Mom On Strike

After years of riding the roller coaster of the frustrated and taken for granted homemaker, I decided to take action. Rather, I decided it was time for less action. Less talking, less nagging and most importantly, less doing for the males in this house is the plan. Yesterday I announced that I was on strike. This morning I awoke feeling incredibly rested. Interestingly I realized, this is what the rest of my family feels like on a Sunday morning as they sleep in and pay no mind to what will be served for breakfast, lunch and dinner, the day's chores including braving the crowds at Costco...and the careful, detailed "Franklin Planner planning"that takes place each Sunday afternoon in preparation for the week's responsibilities involving 5 individual schedules, cleaning, organizing, errands, meal planning-shopping, prep time- cook time- serving- clean up, school communications, homework, various kid related appointments like the math tutor and the doc visits for middle son's broken arm and youngest son's casted foot, paying bills, the dogs (dog #2 still battling ear infection), house maintenance, teen maintenance (until you have one, you can't yet understand that, in itself is a full time job), after school driving, and then there's my personal commitments which include volunteering at school at least twice a week, the shul and my work in hospice care...

Officially Day 1 (announcement came yesterday at 5:00 pm) . Awoke to what appears to have been an after midnight Gremlin party in my kitchen. Dirty dishes with caked on cheese and heaven knows what else, and opened food everywhere- including the almost full remaining bag of Boar's Head turkey breast that I bought pre-strike. I told my husband that the kitchen was a pit and he woke the suspected culprit immediately to clean it up. Culprit has now cleaned up his mess and headed back to bed. Bummer because when he awakens there will sadly be no turkey to eat. No bread either as he left that for the dogs to eat. Speaking of dogs, just discovered them drinking out of the toilet. They don't feed and water themselves. Mentioned the dogs were drinking in the bathroom to my husband. He was easily able to locate the dog food canister as it is in the center of the kitchen next to the dog dishes. Hope someone remembers to let the dogs outside in a little while or there's going to be a mess on the floor... Equally important , they hopefully remember to let them back in before someone registers a complaint with the police department. My personal plan for the day is cleaning out my closet, reviewing some hospice care materials, and curling up with the novel that's been sitting on my nightstand so long that I can't quite remember if I actually read it or not. Later, I'm sitting down and watching the Grammy's just like the guys sat down and watched the Super Bowl last weekend. And believe me you, no one asked if that would fit into the schedule. In fact, I believe what my little cherubs asked was what sorts of Super Bowl foods would there be. Hmmm... To be or not to be... the Mom on the roller coaster...? I'm done "beeing"! Busy, busy, busy, bee doing for everyone and too little participation from everyone else . So, that is the question and starting now, this Queen Bee is leaving the nest to the worker bees. Wish me luck or at least that I can wear blinders...