Pathetic Revelation
Ok, so I know I still haven’t delivered on anything I promised almost a week ago….sorry.
Instead, I have this one comment on a startling revelation I had two days ago that was startling primarily because it struck as if it were a revelation.
So I’ve been trying to get our life back under the reign of routine and been doing well on recapturing what we once had (boys doing jobs after breakfast, reading Proverbs and a Psalm at breakfast, maintaining the dishes) but not so hot on adding the newer elements (reading between lunch and quiet time, reading after quiet time). So Tuesday I was attempting to get through the “school agenda,” but my desire for the good was conflicting strongly with my contentment with mediocrity. The wrong side won and we did “enough,” which was about half of what I’d planned (which was still less than what I intend Kindergarten to be; it was no Ideal Expectation).
Later that day I was thinking about it (because I was perfecting my Kindergarten plan…I’m hopeless), and it came to me with sudden clarity and force that school was actually going to take quite a bit of my energy. What do I do with my time now? Read blogs, putz around the kitchen, fritter away time in list-making that impacts reality not at all. So, my thinking had gone, dedicating a couple hours in the morning to school will be no real hardship. And my Kindergarten goal is only about an hour so that it won’t interfere with any morning errand or social engagement habits I already have established. But even this is actually going to require a revolution of my habits of mind. I live within my mind more than I live in the moment. So it occurred to me this week that even an hour of school is going to require me to emerge from my inner musings and self-absorbed focus and actually be 100% present with and aware of my children for a complete hour together. No room for the inner narrator, inner commentator, inner philosopher, inner detached observer….I realized that it will be an exertion for me to give complete attention to my children for a complete hour.
How pathetic is that? But it’s true.
Oh dear. You’re absolutely right. It could be a problem to be 100% aware and present during school time. I’d never thought of it like that before, but it’s so true!
I could have written this post. These are the types of thoughts I think whenever the idea of homeschooling comes into my mind. Fortunately, my little guy is only two so I’ve still got some time to listen to my inner narrator!