The Best Part

Yesterday I started about a million things, none of which are finished yet. It was one of those times when you have so much you want to do that you can't stay focused long enough to do any of them. The same frantic feeling followed me into today and I resorted to making a list of things to do, hoping it would help me focus.

I finished my list, but instead of cleaning the bathroom like I planned, I put together a puzzle with my son, drew a picture of a castle and dragon, helped him color it, and dug a crayon out of the pencil sharpener.

Instead of starting dinner in the slower-cooker at lunchtime, I drove to a fast food place, let my little boy take as long as he wanted eating, and made dotted letters and numbers in his notebook with a crayon while I waited. Thrilled, he traced them on our drive to the city center where I did something that was on my list, vote.

My plan included an in-and-out approach to voting, but the line stretched down the hallway, through a set of double doors and almost to the front entrance. I spent my time there explaining to my son why Hawkeye was mad at Black Widow in one of the Avengers cartoons we recently watched, helping him trace more of his letters, distracting him by asking how many times he could hop on one foot, keeping him from hopping into the people next to us, and sending him on a search for letters. (He insisted on finding four of each letter. Thankfully, a man there had a hat with two H's on it or we might have had a problem.)

We finally got through the line. Then instead of working on a project I have going for Christmas, we went to the library. He picked three books about a bear, looked through them, put them back, and found something else. When I went to the front, he didn't follow. I back tracked and found him still sitting in front of the shelves of books. We made it too the check out and by some miracle didn't have a fine.

When we got back, my son had to shovel what remained of the snow, which meant he needed hot chocolate after. At this point my day was more than half gone. I started to get stressed. I turned on my music, and pulled up my "Uplifting" playlist to try and refocus. The first song was one of those songs you can't help singing to. I took one look at my son and the splatter of hot chocolate he'd sprayed across the table and scooped him up. Instead of taking a nap, we danced like a couple of crazy people.

Finally, we made it to the nap. I consented to read three books before I left. THREE!

I sat down to write my blog, which I'm happy to admit is on my list of things to do. I needed something good to write about, something happy and uplifting. Funny how everything we did today was just that. As I thought about it, my stress lifted and I didn't care so much that the bathroom wasn't clean yet, the clothes were still wet in the washing machine and the dishes weren't done. We'll still get to the list, but the best part of my day wasn't on there. The best part has brown eyes, a huge smile, thinks spinning in circles is dancing and gets crayons stuck in the pencil sharpener.

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