In The Fast Lane

Sometimes all it feels like I do is go, go, go with nothing to show for all my 'going' at the end of the day. The house may or may not be cleaned. I feel like all I do is reach for something just beyond my grasp, getting tantalizingly close before it flutters away with a mocking laughter as the golden beams of sunshine slowly disappear with it. Reminds me of a verse in the Bible, though I can't put my finger on which one.

It feels like I should have 'arrived' by now, like everything should already be in its place and like life should be flowing on an even keel, but its not, I'm not, my family is not. Instead it feels like I've entered the greatest rat race of all, the one where nobody knows where they're going but they're bound with fury to get there. I guess I'm just not sure what I can do differently, but it doesn't really seem to be working right now.


Sure, I'm probably just in one of my moods, the depressed kind I get every now and again, usually when my introverted secret self hasn't had enough alone time or enough shopping time. My mom began 'fixing' my moods with shopping trips when I was 12. It was really strange, I would be happy go lucky most of the time, determined to be the peace maker in the family, which was difficult because as the middle child, and then KABOOM. Christina just couldn't take it anymore. (I went by Christina then, that was just before I thought of taking on a nickname.) As if a quiet fury ready to explode if something didn't happen Some days I tried to work it out on my own, but I didn't really know how, so most often Mom would just load me in the car and take me shopping. It wasn't always shopping for me, sometimes it was grocery shopping, sometimes window shopping and every now and again it was splurge a little on Christina. Those were the funnest, since most of the time I didn't beg my parents for something I wanted or really even let on that I wanted something, most of the time. That was the role of my sisters, I seemed to be more conscientious of my parents money than they.

So maybe that's why, now I love to go shopping to ease away the stress. Only now, there's a slight problem with shopping to relieve stress because now I'm not spending Mom's money. I spend my own and it's a lot less carefree than it used to be. Darn. like most red-blooded women I know, I really enjoy shopping. I guess I'll have to find some other way... hopefully.

Though I sound like I'm in a real mood, I am feeling better. I think it started around lunch time when I tried to arrange quiet time for my kids long enough for me to make lunch, only as soon as I would get the last child settled into a task then the first would be finished and I wouldn't have made any progress on lunch. It was like I was the bread tossed out to hungry seagulls as they fought over which piece, all gravitating toward the same one and squawking all the while. Insano, but I know its for the greater good- because if my daughter's not worth it, than what is? Nothing, absolutely nothing, because my daughter is the most precious thing I own.