little girl. It was the best moment of my whole day, which overall sucked like a sour lemon because my act was far from together.

I am ashamed. And my heart is just throbbing with regret over the lost hours I misepent today.

I pray for a vastly improved tomorrow, to make better choices, and to get my life back in balance again toward the goal of having no more lemon-sucker-scrunchy-face days like this one.