Tuesday, August 12, 2008

Goals for the Week

I would hate for my time in boot camp to be wasted, so my goal is to maximize the three-day per week three-week experience with additional exercise and a healthy diet. To that end, I should exercise today. Plan: run 3 miles. Reality: it's hot outside, my girl is on a play date, I got off of work early so I have some precious alone time, my thighs ache from boot camp squats and, most of all, I don't feel like running right now. It's quite a dilemma. (UPDATE: dilemma resolved. Tim just called to say he's getting off of work early too, so hey, let's go to the gym. What ever happened to hey, let's go to happy hour? Oh, well, gym it is.)

Anyway... goals for this week:
Boot Camp 5:30 a.m. M/W/F
Run 5k Tu/Th (I am running a 5k race Sunday, so I need to get some run time in this week)
Clean ALL THREE bathrooms, top to bottom
Mop kitchen floor
Do laundry. ALL of it.
Get transcripts done. ALL of them.
Be nice to Carlie.

I was very NOT nice this morning. We had a rough morning. She had day-two of back to back early morning dental appointments and I had to work. So the plan was go to the dentist, drop her at a play date, then go to work. This means in the morning I need to get MYSELF and my STUFF ready for work. Which means SHE needs to get HERSELF and HER STUFF ready to play. Seems equitable, doesn't it?

The girl who got two new bathing suits in the last two months couldn't find her bathing suit and I just about flipped my lid. I bought her a new bathing suit! Two of them! In the last two months! And they're gone? Her bedroom is a BLACK HOLE of laundry and it's making me insane and, hello, she is nine years old, so I do realize that the BLACK HOLE is not going to be properly eradicated without my assistance, but jeez... two missing bathing suits? Give me a break.

So I was in full-on lecture mode about being resonsible for our things and personal accountability and not living in a black hole while I'm sure all she could think is "BUT I WANT TO GO SWIMMING!!" In other words, lecturing for the sake of hearing my own voice more than anything else.

Carlie said, under her breath, "I wish I had a NICE mom." What would a nice mom have done? Would a nice mom have helped her look for the bathing suit instead of lecturing? Would a nice mom have gotten both her and I up a little earlier so we wouldn't be in running-late mode from the very start? Probably, a nice mom to begin with would know where the bathing suits are because nice mom puts your laundry away for you instead of making you do it yourself. I am at a loss. I want to be a nice mom, but most of the time I'm just a running-late, deadline-looming, no-clean-laundry mom. And, to be honest, even on a good day, I don't really "do" nice.

It reminded me of her kindergarten Mother's Day program. Her kindergarten teacher transfered away mid-year, and we had a new teacher. You can't imagine the kind of trauma this caused in the lives of the parents and children in Ms. Irvin's kindergarten class! Anyway, the new teacher was always looking for ways to get to know the parents, get the parents in the classroom, etc. He decided that all of the mom's should come to school and each child would read a little "Why my mom is special" thing that they wrote (or dictated) earlier in the week.

It was pretty comical. "My mom is special because she let's me have Top Ramen for dinner every night." "My mom is really pretty, with her makeup on." The kind of stuff only a five or six year old would come up with. When it was my daughter's turn, I'll never forget what she said, "My mom is medium nice." Decipher that as you will. Medium nice. I haven't thought about that in years, but I guess I might not even be medium anymore. Life is taking a toll, what can I tell you.

So now I am making it a goal for the week: be nicer to my nine year old daughter. Because nice is good. Because she is a nice girl, even if her room is a disaster. Because I am self-actualized and self-aware enough to know when I am being NOT nice and it's probably time I learned how to tame my NOT nice tendancies.

Where was this going, anyway? Oh, yeah. Goals: exercise, avoid crap food, be nice. Sounds doable, doesn't it?

1 comment:

Anna Whiston-Donaldson said...

I often wonder why my kids are so moody and then I take a look in the mirror. I am so NOT nice some of the time.It's easy to resolve to be nicer to them (and my husband) when I'm alone. Then I see them and get myself all worked up again. Ugh.