I quit my job last night!
I walked right up to the boss, whose name is Dave and who happens to be my husband, and I resigned. He had just come in the door, whistled his familiar whistle, and called out, "anyone home?"
I had a crying baby in one arm, and one was in the kitchen wailing for a peanut butter sandwich (and dinner was in 30 minutes) and the third was sitting in front of the television set, howling because he wanted two mouse cartoons instead of the usual one.
Dave kissed me dutifully on the cheek. It was then that I gave my notice.
"I QUIT! I've had it! If you can find anyone who will take this job on the salary I get, she's welcome to it!"
Dave took the toddler from my arms, gave her a hello kiss, and sent her scooting. Then he put both his arms around me tight and kissed me special --- that tender kind of kiss that curls my toes and wilts my heart. "How 'bout a movie, Beautiful?" he whispers in my ear.
I must say, my husband knows how to handle the help around here. I shudder to think what would happen if the office got wind of his phenomenal success and put him in charge of female personnel. I mentally tore up my letter of resignation and settled for a movie instead.
Not that I don't like my job. I really do. Even though the hours are horrible. Even though the pay is... I guess I should say the pay just isn't.
It's the future of my job that holds such tremendous possibilities. And the people I work for just can't be beat. I have a dream of a husband and three shining pink babies. No one could ask for more. It's just that sometimes it seems like too much! Sometimes it all seems too overpowering for any one woman to handle. It is not the daily routine tasks. It's not the washing and ironing and the cooking and the mending! It's life's little emergencies that keep cropping up to disrupt my busy schedule.
We just get over a bout with measles, and suddenly the flu bug hits us. We just get the tonsils out, and somebody falls off the swing and has to have three stitches taken in his scalp.
It's the battle of the budget. It's one new pair of shoes after the other, and the dentist calling to tell us the x-rays revealed more cavities, and the milkman subtly asking me if I got the bill or did it blow away...
It's never finding time to wash the windows. You know that one hall window where the baby kisses the mailman through the pane? Dave passes it on the way out the door every morning, and more than once he has slyly suggested, "Better get with it." And I always say, "Yes, dear. I'll do it for sure." Notice I don't say WHEN. What I mean is, "Soon as the baby gets off to college I intend to do a lot of things around there."
It's that permanent jelly on the woodwork. I no sooner get it scrubbed off than it takes root again. It's the cookie crumbs on the floor and the cobwebs clinging to the ceiling. It's the mud pies that get tracked across the kitchen floor. It's the bottomless sand pile that never loses its sand despite all that seems to accumulate in front of the television and beside the bathtub.
And the bulging closets! Every December when we get the decorations out I say with all good intentions, "Now I'll clean out that closet before we put them back." And, along about March, after we're still stumbling over the boxes in the hall, Dave puts them back again, and I say, "Next year for sure."
It's missing our vacation because we had a tiny tot, and missing it the summer before because we were expecting that tiny tot. Then the summer before that we had a tiny tot, and before that we were expecting that tiny tot. And the summer before that...more of the same, and the summer before that....still more of the same!
It's confining a squirming baby in the supermarket basket and at the same time keeping track of the two who are wandering through the store putting unwanted articles in the baskets of unsuspecting housewives. It's standing in line and sorting out my purchases from the boxes of cookies and animal crackers that my little helpers have seen fit to select.
It's a collection of assorted bruises, and bumps, and skinned knees, and runny noses and untied shoe strings and "I'm thirsty's." It's the constant barrage of "Why?"
Do you see why I threatened to quit my job last night? It was all of these things rolled together that suddenly seemed to overwhelm me. But that was last night. Tonight will be different. I discovered something today.
I had some errands to do, so I took a dollar out of the milk money to pay a sitter. While I was gone, I discovered exactly what happiness is. It's this very thing I have just come home to ---- the four walls of this happy house, the three little mouth all talking at the same time!
It's a hard job, this business of raising a family. And like all jobs, sometimes its demands sweep over you with such unexpected force that it seems too much --- too difficult --- for you to manage. But even during those occasional discouraging days, I know it's a tender and rewarding job. A job I wouldn't trade for any other in the world. Because it is MY JOB. There happy little people are a part of me. They depend on me and need me.
Oh, the most wonderful thing has happened! . . .
We are going to have another baby!!!!
Last Friday I was putting away our decorations and started cleaning out cupboards as I did so. I ran across this story as I was sorting through a folder of old articles ($1.00 for a babysitter for three kids would have given you a clue as to how old).
I could have written this but I didn't. I would love to credit the author but she was unknown back then and remains so.
Over 40 years ago I was asked to give a talk before a large group of ladies. I was petrified and didn't know what to do. And, this is what I did:
I agreed to talk, but advised the one in charge that I would not be sitting up in front before the program began. I indicated that I was pretty scared and asked that she call out for me when it was my turn.
She did. Actually she called for me twice. I hurried up the aisle. My slip was hanging crookedly below my dress and I had two curlers still in my hair. I had our baby under my arm with his blanket trailing behind.
I saw someone I knew and barely stopping, handed off the kid and his blanket, stumbled to the podium, took a deep breath and said
"Last night I quit my job . . .
Motherhood is a partnership with God! There is nothing like it!
Wishing you a wonderful 2012.
Simply, Gail
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