No, actually, I'm not that busy.

With few things demanding our presence during the week and not much extra money to spend on things anyway, the pace of life is decidedly slow. Every commitment, at this point, is really a choice. The boys and I can spend an hour getting a $6 car wash, or make a whole morning out of making chalk soup and listening to free audiobooks. A trip to the donut store could equal an entire day's events. I actually do have time to make homemade pizza dough on any given night, or have a long talk on the phone, or just go to bed early. 

As much as it embarrasses me to say it, I'm really not that busy. 

And see, I almost added "most of the time" to the end of that sentence, instinctually. It's just what we say now. Life is busy. Crazy. We are in demand, and our schedules are always full of interesting, meaningful or important tasks. 

Why do I feel like a weirdo by admitting that I'm really not that busy?! 

Am I the only one who finds herself slightly exaggerating her busy-ness in order to fit in?

I'm learning that it's okay to admit we have space in the margins of life. As my wise friend Penny once said, you learn to sit with yourself, which is surprisingly hard to do. 

Here is my resolution to stop hiding behind busy-ness, and to admit that I do have plenty of time for things that are valuable. I'm resolving to honor people by letting them know I don't have to pencil them in, and that I genuinely look forward to spending time together with no rush and no agenda. 

Ode to what once was

Summer here is a tyrant. I've never much cared for it, so it surprises my how much intense nostalgia the heat and sun have created in my heart lately. 

I drive past the house I grew up in, but I can never go inside because another family lives there now. I'm in my hometown but feel like a nomad, because that world doesn't exist any more. 

You see, It's been four years since my parents sold that house, and two years since they have been divorced. 

I've debated writing about it so many times, but never wanted to sound maudlin, or to make my family's pain and guilt worse than it already is. When two people split up after nearly thirty years of a great marriage, only they can say what went wrong. 

All I know is that it has created a very bizarre, suspended reality for me. One where my childhood is completely disassociated with the present time, almost as if it still exists somewhere. It wasn't till after I left for college that things changed, so I barely witnessed anything to contradict what I perceived to be my family life. They've tried to make the best of it, and what else can you do?

Lately, though, I have been having these dreams where I am back in the old house. In my mind's eye I can still walk through each room and see things exactly as they were. The extent to which the details are seared in my memory is quite shocking to me. Do the new kids sit on the stone wall in the backyard and crack pecans with their teeth? Do they stare out the window and watch the lizards bask on the flowers my mom planted? 

If I had all the money in the world, I would buy that house just so I could turn that key one more time. 

Perhaps this is a useless exercise. All I know is that these emotions surrounding my childhood home are some of the most intense I am capable of feeling. These things never leave you. 

Is it vain to make a promise that I will never do this to my children? It is so easy to get disillusioned. We the young, with years and years of life ahead of us, brazenly making vows that are being broken by so many we love and look up to, even as we utter them. People so far ahead of you giving up, just as you're starting the race. Clay feet, everywhere. 

This is about a house, and about more than a house. As I mourn the loss of that world, I know in my heart that this is the way of it, one way or another. How lucky are those few whose ancestral homes remain an open harbor to them all of their life? For the many, what can we do to keep home in our hearts always?