The Tyranny of Clocks by Bonnie Le Hamitlon

I wish Patches could tell time.

If he could, maybe I could get some more sleep.

As it is, my day usually starts with Patches jumping onto my abdomen from probably my dresser. Not sure, because my eyes were closed, being as I was asleep and all. All I know is I get woken up more times than I care to count by twelve pounds of cat landing in my bread basket!

And when he isn’t trying that, he shoves his nose into my face!

Have you ever tried to sleep with a cat shoving his cold, wet nose into your face?

Not fun.                 

The worst part is he starts way before my alarm is set to go off! I have even been in the bathroom, after my bladder protested the twelve pounds of cat bit, when my alarm went off! “Patches, that 

means you woke up early.”

“Meow.”

I can’t tell you how many times I was already up, thanks to Patches.

Why do I even have an alarm?

I turned the thing off. Who needs an alarm when they have a cat? Or a dog for that matter?

I have had to push Patches away from me dozens of times, then when I finally give up, sit up, and grab my glasses, it isn’t even seven in the morning! Geez.

“Dang, Patches! It isn’t morning yet!”

“Meow,” he says from the window sill. I guess he’s trying to tell me the sun is up.

Blasted cat.

He doesn’t seem to understand that I was up late the night before, either reading or writing or usually a little of both.

It was worse a few nights ago.

I stayed up until about midnight writing then I got comfortable on my bed and did a little reading until around one in the morning. Then I turned on my oxygen machine, turned out my light, and started to drift off to sleep.

BEEP BEEP!

I sat up. My oxygen machine was making that noise, but that’s all it was doing, no air at all. A second later it dawned on me the power was out. I’d barely been in bed an hour.

I contacted the power company.

They already knew about the outage and promised it would be about an hour and a half.

I can wait that long.

I start reading again. Two hours later, there’s still now power.

I called the power company again. It’s going to be another hour and a half!

Dang.

I have to dig out my charger pack for my phone, the only light I have. And I keep waiting.

Finally, at around 5:30 in the morning, as the sun is starting to come up, the power comes on. Great. I can get some sleep now.

An hour later, Oof! “Patches! I just got to bed! Let me sleep.” I push him away and try to get back to sleep.

Patches doesn’t give up, switching between jumping on my belly and shoving his nose in my face I have no idea how often or how regularly because I have no desire to grab my glasses or check my phone.

But eventually, I sit up. “Okay, you win! I’m up!” I put on my glasses and look at the clock and glare at Patches. “You do realize I only got to bed like three hours ago, right?”

“Meow.” He stares at me all innocent.

I groan and get about my morning routine, which of course includes feeding him.

About an hour later I crash for a couple of hours.

When I wake up, it dawns on me I have a fully charged solar generator!

Why didn’t I go get that? I glare at Patches. “Why didn’t you remind me I have a solar generator?”

“Meow.”

“Yeah, right. I got that before I got you! How were you supposed to know?”

“Meow.”

“Yeah. Yeah. You don’t understand a single word I’m saying.”

I only wish he could learn to tell time.

The problem is, he can. He tells time by when his stomach is empty, because, obviously he’s a cat, not a human being.

Which is why all farmers hate daylight savings time, because no matter what the clock says, they have to get up and feed the animals, so six months of the year they’re getting up an hour earlier, but it isn’t really an hour earlier, the clock just says it’s an hour earlier.

Good luck trying to figure that one out if you don’t have pets or livestock, but the rest of us know.

Clocks have no meaning to animals. When their body says its time to eat, well, by golly food better be available!

Though knowing this might just add some fun to a story. Something to think about.

Anyway, happy writing, everyone.

There is a Season by Konnie Enos

Today, our Sunday school lesson was on Ecclesiastes. To start the class the teacher played “Turn, Turn, Turn” by The Byrds. I won’t try to quote the whole thing but go read Ecclesiastes 3:1-11. Then listen to the Byrds song. Turn, Turn, Turn

Between both of those I remembered a book I read years ago when I was maybe thirteen, “A Time to Love, A Time to Mourn” by Paige Dixon. You’ll cry, but you really should read it, great story.

Then I remembered a conversation last week with some ladies we go to church with. Last Sunday she was mentioning the recent marriage of her next to youngest son. She also, not too long ago announced her only daughter giving her a grandchild. The thing is her youngest son is about nine years younger than his next youngest sibling and he is only in middle school right now.

I asked her and she confirmed, all of her other children are now married and except for the one newly married they all have at least one child. One of the other ladies there commented she’d be an empty nester if not for her surprise baby.

Then I went home and was scrolling through Facebook. I happened to see a post by one of my cousins many children congratulating her and her husband on all their years of marriage. It included pictures, of my cousin, her husband, their children and all their grandchildren (counted seventeen). She has at least one still in high school and she once mentioned her younger kids going to school with some of her older grandchildren.

My cousin, like the lady at church, is in about her mid-fifties and still not an empty nester. Only my cousin doesn’t have any nine year age gaps between any of her kids.

Then there is me and my husband.

My prolific cousin is younger than I am by a couple of years and my five children were all born within the span of a decade. (My oldest will soon be 27 and my youngest turned 17 just a few months ago.)

In case anybody hasn’t counted recently, I’m far from an empty nest.

Of my four adult children only the oldest, the nearly 27 year old has moved out. She is in fact, as of this month, married for a full year now.

My second child moved out briefly but health issues forced her to move back home and she has been unable to move out or otherwise take care of herself, at least financially, since. She is hoping and praying to find the means to move out, preferably soon, but it hasn’t happened yet.

My next to the youngest, who turned eighteen just before last Christmas, insists he and his best friend are going to move in together just as soon as they both find full-time jobs and they can find an apartment. The job issue is holding things up at the moment.

My youngest son? One, he isn’t an adult yet. Two, he insists he’s never moving out. (Autism spectrum, he hates change.)

The only other child we’ve got is my youngest daughter. Starting in high school she began telling us her plans for college. At first she was saying she would move off to college right out of high school, but as she investigated her options she decided it would be cheaper to live here and start at the local community college.

She’ll graduate next May.

She’s been saying since she started at this college she’d move out and on to where she plans to continue her education as soon as she finishes here. HOWEVER, she has also, on occasion mentioned the possibility of getting her bachelor’s degree locally and still live at home for two more years. She hasn’t said she’d for sure be staying for quite some time but until she actually settles on a university, there is still the possibility. (After all we do have universities and four year colleges here.)

This all brings me to something my husband said the other day. “We could be empty nesters in the next year.”

After considering everything I just stated I concluded: Only if the three with plans to move out don’t have those plans thrown awry or they never come to fruition because, two, you never know what surprises life is going to hand you. AND three, if the one not planning to move out actually changes his mind OR we move out.

And then in my mind I heard. “To everything there is a season, Turn, Turn, Turn…”

Kind of funny that very song would be played as part of our very next Sunday school lesson.

Now tell me why I chose a fiddler on a roof for the picture for this post.

Smile. Make the day a brighter day.

The Best Laid Plans by Konnie Enos

Planning is supposed to work. Make a plan, follow it and get things done. The problem with planning is we don’t live in a vacuum.

You make a plan to do something and life will get in the way because inevitably the others around you affect whether or not you can be successful.

Take this month for example.

One, since we get all our money at the beginning of each month I generally spend about the first week paying all our bills and dealing with most of the finances which includes making sure my children get their money. Due to illness and just being busy, even this late in the month, I’ve barely managed to get the bills paid.

Then since it’s been about three months since my dog has had a grooming I had planned on taking her in since it is clear she is in need of it. Generally we bath her regularly but she also needs her fur and nails clipped once in a while. We don’t have the equipment or knowhow to do her fur so I take her in when she needs that done. Between being sick myself and just plain busy, I have yet to get her in.

I’ve also planned for several weeks to attend a local writer’s group meeting. The first week I thought I’d be able to go I glanced at the clock in my car as I was leaving the Quick Care with my son. The meeting was already starting. Considering how far away it was and traffic that time of night, I would have missed most, if not all, of it. The second one I myself was horribly sick. This of course was thanks to one of my children bringing a cold home from school.

  Then there is this week. Feeling better and finding it time to go to the writer’s group meeting I realized I had nothing stopping me from going so I just got up and went. It was nice to be able to do something I wanted to.

However, this week being the one I had to post I also planned on getting my post written well before Wednesday morning so I wouldn’t have to worry about while I was getting my kids up and off to school.

Yeah, it didn’t work out that way.

One, I wasn’t coming up with any solid ideas. Two, I simply didn’t have time. One child has been on my case to either help him with his homework or finish doing the finances for this month. He wants his money. Another child needed to borrow my computer to do either homework or something for school. And yet another child, currently hospitalized, wanted Mom. And while I was dealing with that I was told a trip to the grocery store was needed, again.

So again, my plans went out the window.

At the rate I’m going my son will get his allowance a whole month late. I doubt I’ll be able to get my dog groomed before her booster shots are due, next month, which means I have to get that done first. So putting that off too.

Being a mother is a constant juggling act and a never ending to-do list. Sometimes delegating works. Thankfully I have a daughter who can handle grocery trips when needed. It’s just all the stuff I can’t get anybody else to do that can be daunting. It can also put a wrench in my plans.

Back to the drawing board.

Smile. Make the day a brighter day.

The Flow of Things by Konnie Enos

I’m going to tell you the honest truth. Last night I had several ideas I could write about for my blog post. I really did. I don’t know if it was the hour (it was nearly 2 this morning) or they simply weren’t good ideas, but I couldn’t get any of them to flow.

I finally scrapped them.

Sleep. I need sleep. Then I’ll be able to think, write.

I went to bed. Then got up way too early to get my son up for school (he’s in summer school). I still had plenty of time to type up one of those ideas I had. I got him going then laid down to get some more rest.

Apparently my son, despite what he said, also got some more sleep. He missed his bus because he wasn’t looking for it.

That debacle at least got me awake. It also took me half an hour to figure out that he’d actually missed it. (I called the bus garage right away, I was on the line that long trying to find out where the bus was.)

So here I am, Wednesday morning less than half an hour before my post is supposed to go up and I’m tired from not enough sleep, plus I can’t think beyond the fact my son tried to get away with lying to me.

And to make matters worse my dear sister is complaining about how she feels every few seconds while I’m trying to organize my thoughts.

I suppose it could be worse.

I could have the rest of my family vying for my attention.

I’ve certainly been there. Trying to write and every single member of my family comes in and insists on talking to me interrupting my train of thought. But of course, I’m just on my computer, I’m not doing anything.

I could go on and on about family members who always interrupt me, who think I’m never busy and always have time since I’m ‘just on my computer’.

And now my post should already be up and I still can’t get the ideas to flow.

There are several things I should be doing.

Getting breakfast. Taking my medications.

Doing the chores I’ve been putting off, avoiding all week.

Doing the finances, because those always need done.

Getting a bath. Getting dressed. Though I doubt I’ll go anywhere today so I probably won’t do the last one.

And last of all, I could be editing my opus. I’ve actually been working on it for the last month.

In the end I just have to tackle one thing at a time and hope too many things don’t crop up to interfere with my plans. Because we all know life happens.

A child gets sick. A pet gets hurt. You run out of milk (ask Bonnie, that happens a lot around here). Someone needs a ride someplace. Or, like today, you have to write something and you can’t get a single idea to flow.

 Some days you just have to grin and bear it.

Smile. Make the day a brighter day.

Past, Present and Future by Konnie Enos

Time.

Last week about this time my youngest son was complaining about how slow the week was going.

Isn’t that how it always is? When you’re anticipating something time seems to drag by, but when you’re furiously trying to prepare for something it flies by so fast you simply don’t have enough hours in the day, week, month or even year to get everything done.

Here it is, the next to the last day of 2015. The whole year has gone by, in little more than a blink of an eye.

When I look back on this past year I can see some of the changes in my life.

With some effort I’ve lost between 50 to 60 pounds.

I decided I did not need my job but rather my family needed me home more than I needed the stress of trying to work and I’ve found I’m running just as much being a stay at home mom as I was trying to maintain my very part-time job.

I finally, with a great deal of prodding from Bonnie, and encouragement from friends at The Writer’s Chatroom, I finished writing my opus. All 150 chapters of it, and clearly the story can go on. Now the editing begins.

Considering the time of year that it is. My goals for this next year are to lose another 50 or 60 pounds, work on editing my opus and a romance I have finished, plus finish and edit my fantasy.  I hope by 2017 I’ll be ready to start looking for an agent for any and all of the above. Of course, I’ll still be writing more stories while doing all of this. I’d also like to make my saving account grow, hopefully better than I did this last year so I don’t end the year with empty bank accounts.

And, per advice from my Writer’s Chatroom friend Audrey, I’ve already broken my savings goals down into monthly goals (I only get money monthly so that works for me.) Now I have to do that with my writing and editing goals.

Then I have to work on my weight loss goals. Which I’m sure would entail actually adding exercise to my routine since I’ve almost got the diet thing down pat.

Anyway, that’s where I’m at on this bright morning, two days before the start of a brand new year. Now back to being a busy mother.

Where are you?

Smile. Make the day a brighter day.

Ramblings

The last two days I’ve mulled over what I could write about this week for my post and I actually got nowhere. As I sit down to at my computer to work on my post I still have no clue what to write about and while I should be focusing on the words to put here, my brain is tumbling over and over again on all those tasks I need to get done.

Laundry. Bills. Picking up my son’s glasses and getting my daughter’s new glasses adjusted. The cat needs shots, two dogs need their nails trimmed, and another one needs his tags renewed, the air filter needs changed, we have to get a new one. Hopefully my car will be ready today. Somebody has to do the dishes, probably me again because my girls are down for the count and my boys, well you try getting teenaged boys to wash dishes, by hand, and actually get them all clean.

And in the middle of all this my oldest has called twice in two day having a severe allergic reaction to something. So it’s looking like her sisters aren’t the only ones with severe food allergies.

Now I have a kid home sick from school, so I have to call the doctor, again.

Don’t let anybody ever tell you managing a household isn’t a job.

Half the time when I’m trying to do something, I’m “doing three things at once”, something I tell Bonnie all the time when she asks me why I haven’t done something simple yet, like answer her last question or check my mailbox.

Try talking/typing to someone through AIM while talking to someone on the phone and attempting to work on your own writing, or paying your bills, or whatever else you need to get done while four dogs are loudly announcing someone is at your door and nobody in your house seems to be making any effort to get to the door. Either that or the landline is ringing, which still means going to the front room. Oh, and you’re buried under your computer and a mound of paper work so getting up and getting to the front of the house is a production in and of itself.

(Okay, I’ve actually never had all of that happen all at once, but I’ve sure come close a few times.)

The one good thing about my strong attempt at trying to focus on writing yesterday is that I finally, after a month at least, wrote the next scene, and actually chapter, of my opus. I’m thinking I’m within six chapters of “The End”. I know I only have five events to put in and one of those is basically already written. So much closer. Maybe I’ll be able to get it finished soon.

Now to move on with another chaotic, perfectly normal around here, day.

Smile. Make the day a brighter day.

Time

Have you ever had one of those days, when you're moving right along, everything is going smoothly then you happen to glance at the clock and realize that Time was moving too fast. Suddenly, you didn't have enough hours in the day to finish everything, because just one thing was taking longer than you thought it would?

Well I've had that sort of month!

I'm not going to tell you how many times I've looked at the clock and realized that I'd spent hours more time writing than I'd planned. Nor am I going to tell you how many things I didn't get done when I should have because I was writing.

But this week I actually thought I was doing okay, and managing to get more than just my writing done then just a few minutes ago I realized what little writing I managed yesterday should have been on my blog post not my novel.

I did think about it, but I did that while I was driving to and from doctors appointments. It didn't do me much good, and I sincerely wish there was someway to slow down the sands of time, just for a little while, so I could get more done in a single day.

Until that's possible, I'll just say: Happy writing everyone!