Category Archives: daily life

Apparently I have a severe case of “people burnout.” A few days ago I posted about a lack of free time, and that’s been a problem, but a similar problem is a lack of “alone time.” I’ve gone without it for most of the summer, including evenings and weekends, and on Sunday something snapped.

Or dripped might be the right word. Our family was camping, and that’s always fun but a whole ton of work before and after, and on top of that there was a lot of socializing, and I had gone back to the tent for some alone time, to nap and work on a story in progress. And then my husband came up and said, “Kristin,” and I said “Go away,” and he said, “It’s raining, we have to take the tent down.” Which we did. Because otherwise, we would have had to pack up a wet tent and take it home, and somehow dry it, and it would have been a huge hassle.

Basically, all week I’ve felt like my brain has had the flu – mental exhaustion, emotional exhaustion, and immense feelings of resentment. It’s hard to think, hard to do work, hard to talk to people. So I’ve been busy taking my precious free moments to read books, play Katamari, and take walks. It’s helping. This morning for the first time I’ve been inspired and energized to come downstairs and write. Hope I can keep it up!

Long story short, dear beloved people in my life – if it looks like I’m avoiding you, don’t take it personally.

Cleaning out my files, I came across an old lullaby I composed while angry, frustrated, and tired – all those normal mom feelings the usually don’t appear in lullabies. This is to the tune of “Too Ra Loo Ta Loo Ral.”

Pretty little baby,

I’m feeling mad right now

I’ve fed you and I’ve napped you,

So why do you cry so loud?

After your nap in the morning

And in the afternoon

Why do you wake up crying,

When I’m so tired I could swoon?

It’s time to do the laundry

A million things to do

But now I’ll sit here rocking

Cause you’re sad and I love you.

WordPress now lets you view your site statistics by country. Here’s what I found out. Hello to everybody who checked out my blog and thanks for visiting.

In the last week, my blog has been viewed by people in Ireland, Germany, Indonesia, Canada, Croatia, Taiwan, Norway, the Ukraine, Belgium, Australia, the UK, and the US.

(This list is sorted by number of views, from least to greatest.)

Since Feb 25th, 2012, it’s

Iceland, Rwanda, Malta, Japan, Finland, Poland, Estonia, Bolivia, Costa Rica, Yemen, Kenya, Guatemala, Moldova, Pakistan, Guyana, France, Ecuador, Argentina, Saudi Arabia, Luxembourg, Serbia, Chile, Bangledash, Afghanistan, Lebanon, Hungary, the Ukraine, United Arab Emirates, Republic of Korea, Slovenia, Georgia, Iraq, Thailand, Viet Nam, Israel, Jordan, Italy, Macedonia, Malaysia, Russian Federation, Portugal, Belgium, Switzerland, Austria, Turkey, Singapore, Norway, Denmark, Peru, Taiwan, Trinidad and Tobago, Spain, Romania, Bulgaria, South Africa, Indonesia, Mexico, Croatia, New Zealand, India, Greece, Brazil, Ireland, Czech Republic, Sweden, Philippines, Germany, Netherlands, Australia, Canada, UK, and the US.

I really enjoyed last year’s Rumi calendar. I got to ponder a Rumi verse all month long, and finally, toward the end of the month, saw how it epitomized, shed light on, or offered comfort for some event from that month.

This year’s wall calendar is Alice in Wonderland, illustrated by Iassen
Ghiuselev. And January’s, with the title “Curiouser and curiouser!” shows Alice taking an Escher-esque fall down the rabbit-hole. What with the Egyptian uprising and my reading of Hyperspace by Michio Kaku, I’d say the calendar was right on.

“I don’t like your calendar,” my daughter said.

“Why not?” I asked.

“Because she’s falling. When will she stop falling?”

“Oh, I don’t know, she’s just going down the rabbit hole . . . ”

“Yes, but when will she stop falling?”

“Well, when she gets to the bottom, of course.”

“Yes, but when will she get to the bottom?”

“February.”

Well, now it’s February. “Sentence first, verdict afterward.”

Going through my Google Reader, I found this post about mothers talking to their sons about war:

4 Mothers Remember

It inspired me to make this response:

My son asks me questions at bedtime. He started asking war questions on Veteran’s Day – it turns out a teacher in his school had given a talk about being a veteran from Vietnam. Is the Vietnam War still going on? Did Daddy fight in the Vietnam War? Do they send kids to war? Might they send his sister to war? Did the teacher kill anybody in the war? How many people died in the Vietnam War – was it forty? Which was the good guys’ side? Did the teacher have to go to war, or did he sign up?

The next day, he and his sister took our “No Iraq War” sign, which has been floating around near our window since the war began and has long since been torn, folded, and covered with monkey stickers, and taped it high on the window so everyone could see.