Okay, seriously.

Let's be honest. Sometimes being a "stay-at-home" parent is complicated. It's blooming with happiness and contentment on one hand, and rife with scheduling and squeezed personal moments on the other. And there are the goals, the things I want to accomplish for myself and my family. Like, trying to write a novel during 2-hour stretches a few times a week. Or vacuuming the house in the morning and finding crumbs all through the hallway in the afternoon. It can start to feel defeatist. Like, where's the story now? Where did I leave off, anyway? And why bother vacuuming at all? Who the bleep cares whether my house is clean? Why not just live in a hell-hole and call it a day?

But I am on page 157. That's something, right? Making it there slowly, but making it there I am, Sam I Am.

And the dust bunnies are being held at bay by teeny tiny people carrying itty bitty guns attached to the psychic vibrations of my vacuum, which is calling out to them from the confines of its closet: I want to run screaming through the house and get it allllll! Let me out, the dirt is callllling me! I can hear it shouting now.

And things in life, as they are for everyone else, is a series of juggling acts. I am not going to be able to write today because I am making baked macaroni and cheese for a family who just had their second child. I am going to go upstairs and grate the cheese and cook the pasta and enjoy watching the white sauce simmer on the stove. And I'm going to be at peace with that. It is a joyful thing to be able to help friends. I hope the food turns out alright.

All the while, my little one will be sleeping, as she is doing now. And I hope I will always remember the feel of her hand in mine as we cross the street. I want to remember forever what it feels like to take her to gymnastics and watch her swing into a pile of foam blocks and crawl out like a wriggling fish. I want her to always trust me when she needs help, like she did this afternoon when trying to walk on the balance beam alone. And I hope that by writing this down I'll always remember her 2-year-old voice today as she said sleepily, "I'm going to wake up and see you in the afternoon." Then tucking her head in my neck she started singing, "I love you in the morning and in the afternoon, I love you in the evening and underneath the moon. I love you so much, mama."

Ah, crikey. Does she have any idea? My heart is still lying on the floor in her room.