Looking Forward

It wasn’t just having a bunch of little kids who needed me to feed and clothe them — not to mention change them, soothe them, read to them, ferry them around, and kiss their boo-boos. It wasn’t only having teenagers who needed me to tell them that no, not everyone’s parents lets, and wow, that sounds really rough, and no, I will not finance your car ownership, or even subsidize a large percentage. It wasn’t just working with deadlines for a boss who liked to send things in at 11:00 today and tell me she needed them back at 10:00 yesterday.

It wasn’t any of those things alone, and maybe even not a combination of them all. But somehow I found myself always running on a treadmill that seemed to speed up every time I tried to get off. Forget about stopping to smell the roses, I didn’t even see them as I sped by.

But they day came when I realized I’d had enough.

“You don’t have to work harder,” a good friend advised. “You have to work smarter.”