A Mom's Life

I never knew that Hell on Earth is a cold, icy, arctic tundra. January in upstate is a barren, lonely place. It makes me feel insane. Living here is driving me crazy. Living here is testing every patient fiber in my body. My days consist of dragging myself out of bed in the dark, driving to and from work in the snow and sleet, sweating in my boots and never feeling the teeniest bit of sunshine on my shoulders. I have determined that, like the big, fat, white polar bear I feel and look like, I should just go plop myself on an ice chunk and set sail. Yes, I'm grumpy. Living here makes the grind dig a hole into my soul. I imagine I've felt this way ever since I moved here but having kids, and I'd think being a caregiver to anyone, makes the winter workload a million times harder. For example, I don't want to wash my own laundry and I certainly don't want to wash the 8 other loads of clothes that belong to the rest of my family. Did I mention I'd rather run naked ...

Last January, for the first time, I considered and shared my New Year's resolutions. In preparation for today's post, I looked back at what I'd written a year ago, to see if I had any success keeping my promises and intentions. To recap, I said that I would: have a fit pregnancy (check! I gained only the recommended amount and had a fantastic labor and delivery), read more (semi-check because I still watch way more TV than I should), stay in touch (check! as I predicted, I obsessively check facebook and text message), be a better mom and wife (semi-check, again, as predicted, I swore and stomped my feet a lot BUT I think that I'm doing pretty good as a mom of two and Andy keeps me around for some reason), learn a foreign language and play an instrument(semi-check, I do practice my Spanish several times a year at a Spanish supper club but the instrument has yet to be conquered.) Looking back, I'm not ashamed that I shared these goals with the cyber world and I'm ...