Splintered Reflections

I sit before you now, during a brief respite in what has felt like an endless “spin-cycle” on a broken washing machine. The last few weeks have been an exhausting merry-go-round of late nights, early mornings, snatched moments for writing, housework, administration, visitors and accidents.

I am not entirely sure why I refer to this as if this isn’t the usual run of things. Who am I kidding? It’s time that I faced up to the fact that there are simply not enough hours in the day for me to achieve everything I want to.

So in my usual mind-set of trying to find a solution to the problem at hand, I have been crafting a little “schedule” for my week, in the hope that I can achieve some kind of balance in my life. Elements I am trying to include are: quality time with kids, quality time with boyfriend, time to write, time to exercise, time with friends, administration time (I am in charge of our family finances) and, finally, time for house-keeping. OK, so hair appointments, tanning sessions and manicures don’t feature strongly here, however, I need to be realistic.

I came up with the idea of going out for a walk or run when I wake at around 5.30 am. You can set your watch by my daughter’s body clock and even if she is tired from the previous day’s activities, she is always awake before 6 am. It is a killer, and I shamefully admit that I often use an expletive as my first word of the day. However, I need workable solutions in my quest for time, therefore, I figure that this is the perfect opportunity to pound the streets with my IPOD, whilst my boyfriend takes his shower and has breakfast with the kids, before leaving for work.

What I hadn’t really factored into the equation is my boyfriend’s snoring, my daughter’s restlessness during the night with her recently broken arm, or my son’s difficulty breathing at night with his horrendous head-cold. Come 5.30 am, I feel as if I have only just shut my eyes to begin the drift into a peaceful slumber. So, my foray into the world of morning jogging hasn’t yet achieved lift-off.

I was starting to feel a little depressed about the whole thing; that was until yesterday morning. After yet another night of writing into the early hours, and collapsing into bed after 1 am, only to be woken forty minutes later by a screaming child, I woke at 5.45 am to a peace and quiet. Did I sleepwalk into the wrong apartment? No, my own body clock had failed me miserably.

Despite feeling exhausted, sleep eluded me, and instead my mind kicked into overdrive, frantically planning the day ahead and making mental “lists”. I could not switch the damn thing off.

What to do? It was an unusually cold morning and the thought of venturing out from under my cosy duvet was a concept I didn’t want to contemplate…

Forty five minutes later, I was showered, organising breakfasts and getting the kids dressed with a smile on my face and a spring in my step. My boyfriend kissed me goodbye and left for work looking a little tired and somewhat bewildered.

With kids happily tucking into their cereal, I sat at my desk with the highlight of my day; my cup of triple espresso. As I sipped the hot, steaming liquid, I sat back in my chair and thought to smugly myself, “You know what? I CAN have it all…kids, work, friends and a great sex life! Yes, Jane, you’ve still got it…”

I set my cup down and stretched lazily, arms above my head, fingers splayed, as if welcoming fresh challenges, feeling very much like a female warrior, ready to do battle with whatever challenges life threw at me.

And then I trapped a nerve. The rest of the day was spent in agony, hobbling around the apartment like some kind of faulty robot, with a field of vision of only 90 degrees.

I will never be so smug again.