Blahging

It's obvious why I've blogged infrequently this summer. With the new babies and nursing and diapering and such this is how things go, staring at toes and echoing back "goo, gaa, yes, yes, I love you!".  That, and many of you have heard me all but beg for sleep. Any sleep. And you can't really complain about not sleeping and then be blogging about the intricacies of homemade soup.

But when I used to daydream about the possibility of staying at home rather than teaching I, without question, assumed an increase in blogging would be natural.  However, my inclination to share with the world has found a lull lately and it has little to do with losing sleep to hangry babies.  

Leaving the classroom and putting down my work roots at home has catapulted me into an experience just as intense, challenging, and exhausting I had ever known as a teacher. And before you start with well, duh! you just had babies--two babies, Ash!, that's not exactly what I mean.  Taking care of the twins has been its own beautiful and unique experience but it has not swallowed whole all the other facets of my life. Needs are surfacing which were waiting for some attention all along. Needs like how to negotiate medical bills or curb a toddler's whining or how to connect, un-distracted, with my husband after dinner and tucking children into bed and finally catching our breaths from our separate but equally craptastic days. I have lots to learn and knowing I have lots to learn leaves me feeling like I have not much to say.

Being at home means a lot of quiet time to think.  Even when the dishwasher's running, a baby is crying, and my son's singing "He's got the whooooole word in his hands. He's got the itty bitty babies in his hands"--even then, the home takes on a different kind of quiet I wasn't accustomed to for as long as I had been a mother.  And that space and isolation and hum of the computer when littles are asleep, there's a lot of opportunity there. It's all a door to anxiety and grief and depression. Or a door to questioning, learning, humbling myself to consider a lot of new things.  

Being here amid the laundry and the chipped wine cabinet and the spider web under the t.v. console I just eyed a minute ago when nursing has my mind expanding in new directions, directions that need some water and sun and nudging before they blossom here on my blog.  

But above all else, my heart is crying out for me to show up and be present. I want carefree time with my husband to laugh and listen and work through some things that maybe we weren't allowing ourselves time or energy for before. I want time to read with a lingering spirit to Thomas and let his questions do the leading as he learns how letters make words. I want time to smile at Alistair & Emerick and babble with them "goo, gaa, yes, yes, I love you!"

And while I say all this and mean it about blogging, it doesn't change how I feel about writing and that is this: Writing helps me make sense of things, it cleans up my brain.  It fills my cup and is always worth the work.  Even though I don't feel I have much time or much to say, I'll still be drooling out my words here because I need to hear that other mothers were also embarrassed when they figured out they were doing ___________ ALL WRONG!! or at least to laugh at/with me when I reveal I have.

Plus, the hum of the computer can make me feel I'm going a little ca-razy some days.  If all this blahg turns out to be is a humble scroll of my cliche and totally ordinary mommy-ness (so I can connect with other mommies saving themselves from isolation the same way), I'm totally cool with that. 

Those of you who do read---which I guess would be you right now--thanks for stopping by, saying hello, and reminding me I've got a few people to share with when I've yet again managed to get baby poop on my cami.