"Busy-ness is a bad habit"

I read this quote on one of those portable signs in front of Tim Horton's one day, and it has really stuck with me. First of all, I'm not entirely convinced that busy-ness is actually a word, so the fact that it was on a sign bothered my grammatical acuity. It also makes every other word I see seem wrong too - like acuity, lol.

But, it is a quote to be remembered. I have definitely adopted the art of being busy as one of my worst habits. My lists have lists, and I am often so overwhelmed with the thought of "so much to do" that I can't dig in my heels and get things done.

Admittedly, one of the biggest frustrations of my ugh - busyness - (ok, well, if it isn't a word, it should be - its quite handy!) is that, like most Moms, I spend too much of my time doing repetitive tasks such as housecleaning, laundry, cooking, etc.

By unlike my Mom of 30, er, 40 years ago, our family has also added in many things that add to our constant state of moving.

As predicted earlier this summer, I am at the point where Little League has become a heavy weight to drag along - having started this League from scratch in the Spring, and quickly moving into having 12 teams, 165 players ranging in age from 4 to 16, we are very busy with it.

Its not even the actual playing of the game, but the constant organizing, and various other tasks that go along with it that are overwhelming me. We are planning a tournament day, as well as a visit to the Ottawa Lynx triple A team in Ottawa in two weeks.

There's so much planning that goes along with everything -- even acquiring fields is a daunting task in our community.

Add the other parts of summer to this mix - Dakotah plays soccer, and wants to go here, there and everywhere with her friends, Paige is playing t-ball, and we are working hard to concentrate on Hanen, and both working, and well...you get the picture.

Every family that I know lives this sort of chaos that wasn't present 40 years ago. One of my friends has a son and a daugther. The daughter takes piano, violin, dance, and voice lessons, and has recitals throughout the year. Her son plays in two different soccer leagues that practice 4 nights a week and have games twice a week, and does the same thing with hockey in the winter.

Her children are uber-scheduled out, and she will admit, they don't know what to do with an afternoon off -- they can't turn off their busyness even when they aren't actually busy.

This morning, I have a list of about 50 things to do - phone calls to make, bills to pay, school uniforms to order, etc. My house, well...you'd have to love me a lot to see through the flash cards and fridge phonics on the floor, the half finished baseball poster on my dining room table, the pair of dirty socks (grr) that my husband took off and dropped beside him on the floor in the living room, and the two baskets of clothes (hey, they ARE clean!) waiting at the bottom of my stairs to go up and be put away.

I promise that under it all are floors that were vacuumed and mopped yesterday though!

I'm overwhelmed with my "to do's" and bothered by the fact that, if I leave them, they just kinda wait for me to return, lol.

But, I'm taking the advice of a very wise friend of mine today --- my toes are painted aquamarine, fresh baked cookies are cooling on the stove, a cooler is sitting next to my refrigerator, waiting to be filled with turkey sandwiches, potato salad, yogurt, and cold lemonade.

A half-filled bag contains sunscreen, a tiny size 5 bikini with goldfishes on it (dis one!) and like Goldilocks and the Three Bears, a bigger bathing suit, and then yet a bigger one. A Dora beach towel, a turtle beach towel, and two other towels chosen at random wait for the next bag. Paperback books are tucked in, probably to stay for the day, as we abandon them for shovels and sand pails.

Today, as my dear friend Tara would say, we have "Gone Fishin'"

Well...not really fishin' - but in a fishin' state-o'-mind.