Quiet

It's shortly before 6am and everyone is asleep. I should relish this small slice of quiet rather than be annoyed than I am awake too early in the morning and it is fruitless to try to go back to sleep.

Quiet is something that is taken for granted. I see that now that I am a mother. I have always been a person who has enjoyed time alone to herself. As a child and a teenager I would spend hours alone in my room just reading or dancing, listening to music. I loved having the space to think. Today that quiet is something I have challenges achieving. I have always enjoyed writing poetry, however it takes a lot from me and a lot out of me. I am not one of those people who are able to spit out something onto paper and call it good. Over this past year and a half, having that quiet space to think has become even more difficult to achieve. It's challenging to find a healthy balance between what I need as an individual, and what is needed from me as a mother of 4. It would be selfish of me after I work all day to close the door on the kids, who demand my love and attention at that point.

So, here I sit.. listening to my sweet 4 year old snore in my bed. His eye did swell up and now he looks like he lost a battle in the boxing ring. Soon I will have to wake my 10 year old daughter for school, the first day back after winter break. I have "trained" her well... she will get up and make a pot of coffee and bring me up a cup. The quiet will cease as we start our day.. fixing her unruly, but beautiful hair... waking my first grader up and helping him get ready... getting them off to the bus and heading out to work, all while hoping the two little ones won't wake so their daddy can get some sleep after working graveyard all night. I plan on working a little bit of overtime tonight, however my husband promises me we will sneak off to dinner tonight alone without the kids.. a small space of quiet to ourselves where we can be Rodney and Janelle for an hour, rather than just Daddy and Mommy, before starting another cycle of getting the kids to bed then back up again for school... then so on and so forth...

Here we go.. the week begins..