Top 10 Reasons I Love My Job!

This week I worked at our main office for a day and a half and it was just enough to remind me what an awesome job I have working from home (and while I'm out and about with my cell phone). First, I have to give props to all my working mom friends who get to the office day after day, week after week and keep things going at home. I admire your organization and time management skills and the amount of energy you have. A day and a half was enough to make me feel like my world was falling apart so I'm not quite sure how you do it.

There's a part of me that loves the environment of an office, the social interaction, the feeling of productivity and contributing to the team, but despite all that I had to politely decline the offer to jump in full time. Getting a glimpse of what I am missing makes me so grateful to have what I have. I recognize that not everyone would like to do what I do, but here's why I do it...

1. No commute. Man, it stinks to watch that gas gauge plummet so quickly each day eating up all your earnings. The time and money I save by cutting this out of my life--huge.

2. Less rush in the morning. I am not a morning person so I love just focussing on one thing at a time..it helps me feel less stressed. Since I don't have to don high heels or do my hair to be presentable for an office, I can get the kids ready and out the door and worry about my own self later (which on days when I'm cleaning means much later--why get gussied up just to get all sweaty and gross in someone else's mess?).

3. The great work/home mingling of tasks. This one probably would drive a lot of people crazy and sometimes it's not great for me (like when work interrupts my family time--the other night, for example, when I had to clean up a flood at 9:30 at night). However, I recognize that my personal life interrupts my work life way more often than the other way around. I love that while I'm making phone calls I can do laundry or pick up the place or load the dishwasher--none of which gets done while I'm at the office.

4. Eating at home. This one is a big deal. It takes time to cook dinner--not just the prep but the cooking time and the planning time and the shopping time. Because of our evening schedule, we have to eat early (we're like senior citizens). If I worked out of the home, we'd be doing take out...a lot. It doesn't always work out for me to fix a home cooked meal every night...I do actually work at home, but those interruptions are the exception, not the rule. One of the reasons I make this a priority is that I like cooking. Someone else might say that they like working from home because they can keep their house dusted. My house will probably always have dust and I'm OK with that.

5. Smaller wardrobe. It's not that I like wearing the same outfits over and over, but doing so really saves money and time. Most of the time no one even sees me so I do not have to dress to impress.

6. Being home for the kids. I love that I get to pick my kids up from school. I love that I am not stressed when they are home sick. I love winter break and summer break and not having to take time off from work or having to pay for day care. This actually should be #1. That is totally the reason I do this job.

7. Working at the office really cuts into my blogging time. The nature of my job is that I do what I need to do to keep the place full and clean and maintained. After that, they pay me to wait around for something to happen: someone to stop by or call looking for an apartment, a delivery, a vendor needs to be let in, a maintenance emergency, someone has a question or need I should respond to, etc. If nothing happens, I get paid anyway. Stuff used to happen all the time. I worked very hard to get to the point where stuff doesn't happen as much. When stuff doesn't happen, I blog.

8. Most of my income is not taxable. I know that's a weird thing to like about your job, but when you consider how much of your income goes to taxes, it's kind of a nice benefit. Of course, it's a little disconcerting how much less I make now than before I had kids, but if I don't compare myself to my ivy-league educated peers, I really don't care. And if I compare myself to what I used to make as a full-time, stay-at-home mom then my little salary looks pretty good. Free rent is a huge savings to our family and that is money in the bank...well, not really in the bank, but money to pay our student loans, which is a good thing for us.

9. I can work anywhere. This has more to do with the invention of the cell phone than anything. When I first started and they asked me if I wanted my calls to go to my cell phone or home phone that was a no-brainer. As long as I have that little puppy, I can work at the store, at the park, at the pool, at the gym, at my kids' school, wherever! So if someone calls and needs me, I say, "OK, I'll be there in 5 minutes." Snazzy. It's not convenient to be interrupted, but who gets to volunteer at school during the work day?

10. I have learned to be alone. I don't always like this. Being alone does not fit my personality, which is why I love Facebook--it makes me feel like I am interacting with people when I can't actually interact with people. I used to feel really lonely and isolated working from home. People energize me so I can get kind of lazy and depressed if I isolate too much. So far, this is not looking like a positive so let me get to the good part. The down side of my extroversion is that I can fill my life with people and activity to the point that I never experience silence and solitude. Without silence and solitude, no matter how "filled up" I am by people, I will never be filled up by God because I can't hear the still small voice He uses to speak to me. This becomes super obvious to me when I have zero silence and solitude for an entire summer when the kids are home. My soul starts to shrivel and I have no peace. Being alone has been very, very good for my soul.

OK that's my list. It's not in order. I realize that some of the stuff could be combined, but then it would not be a top 10 list so work with me here. I truly hope that you can take some time to reflect on the benefits of your job. I find being grateful to be good for my attitude (like when I have to do the really stinky parts of my job). Rejoice today in your lot in life!

"Before" Photos

Today I thought it would be fun to load my "before" pictures from a few years ago when Bo and I were going to do P90X to get in shape. There are no "after" pictures because we didn't last all that long. We couldn't figure out a place to put a pull up bar in our apartment and then people moved in downstairs from us and we felt bad doing all that jumping around on their heads at 6:00am. I know, I know, excuses, excuses. We have a lot of them. But this picture is what I'm talking about. Maybe I don't have a lot of muscle definition and maybe I have some extra skin around the belly from bearing two children, but I look at the "before" picture and I think, "If I am exercising to see a great impact on my body then there's going to be a lot of pain for not much gain."

So maybe I will write my before statement and post it on the fridge. Something like...

When I don't exercise I feel...

Tired

Weak

Cranky

Sluggish

Lazy

Like a bear could overtake me in 5 seconds flat

In 90 days I will rewrite my statement. I hope it says...

Energized

Strong

Cheerful

Quick

Motivated

Fast as a cheetah for one minute

The Downside of Skinny

I am already anticipating the scathing comments I could receive just by saying there is one problem with skinniness. Kind of like that article I read on Yahoo about how living on $50,000 a year is like living on minimum wage because you have to pay for dry-cleaning and massages because it's so stressful. Actually, I'm pretty sure that by the end of writing this, I will hate it myself so just relax and let me get it out. This is my free therapy, remember?

Lest you think me a total whiner, allow me to disclose some of the enormous benefits of being skinny:

1. Finding good stuff left on the clearance rack.

2. I don't have to count anything when I eat. This is a big deal for someone like me who has a hard time keeping track of things. Weighing things, counting calories, points or carbs would really stress me out.

3. Fitting into awesome hiding spots in hide & seek.

4. No problem squeezing into tight spots at work (like when I have to clean behind refrigerators and washing machines--super handy).

5. Sitting in the middle seat on an airplane causes me no stress.

6. People make all kinds of positive assumptions about me, even if they aren't true.

I'm sure there are endless benefits of being skinny, but it's #6 that I would like to address today. While I find it a definite benefit that people automatically assume that I am energetic and hard working and athletic, none of these are particularly true of me. Believe me, I like being given the benefit of the doubt. I would much rather have people start out with a positive assumption rather than my friends who are actually energetic, hard working and athletic (or at least in decent shape...I'll explain what I mean by that in a minute), being assumed that they are lazy and undisciplined because of their build.

Don't say you are free from stereotyping. Even kids do it. One boy announced to his class at school that I teach him basketball. Mind you, there is no way I have ever taught him one single thing about basketball because I, in fact, know nothing about it. It's actually my husband who teaches kids about basketball. All I do is stand next to him looking like I could play basketball and it works some kind of Jedi mind trick on them. ("Ooh. She's skinny and above average height for a woman, she must be a basketball player.")

Ok, ok, you might be one of those skinny people who worked really hard to become so and you'd like to take credit for it. That is fabulous and I applaud you. But not every skinny person is self-made. Some of them were born and, by the grace of God, are not subject to a struggle with weight and food. That would be me. But let me tell you that I battle the demons of laziness, discipline and self-control all the time. You just can't see it. (And let me clarify that I do not believe that all fat people are lazy, undisciplined and lack self-control--that's NOT what I mean. Sheesh, I know I'm getting myself into big trouble on this one.)

Before I dig a hole too deep to ever climb out of, let me just get to the point. Here's the downside, for me, of being skinny:

I have no motivation to exercise.

OK, I know what you are thinking, "Really, that's your downside?"

Yes, that's it. Believe me when I say that I am flattered when people look at me and assume that I am a runner, but I would much rather be a runner because then I could run without sucking wind so hard I think I'm going to pass out. Truth is, just because you're skinny does not make you in shape.

If I were being chased by a hungry animal I could out run it for about 5 seconds. I'd like to increase that to at least a minute or so just so that I would have time for my life to flash before my eyes before the thing chews open my jugular. Call that the weirdest fitness goal you've ever heard, but that is my goal.

Now my sister thinks you can't really be fat and in shape. Her theory is that you can be fat and strong but not really fit. I tend to disagree. I know plenty of overweight people who could outrun me any day, and they could definitely beat the crap out of me (and I don't mean by sitting on me). And they are way more disciplined about exercising than I am. I am skinny but not fit. My sister also tells me that she would rather be skinny and out of shape than fat and in shape. I totally agree, BUT what about being skinny and in shape? Wouldn't that be the best?

OK so what I just figured out is that there really is no downside to being skinny, all that is for me is a really lame excuse to be lazy in the area of exercise. I mean, just because my goal is not weight loss, does not mean I can't have other goals.

So here are my 2012 motivations for exercise:

I would like to participate in a friendly game of soccer without having to play goalie the whole time because I can't keep up with my super athletic husband and children. Ok that one will probably never happen. Scratch that. I need to keep my goals realistic.

I would like to not throw my back out when giving my kid a piggy back ride to his room.

I would like my backside to not jiggle. Hey--just because there's not a lot there does not make it any less jiggly.

I would like more energy and to be less crabby. I've heard that regular exercise helps with these things. Wouldn't my family just love it if I did not throw the regular hormonal temper tantrum? I think so.

I would like to out-run a wild animal for one minute before I die.

These are the things I will train for. I have found my motivation.

Darn it. Now my title is trash, but I can't change it now because "finding my real motivation to exercise" is a super lame title for a blog. Oh well, leave your scathing comments below. I'm ready for them.

Santa and the Separation of Church and State

First, I want to say that I love my kids' school. I love their teachers. They are wonderful and these thoughts are not a criticism of them at all. I am not mad. I feel no need to complain about anything they have said or done. It's all good.

However, the whole Santa issue has made me come to the realization that the separation of church and state is a really good idea.

We live in a small school district where holidays are still celebrated. I like that. I think it's kind of weird not to acknowledge what most kids are experiencing in their lives. Roy came home from school with a Kwanza candle holder he had made (I'm sure there's a name for it...displaying my ignorance.) and I'm really good with that. I want my kids to know about what goes on in the world outside their tiny bubble. I'm not mad that there wasn't also a unit about Jesus' birth. My kids already know about that. Teaching them is my job.

What I think is strange is that teachers are so pro-Santa as if everyone teaches their kids that Santa is reality. I mean, I get why teachers don't spoil the fun for the ones that do. I'm not saying that teachers should out the parents and the whole charade, but to be totally Santa-focussed is almost a form of religious-persecution for the poor kids who have been told the truth that Santa is make-believe.

I mean, it would be one thing if they presented the religion of Santa as a belief as they would any other belief system...i.e. Christians believe such and such, Jews believe thus and thus, Hindus believe whatever, Santa followers believe that a big fat man in a red suit is the one who brings your presents on Christmas etc., but they don't present it that way at all. Instead, the teachers have kids write letters to Santa. Teachers say things like, "I hope Santa isn't watching you right now." (Fact, although I will never reveal where I heard this.) They give out Santa gifts. It's all Santa for the month of December.

This has turned one of my kids into an anti-Santa evangelist. We are not anti-Santa, but we have taught our kids that Santa is a myth and something parents play with their kids at Christmas time. We have told them it's not their job to tell kids that their parents are wrong. However, I kind of feel that the constant barrage of Santa propaganda probably made my scrappy son feel backed into a corner where he felt the need to fight his way out.

Today, one of his friends tattled on him to me. "Sarah, he doesn't believe in Santa." As if to say, "Can you believe that? Tell him he is wrong!" I wanted to defend my son but I also didn't want to ruin the whole game for him and his family so I said, "Do you think you can still be friends even though you don't believe the same things?" He said he thought they could.

When an entire group of adults goes to such great lengths to convince my child of something that no one believes to be actually true, it makes me glad that teachers are not allowed to try to convince my child of a belief system that they do actually believe to be true. I mean, I think that people get all bent out of shape about the separation of church and state because they assume that everyone is a Christian and that their kids' teachers would be teaching them Christian principles. But what if my kid's teacher is an atheist? We live in a country where hiring decisions are not based on religion so this is entirely possible. Do I want my child, in a public school, to be taught that there is no God? I really don't. So I think the same can be true of a parent who is an atheist in regard to Christian beliefs.

Frankly, I feel that my kids' spiritual education is my job. Actually, all of their education is my job, however, I am totally OK with getting lots of help from the amazing educators in our public school system. I don't expect them to do it for me. Take reading, for example. I do my job by reading to my kids for hours and hours, introducing new vocabulary, exposing them to tons of books and listening to them read. The mechanics of reading and all those tricky grammar rules, they have learned from teachers. How about math? They pretty much taught themselves by playing and watching sports, but all the rote practice is enforced by teachers. I'm pretty sure that my kids' teachers do not have to love Jesus in order to be awesome at helping my kid learn to read and do math.

When it comes to enlisting help with our kids' spiritual education, we found people who love Jesus. We have a great church community with other families we trust and our kids know. They have Sunday School teachers and pastors and other adults who encourage them in their budding faith. But I don't expect these people to do my job.

In Deuteronomy 5, God gives the people the 10 commandments. Then in chapter 6, Moses tells them that these commandments are to be upon their hearts and that they are to impress them on their children (or teach them diligently to their children). He goes on to say, "Talk about them when you sit at home and when you walk along the road, when you lie down and when you get up." Basically, teaching our kids about God is supposed to be an all the time thing that happens in families. God didn't say, "Send them to school so they can learn about me." No, he tells us to do it.

I'm really not bent out of shape about Santa at school. And no, I did not tell my son that he is facing religious persecution because of his unbelief...that's just me being melodramatic. But it did give me some small peek into the life of someone who might hold a different view than the majority and an appreciation for letting parents be the teachers.

Book Review--Where the Pink Houses Are

If you are looking for a reason not to do any housework, go ahead and start this book. If you have too much work to do, wait until you have a day off. You will not be able to put it down!

If you have a Kindle you can download it today. If you have a Nook, you can still download it today through WestbowPress.com as a pdf.

Brenna is a tragic character being both an orphan and young widow. Following her former mother-in-law to Ireland promises to be a needed escape and change of scenery in an otherwise lonely existence. Besides, her mother-in-law is the only one Brenna has left. Where Anna goes, Brenna goes.

The last thing on her mind is love, but apparently her beauty is irresistible and the local lads are drawn to her charm. A short term vacation turns into an extended stay and Brenna learns to forge friendships and navigate a painful new relationship that is wrought with drama.

Brenna's budding faith is growing, but so is the emotional turbulence that leads to a life-changing decision akin to watching a train wreck. This is my favorite kind of story, however. There's plenty of real-life mess with a hefty dose of redemption. It might seem too good to be true, but if you don't want a happy ending, you can watch the evening news.

In full disclosure, this book was recommended to me by the author, Rebekah Ruth, who was going to be a friend of mine in Buffalo had we not moved to Omaha, but through the wonderful invention of Facebook is a cyber friend whom I can observe, admire and support from afar.

http://www.amazon.com/Where-Pink-Houses-Are-ebook/dp/B006K8XPYO/ref=sr_1_1_title_1_kin?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1323748143&sr=1

Confessions of an Email Hoarder

Wow. It's so obvious now, but why it has taken me so long to reach this conclusion is a mystery. I've already confessed my natural tendency toward hoarding so it's not all that surprising actually, but I really thought that I had licked it pretty good. No one would walk into my domicile and accuse me of hoarding. I do a pretty good job of getting rid of stuff so it doesn't overtake the few bits of space that we need for wrestling matches.

But today, I was called out by a complete stranger for email hoarding.

When Yahoo switched to unlimited data storage it was the best and worst thing that could have happened to me. On the one hand, it's awesome that you don't have to delete large documents, photos, etc. to make sure that your emails don't get bounced. Remember those days? Someone would send a few pictures and you'd be done for. Don't even try to go away for a week without clearing the Inbox...you'd might as well have fallen off the face of the earth to anyone trying to reach you.

On the other hand, I completely gave up the discipline of deleting emails. Other than the obvious ones that I don't even open--special offers I'm not interested in, lists I joined and haven't bothered to unjoin and other random junk that I don't have time to read, I pretty much just left everything in my Inbox.

I kept thinking that I would go back and organize them--you know, save important things in well labeled folders and delete the ones I now realize I didn't need to save. The trouble is that every day this task becomes more and more daunting, because the number of emails to sift through grows and grows and grows.

This has been on my invisible to-do list for years (you know the one you have running in the back of your mind that if you ever get a big chunk of time to do something you should probably work on?). Do you want to know how many emails I've been hoarding? I'm not sure I can tell you. It's kind of like divulging your weight, only most people can't really guess just by looking at me.

17,000

Apparently that's a big number. The guy at the Apple Store flat out called me an email hoarder. To my face. That's when I realized that I do have a problem.

At first I fished for excuses..."I know, I really need to go through them because there might be something important in there."

"Don't you think you could safely delete everything prior to say, 2005?" he politely asks.

"There's no way I have emails from before 2005..." I stammer.

"Let's check," he innocently suggests.

Yeah, my problem goes back all the way to 2001. Do the math--that's 10 YEARS of email hoarding gone unchecked. Seriously. This is embarrassing.

"Maybe I just need to delete them all and start fresh," I say hopefully.

"That's a great idea," he affirms.

"But what if I die? Wouldn't someone want to comb my emails for all of the wonderful things I've written and had written to me?," I'm grasping.

"If you die, I'm sure the first thing your family will do is read through 10 years of junk mail that you never deleted," he says, not unkindly.

"But some of them contain addresses, you know for those Christmas cards that I haven't sent in 5 years," I defend gallantly. Then I realize that in 10 years, that person has probably moved 3 times.

I want you to know that I came home and deleted them all. I didn't even look them over first. There was probably something very important in there that I will be screwed without. My life may end without a trace of evidence that people loved me enough to send me email. But my invisible to-do list just got shorter. I'm feeling a little lighter now.

I'm sorry if you ask me for information that I no longer have. I really don't think there was any other way. I am committed now to clean out my Inbox daily so that this never happens again. Feel free to ask me how it's going. I'm sure I can use the accountability. (A 10 year old habit may be hard to change.)

The truth hurts, but the truth can also set you free. On to my real to-do list now...

Why I May Never Move Out--My 1st top 10 list

Lest you think my stories about crazy people mean that I am dying to get out of this place, I wanted to shed some positive light on our living situation. You may already know that we live here rent-free, which is an obvious benefit. I mean, things would have to be pretty darn bad, or our financial situation would have to miraculously change in order for us to even think about moving. Plus, I told Bo when we moved here that I'm not moving again unless we can afford movers. I happen to know that we can't afford movers yet, so I'm setting down roots.

However, I happen to find apartment living desirable for a number of reasons that have nothing to do with the fact that it's free for us (though not really free since I have to earn my keep).

Here's my top 10 list of reasons to like apartment living:

1. It's cheaper than a house. Even if you don't get free rent, apartment living is definitely cheaper. At first, it might seem comparable since some fancy places do charge an arm and a leg, but once you consider utility costs, apartments win hands down. Our highest gas bill last winter (which runs our heat) was $42. That's just ridiculous. If our electric bill is $100 we have a heart attack.

2. It's greener. The other great part about low utility costs is that it also means we are not consuming as many natural resources as when we heated & cooled a house. This gave me great consolation in the early days before I lobbied for a recycling service (no recycling would be a huge down side of apartment living for me, but being the manager means I can fix that!).

3. Noise. It's not a lot of noise, but enough to know that people live around me. Our apartments are very quiet, but I can still hear my neighbor come home and the guys downstairs playing video games. I'm not quite sure why I like it. Maybe it assuages my guilt that we are super noisy so I like it when I can hear other people too. Maybe it just makes me feel not alone in a world of isolation.

4. Bumping into neighbors. We don't exactly have the most social of atmospheres (we don't have a club house or any gathering place, plus there is a wide range of people who live here it's not like there is some kind of affinity group sprouting up), however, I like seeing people in the hallways or in the parking lot or at the mailboxes. Since I know everyone I always say hello and get all nosey about their business. This would probably be true of me wherever we lived, but when people in a neighborhood can drive directly into their attached garage it's harder for me to corner them.

5. Forced simplicity. I am part slob (from my dad), and part hoarder (from my mom). I should say that's whom I would be in my most natural state. I used to have a really hard time getting rid of things, but living in 1000 square feet while trying to maintain some semblance of family order, purging is a skill that I have developed for survival. Also, my office used to be the absolute pit of our house--the dumping ground for everything I didn't know what to do with. Now my office is part of our kitche-offi-dini-living room. I have had to learn to organize paper and not let piles run rampant. Since we have less stuff, my inner slob has less to mess up.

6. Less cleaning. I've finally come to terms with the fact that I will never be a clean freak. I might as well just admit it and stop beating myself up all the time. The beauty of apartment living is that when I do finally suck it up and clean the place (never all at once--I could never be that focussed), it really doesn't take that long. I can vacuum every room without moving the cord for crying out loud. How hard can it be? (It still is kind of hard because I would really rather do just about anything than actually clean.)

7. No maintenance or yard work. When something breaks, I don't have to stress out about coming up with the money to fix it. Now, in my situation I do have to make sure it all gets done and I do plant flowers and rake leaves from time to time, but for the most part we do not have to factor yard work into our family equation. If we're still here when the kids get old enough to start mowing, I envision hiring them to do it so that they will learn how and have some responsibility, but if they decide to get a job doing something else, so be it.

8. I never have to throw out left overs. Furnace filter day is when I get to spy on all of my neighbors and see what goes on behind all those closed doors. What I've discovered is that some people live even more simply than we do. Way more simply. In fact, you don't really need much of anything to live as it turns out. Some people don't even have food. I don't go peeking in cupboards or anything, but you can tell by the trash bin overflowing with take-out containers that there is nothing like cooking going on in that kitchen. I don't offer my left overs to just anyone, but when I know that someone never eats a home cooked meal, they don't turn me down.

9. When borrowing the proverbial cup of sugar I don't even have to put on shoes. Once in awhile I start a batch of cookies without realizing that Bo ate the last egg that morning for breakfast. Nothing like stepping out into the hall and having any number of neighbors to hit up for a favor. I love it when someone asks me for things too. I mean, they all ask me for apartment manager kinds of things, but when they ask for sugar you know they just think of you as a neighbor.

10. Forced togetherness. There is no place to run. No place to hide. We are all together. All the time. Some might include this on the list of downsides, and surely some days it is, however, I have come to love the chaos of cooking dinner amongst the hubbub of the daily wrestling match and the fact that we have one TV to fight over and the times when I have to run into the bedroom to find a quiet place to have a professional phone conversation about the benefits of our apartments when a perspective resident calls. We basically have one room. No basement or family room. It's just us, hanging out together in the kitche-offi-dini-livingroom. The boys share a bedroom, which is...you know, terrible some days and fabulous that one time when they played in there for hours without arguing. In the end though I think there's something to be said about closeness creating.....closeness.

These are a few of my favorite things about apartment living. I sometimes wonder if we will bail the minute we can afford to or if we will continue to choose this lifestyle. Right now we might as well choose to like it because it's definitely working for us. I know that there are things I may never have learned without this season of life so I'm thankful.