Burnout

I'm not going to mince words here.  I'm beat.  And it's the Big Tired.
There are two kinds of tired in my world.  There's the Little Tired, where you haven't gotten enough sleep for a few nights, or you had two really rough days at work but heck, the weekend's coming and you'll get a little down time.

Then there's the Big Tired.  This means that you haven't gotten enough rest and sleep in longer than you can remember.  You haven't a day where somebody hasn't demanded every need from you.  You've gone to bed thinking of all the things that still need to be done, yet when you wake up fresh the next day, you have no energy to do them.  A weekend won't cure it.  An afternoon away from home won't make it better.  The only solution is solitude and a cook.

That's where I am.  I wake up between 5:30 and 6:30 every morning.  I get my cup of coffee and I write.  I write until small people begin needing me, about an hour later.  Then, I don't write anymore.  I don't think anymore.  I don't really get to complete thoughts until they go to bed, but by then, my brain is fried from the day and I'm lucky if I can construct a sentence.

I still have all of my Cinderella duties between their bedtime and mine, too.  There's the dishes and the laundry and the picking up and the sweeping.  It's mind numbing and hateful work.  That's very un-Jesus-like, I know, but it's where I am and I comfortable with my feelings.  I just can't muster the energy to do all of it when it's going to get undone 3 1/2 seconds after they wake up in the morning.

My house doesn't look like a house on Hoarders or anything.  I'm quite tidy.  But the small bothersome things are small enough that I don't feel a pressing need to confront them.  Yet I see them and they bother me.  But if I started one, I'd keep going and wouldn't stop until it was all done and I'd never get any sleep and I'd be worse off than I am now oh lord run on sentence.

The obvious solution is to use my time in the morning.  Forget writing for a while and do the things that will help regain my sanity.  Well, here's the deal.  I feel really anxious when I don't write.  More anxious than the small things make me.  Writing is like draining a bucket set beneath a leaky roof.  Every morning, rain has filled it, and in order for the bucket to catch more rain, it must be emptied.  That's how my brain is.  I want the ideas to flow through me because they keep me alive!  They keep my mind young and fresh and energetic.  It's the only time in my day where I'm not serving others, and to dismiss that time as ill-used is not correct.  That time is pure and unviolated.

So, the moral of the story is this: mountains of laundry, unvacuumed carpet, a handprint on the window, and a drink ring on the bathroom counter are too much for me right now.  I don't have the energy to care.  Two demanding kids fill every time and thought slot.

And, summer's coming.

Maybe I can check in at one of those resorts where everybody takes a vow of silence...silence...silence.