Underachiever

September 28, 2007

Boy, I gotta confess. Sometimes reading blogs is just downright demoralizing. So I've been running all day and haven't had time to read blogs or even read my emails until 10 p.m. And I don't recommend reading a whole bunch of blogs at once because some people have been just way too productive this week.

Take the mom who does this freakishly intense artist and composer study each Friday. Oh yeah!! That used to be me! I used to call each Friday, "Fine Arts Friday." Now I call it: "Yay! Friday!"

Or the mom who blogged about her day as she and her little ones who sat in the meadow amidst the late-blooming wildflowers quietly sketching in the nature journals. Hmmpf. I watched my little one watching his little friend pee against a tree in the city park. Now that's a nature study!

So I was demoralized for about a second. But I can quickly click off of those blogs and look at my day in retrospect. The sky was blue. The trees are just lightening a shade. My children sat amidst a swarm of friends while watching the play "The Magician's Nephew" at the theatre. I spent a delicious hour in the sunshine with other moms while our kids played in the park. My children laughed, and buried their toes in the sand, and sweat profusely. Later, we enjoyed an afternoon at horseback riding lessons with more friends, the smell of horses, and more blue sky. And in the evening, dinner with lovely friends.

And so. Underachiever is a misnomer, truly. I have not achieved today a mastery of artistry or a history of a musical composition. My children wrote no poetry nor memorized multiplication facts. But tonight these people of ours are content in their beds, the little ones asleep with their smelly feet and sweaty heads, and the oldest yakking away like a teenager (oh--he is a teenager!) on the phone. And there is a cool breeze coming through the open windows and a good book to read. Achieve: to complete successfully. A good day.