Saturday, March 12, 2011

Anything can happen!

I've been thinking a lot about the time I spend with my kids. What is it spent doing? This weekend my husband traveled to a TESOL conference and left me alone to fend for myself. Of course, two days is nothing compared to a couple of weeks, or months, or even years. I know there's a lot of wives out there that send their husbands away for extended periods of time and manage everything on their own without complaint. And that's not why I'm writing. To complain, that is. I'm just looking at my life and trying to see us from a different point of view. My poor children had to help me out a lot more than usual. They had to listen to a lot more negative talk from me. They didn't get to have as much positive attention from me. I didn't get to have as much "alone" time. There was a lot more stress surrounding Hector's nap times. I didn't get to feed them as well. I had to rely on other people to help me out at church with Hector. And that's not easy for me to do. I hate panning my kids out. Everything felt a lot more fragile. My interactions with my children should have been more special and happy since they were some of the only interactions they were getting this weekend. I could make a huge list but to sum it all up, I wasn't prepared for what was required of me. However, I was able to realize at the end of the day how special and helpful and understanding my children are to me. If Jonathan were to have a job that took him away from us for days on end, we would be okay. I would work on being a better person. I've got great kids. They are just fine. I guess I'm just writing because I feel like expressing this satisfaction I feel knowing that they are healthy and happy and are able to perceive my feelings. I'm grateful that we can work together and grow together. We are all becoming less selfish together. You'd think that a mother of four would be beyond selfish at that point, but no. If you have a helpful husband, I think the "Me, me , me!" tendencies creep back in and only in looking back at times of trial do you realize, "I was being pretty selfish!"
Sherman prayed the other night. "Please bless Dad so his plane won't crash into the Burj Khalifa and so he can come home safely to Doha" To which Atticus responded "That can't happen. It would be too hard." I think he meant that a pilot would have to be stupid to do such a precise thing. I think that we've spoken to our kids a handful of times about the events of September 11th. I reminded Atticus of that and he realized that something like that could happen. Anything can happen.
Anything can happen. Next thing I know, Jonathan will come home tonight and tell me he wants to make TESOL his career. Who would have guessed?

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