Post Op. Week 5

Ah, week 5.  Tricky week 5.  Feeling better and getting tired of being restful and careful.  Now that I am more mobile and more alert I am noticing all the things THAT NEED TO BE DONE! And lacking the energy to do them.  So many things. I know that none of them are important in a life changing universal way.  That does not make them unimportant to me, or any less annoying to look at. Mostly I just try not to look, stick my head in the sand.  Being an ostrich is hard work though. All that denial. I can't maintain it for very long, too tiring!

 Realistically if I just set small goals I could probably do most of the small chores but I am lacking the physical strength to do the bigger ones.  I need a staff!  All the while I am sitting here whingeing about my weakness  and fatigue.  Annoying myself by seeking out the messiest, weediest places and clucking my tongue at them.  Slowly( or not so slowly) simmering into rage at the unfairness and at my own inadequacies. Not really very productive and not a lot of fun for my family.

This week a family in Doodle's class suffered an unimaginable  loss.   A cherished Mother gone suddenly. Boom.  No longer here to worry about dust bunnies or weedy spots. No longer able to sigh and wonder if no one else sees the dirty socks on the floor, that ring around the sink, or the piles of recyclables waiting to go out.  How? How is this possible? It makes no sense.  This cannot be anyone's plan.  Mother, wife, daughter, sister, friend.  Even as I miss her I can see her generous spirit and brilliant laugh flow so clearly from the faces of her children.  It could have so easily been me, or any of us. While I don't want to live in a mess, while disorganization makes me stabby and grime makes me itch.  I am not defined by the state of my house.

Good thing that, because things are a little out of sorts around here. Six or so weeks of household help means some things are not where they used to be and some things are undone completely.  More than a few items have just up and vanished. This is the part where popular mythology would have me throw up my hands and declare that I will never put off doing something fun in order to weed, or do laundry or plow through the boys rooms.  How the sudden loss of a friend refocused me to what is really important in my life.  Dust bunnies be damned! I will survive! FREEDOM! But that would not be true.  Those things that we call work are just part of being alive.  Doing them ( hopefully together!) is not meant to be drudgery, it's not all unicorns and sunbeams but it doesn't have to be be awful.  Losing a friend,  is traumatic and terrible and a catalyst for reflection.

So I am trying.  Trying to do a little more each day, trying to remember that not everyone cares if the sink is clean.  Trying to find ways to accomplish all the hundreds of things that need to be done and still have the energy to do the more fun stuff. Trying to be patient with myself and others. Trying to reach out to a family in need, trying to conserve my own energy. And trying oh so much trying to make sense of the senseless and to be content with my own strengths and weaknesses.