Last Friday, I wrote about slowing down. My subconscious must have been trying to tell me something because I ended up feeling sick and exhausted the next few days. That is the way my life goes. Just when I think I have mastered something, like slowing down, I fall flat on my face. I feel like I may have replaced one kind of busyness with another - especially as I learn how to manage this project.
On Saturday I spent most of the day interviewing a friends’ grandmother who is going to be 104 years old next week. It was an amazing experience and somehow very tiring. I came to the interview prepared with a list of questions and quickly realized I needed to put them down in order to help my interviewee feel more relaxed. So there we sat on my friend’s porch swing, gently swaying back and forth for close to four hours, chatting, drinking coffee, and watching my friend’s children and my own scamper around the yard. The interview ended when another couple joined us and we ate a late lunch together. I pretty much remained sitting next to my friend’s grandmother for another couple of hours as the interview process took on the informal flow of our lunch conversation.
By the time we packed up to leave, I was exhausted. My body felt tired from sitting in one spot for close to six hours and my emotions were on overload as I tried to process the experience of interviewing the only centenarian I will probably ever meet.
After my interview, I came home to an enormous pile of green beans from my mother in law’s garden, eight quarts of blueberries, and four bunches of basil from the local Farmer’s Market. All of it was waiting to be prepped so I could freeze it for winter eating. I felt overwhelmed but dove into the work of washing, sorting, snipping, blanching, bagging and cleaning up for the next six hours. It was a very quiet six hours. My husband kept the kids occupied and left for some quiet time of his own after they were in bed. I finally finished putting away my mound of goodies at midnight.
On Sunday I met a friend for coffee at 7 am and then volunteered in my church nursery. I came home and my husband left to pick up a window we special ordered from Home Depot for a future house project. He also made a stop to pick up a small chest freezer we bought off Craigslist to store all of the food I am attempting to freeze. When he got home, we immediately packed up and went to the beach for the day with a small group of family and friends. The evening ended with a round of baths and then bedtime.
On Monday, my husband left for work and I confronted a mound of zucchini that has been accumulating from various sources over the past few weeks - a few from my own small garden, a few from my Grandpa’s and a few from the Farmer’s Market. I needed to put them to use or they were going to land in the compost pile. Thanks to the evening air our house felt cool that morning but after baking four loaves of zucchini bread and two zucchini quiches, it turned into a sauna. In the few moments my kids were resting in the afternoon, I tried to write what was supposed to be my post for Monday on my site. Rest time ended and my post was not done. I finished a little more baking as my kids ran inside and out and then my husband came home.
After he settled in with the kids, I went to a nearby coffee house to finish writing my Monday post. I wanted to include a little video in it. It took most of the evening before I figured out how to get the video from my camera to YouTube and then embedded in my post which still was not ready to be published. The coffee house workers began flashing the lights, signaling that I needed to pack up. I went home and worked on my post a little more. I then attempted to go to bed but after a brief review of my day with my husband, I wound up in tears because I felt so overwhelmed. I couldn’t sleep and so I came downstairs and wrote until around 1 am.
Not surprisingly, I woke up groggy on Tuesday. After I got myself moving by drinking way too much coffee, I did five loads of laundry. Laundry always seems to take all day no matter how early I start. It probably has something to do with the fact that I do not like doing it and so I procrastinate. I proofread some of my writings while my kids were resting. I then resumed the task of laundry and found myself half laughing and crying as I contemplated going without my clothes dryer for the sake of living like Grandma.
Now it is Wednesday. I want to be as honest as possible about the process of learning to live more sustainably and simply. I think it would have been misleading if I skipped to my next post without writing about feeling overwhelmed. I want to make some significant changes this year but I am struggling as I learn how to manage this project - especially the website and writing. The problem is I am not so sure I would try to make these changes unless I was writing this blog. It is great accountability.
My year of living like Grandma is going to have its fair share of ups and downs as I learn to balance my goals with the demands of my everyday life. I can already tell my house is going to be a lot messier and the remodeling projects I want to get done are going to have to wait. This is an important reality check for me which entails a simple formula: with each Grandma Challenge I try, I will probably have to let another thing go for the time being or I am going to wind up feeling exhausted and overwhelmed all year long. It is all part of the process.
I am learning there are certain activities that make me feel more content and activities that make me feel discontent. Rushing makes me feel discontent. Shopping often makes me feel discontent. Exposure to too much advertising makes me feel discontent. Unrealistic expectations also make me feel discontent.
