Summer bustle

So it is summer, which means SLAMMING busy for me.  I am finding that I feel busier this year than I have in previous years..

Part of me is thinking it is because the kids are older, so they are participating in more day camps and activities.

Part of me is thinking it is because I AM busier - having a hand in planning more events (Girl Scout weekend camp, water safety activities, home school day camp, Jedi camp at the local children's museum) on top of the swim lessons and being at the pool.

Part of me is thinking I just needed the change of pace from the winter - that I need to see beyond my sweet littles into the "bigger" world.

I am feeling both stretched thin and somewhat guilty about the whole thing.

I have felt for some time that my children should see my "life's work" as a "sibling" - so they can share me with the world and understand that while God made me for them, He ALSO made me for others.  I am starting to feel some parenting guilt about that.  I had a conversation with my kiddo last week about his meltdown - making it clear to him that we are there to make customers and guests feel welcome, and he needed to take the meltdown to the car so he did not make people feel sad or unwelcome.  In an EPIC move forward - he DID stop crying and screaming and it was nearly an hour later when I was able to sit down with him and he THEN told me what had been upsetting him, and we solved it.  I guess that is an important "life skill"/ "life lesson"... but I am still feeling a little bad that I am not putting his every need first.

Though the truth is that Younger Sibling (who is more NT) is manifesting insane jealousy behaviors this spring!  It is about time that our family dynamic is not "all about autism".  Now that we are at the pool most days and there are plenty of other kids to play with, Younger Sibling seems to be happier/ less needling.

But I also feel like I am re-examining "me" again - defining reality and perception and Truth again - a battle I thought I had conquered long ago.  Questions about how I know something is real, and how important is it that my reality mesh with those around me... do I need a second or third opinion on my perceptions?  How far "off" from "normal" can I get before I worry people?  DO I just need to change the "normal" around me?  What are the essential pieces of Me that I need to be sure don't get lost in transformation?

 - and I guess that is the real "concern"... I am transforming.  I am not sure where I am going, but I am sure that change is happening and it is real, and I am not the woman I was 2 years ago, or maybe even this past fall...  Those things that I believe to be "real" are changing.  Those things that I believed to be priority are morphing.  I have a vague fear that I am approaching a time to "move", and I REALLY don't want to...  my head keeps coming back to those times in my life where I learned to drive a new route home, built new routines.  Or the time I was driving to the pool and thought, "THIS is the cute time - they will never be as cute, fun, as there are this season." [the kids].  

And change IS happening.  My grandmothers are both gone, and my parents feel older for it, act older.  My mother-in-law ails, and we all hurt to watch her suffer.  My boy is growing bigger, and displaying physical signs of puberty.  My girl is still little, but her personality is NOT.  The leadership at work has changed profoundly, even if the nuts and bolts are still turning stiffly.  I expect negotiations on my work titles in the year to come.  And I am in a place, for really the first time I remember, that I want to grab the change by the horns, know it, and ride it, not just bob...  I want to actively make a new Me.  

It's like I am re-going thru that process I did in Jr. High/ High School where I set out my Primary Principles.  I did the same thing when I got pregnant and faced Parenthood, wrote essays to myself & my family [to the great unhappiness of both sets of future grandparents].  

I am feeling a "growth cycle" I guess...

And just as I could not know where and how that child's body would turn into a mother's body until it happened - I feel that I will not know where I am going until I get there...

And I am still looking at me, at what others see in me, at what I see reflected in my children, to determine IF I am who I think I am...

I still feel like I am missing the point.

I am left scattered - like my thoughts about Jedi camp, and Home School Camp, and swim lessons...

I feel like there is a "push", like there is a "call" to start making decisions and taking action, but I just cannot lay my hands on the records and resources I need... which makes me frustrated with myself.

I need to come back to the middle?  To find the eye of the storm?  I feel like I am doing better this year about not being frantic (except for the weeks hormones are involved), but definitely I feel I am more intense this year than I have been in a long time... I am playing less, and am very earnest in conversations/ interactions...

But I will push thru to the tasks that tomorrow needs, and be sure that I am meeting the responsibilities expected of me.

I still feel like I am in the right place at the right time... but maybe I just need to answer the phone more promptly?