Splendid Mayhem: Avoiding "Work"

Welcome To Holland

I am often asked to describe the experience of raising a child with a disability - to try to help people who have not shared that unique experience to understand it, to imagine how it would feel. It's like this......
When you're going to have a baby, it's like planning a fabulous vacation trip - to Italy. You buy a bunch of guide books and make your wonderful plans. The Coliseum. The Michelangelo David. The gondolas in Venice. You may learn some handy phrases in Italian. It's all very exciting.
After months of eager anticipation, the day finally arrives. You pack your bags and off you go. Several hours later, the plane lands. The stewardess comes in and says, "Welcome to Holland."
"Holland?!?" you say. "What do you mean Holland?? I signed up for Italy! I'm supposed to be in Italy. All my life I've dreamed of going to Italy."
But there's been a change in the flight plan. They've landed in Holland and there you must stay.
The important thing is that they haven't taken you to a horrible, disgusting, filthy place, full of pestilence, famine and disease. It's just a different place.
So you must go out and buy new guide books. And you must learn a whole new language. And you will meet a whole new group of people you would never have met.
It's just a different place. It's slower-paced than Italy, less flashy than Italy. But after you've been there for a while and you catch your breath, you look around.... and you begin to notice that Holland has windmills....and Holland has tulips. Holland even has Rembrandts.
But everyone you know is busy coming and going from Italy... and they're all bragging about what a wonderful time they had there. And for the rest of your life, you will say "Yes, that's where I was supposed to go. That's what I had planned."
And the pain of that will never, ever, ever, ever go away... because the loss of that dream is a very very significant loss.
But... if you spend your life mourning the fact that you didn't get to Italy, you may never be free to enjoy the very special, the very lovely things ... about Holland.

Monday, February 11, 2008

Avoiding "Work"

I know I'm not the only "Mommy blogger" in the world now. So, I'm sitting here checking out the many other blogs in the world. I click on one, read, comment, and find another. I notice one child is standing behind me in the chair, pulling my hair. The other one is empting out an entire cabinet. Oh, wait- he's on # 2. My dishwasher is running, along with the washer and dryer. I've scrubbed the bathrooms today. I've mopped all floors but the kitchen. And, no dinner is not done. And, what am I doing? Playing. So, other Mommy bloggers- do you blog or 'play' to avoid your chores? Is your dinner done and your house clean when you get onto your computer? Are you completely addicted to a BBC board? Do you find yourself thinking, I should really turn my computer off now? Feel free to leave a comment with your answer. Please don't make me think that I am the ONLY one out there doing the named things above. :)

5 comments:

Popcorn HouseFebruary 11, 2008 at 10:14 PM
Me!!! Me!!!! I do it too. Though lately I am obsessed with finding coupons. But I ignore my kids too much to be on the computer. I think they actually like it because they get away with stuff!!!
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Andrea "The H family"February 11, 2008 at 11:00 PM
My kitchen table still has laundry on it! My husband travels and sometimes I'm glad so I can blog!
The only thing I need to do is start printing. I've been worried about blogger blowing up and having no record of it!!
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Andrea "The H family"February 11, 2008 at 11:17 PM
Girl! What are you doing to me!
I'm loving this tips for bloggers site!! I've already added a translation tool!
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* ~ *Jessica* ~ *February 12, 2008 at 10:26 AM
I've thought about blogger blowing a gasket and me loosing my page. How sad that would be! Oh, I am so glad I'm not the only one to ignore my kids! LOL It's therapeutic to tune them out sometimes. Just hash it out on your own for once! haha
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KieraFebruary 12, 2008 at 9:42 PM
I am not sure what you are talking about, I believe all wives make their husbands mac&cheese in the microwave at 10pm because they had been on Blogger & BBC ;) (cue sound of microwave in the background)

I am lucky, the little dude thinks it is fun to watch things a**ear on the screen
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