Writing a blog is a very personal, self- exposing, egotistical thing to do.  Especially a blog like mine, where I have a goal of being so brutally honest that it hurts sometimes.  But I enjoy it.  And it is a hell of a lot cheaper than therapy. 

Often I sit down with an idea in my head and type out the first paragraph in a flurry.  Excited about a new topic, a new tone, or the ability to just vent to those who care.  I usually get to about this point in my blog, get interrupted by a child – yes, Sarah, you can ride your tricycle around the house buck naked – or hit a mental wall and think “Where am I going with this?”

After tending to a child, making a meal and avoiding cleaning up a mess, I usually can come up with the next starting line.  And if I can’t, I do what I learned in elementary school about writing – just put something down on paper!   Yes, I was in school when we still used paper and pen! 

I flail around for a while, looking for direction and focus, attempting to do something that will make my readers stop and laugh or think.  Trying to stay true to my goal of being honest, I edit and edit until I think I won’t cringe in pain from it being out on the world wide web!

It is a familiar feeling, I think, which is why I continue to write while dealing with the chaos of my day.  Because my writing, I have discovered, is hauntingly like my parenting! 

I wake up in the mornings excited about the prospects of the day – most of the time, sometimes… ok – one day a week –  and after – strong – coffee, feel the need to hit the ground running.  I start 85 projects with the desire to finish them all and stick with my goals. 

Easy goals – like get through the day without putting my children on the front lawn with signs around their necks says “For sale to the lowest bidder.”  I’d like to clean the house – or at least keep it maintained in its filthy glory, make some well rounded meals that don’t come out of a can, or a cardboard box, and maybe brush my hair, or my teeth.  Like my blog, not impossible goals to reach – but certainly ones that I would like to say I have done by the end of the day. 

I try to talk the girls into french toast, egg with cheese or anything I can call homemade.  I usually give up and settle on waffles that I will find later in pieces in their rooms, yogurt that I will clean off the floor and question why I keep giving it to them or-  let’s be honest – popcorn that they are happily thrusting in my face. 

Is that not good?  Popcorn for breakfast? 

After dealing with the joyful, frustrating, irritating meal time, I find myself flailing.  Looking for direction and guidance in what to do next.  Roots to grab onto to keep myself from drowning in the attention seeking, Mommy screaming, new mess creating happiness that is my home.  I’ll find my self standing in my living room thinking “Where was I going with this?”

I stand staring at laundry, toys strewn about and kids that need clothes and think about my next plan of action.  I do what I did in elementary school.  Run for the playground and get lost in the joy of swinging with my eyes closed.  After all, that feeling is much like my directionless, unfocused, scarily gleeful feeling of parenting.  And yes, I was in school when there was still recess.  And swings.  And the desire to play outside. 

I look around in hopes of finding something for my children to do while I regather my inspiration to complete my tasks.  Something that will educate them and add to their development of good habits so that I won’t cringe when I send them out into the big, bad world. 

It is ironic, I find, that the same aspirations, apprehensions and joys come out of both my writing and my parenting.  And that at the end of a blog, or the end of an accomplished goal in my day, I have the same uplifting, half- cocked “I did it” grin on my lips. 

Only to be thrust into the next topic, or challenge and again ask myself “Where was I going with this?”