Mom is Just a Nickname

I suppose that sounds bad, that I hear voices in my head.  I actually haven’t heard them recently because I’ve been hearing so many things from my children.  I often call the voices my Muse, and I’ve long believed that she speaks very softly, even at the best of times.  I’ve even got another blog called My Muse Speaks Softly, that I started in effort to spend more time hearing her whispers.  I haven’t posted anything new on it in quite awhile though. 

For awhile, I did really good focusing in and hearing her, even with children and cats and life interrupting the flow of her words.  The last month or two have been harder.  I really need to have no distractions.  I can’t have anything hanging over me that will cause me to make an excuse not to write. 

Wait. I’m making excuses NOT to write?!  What’s wrong with me?  I love to write.  Why would I be making excuses not to write?  Every excuse under the sun has come through my mind though: laundry needs to be done, dishes need to be done, the kids won’t leave me alone, I want to watch Star Trek, I want to knit, I want to sleep, I need to cook….on and on, the list goes on.  The worst excuse of all, the one I heard myself using the most, was the one about the kids.  I found it very irritating actually, that every time I sat down to write anything (even a blog post) a little four year old person would stand beside me singing or speaking the same words over and over.  Worse still, it didn’t seem to matter what I was doing.  This behavior has not been limited just to writing.  I could be in the kitchen or folding laundry, knitting, napping or driving.  He just hasn’t stopped talking much in the past couple of months.

So, today, my husband has kindly sent me off to the library where I can type or read or stare out a window in peace.  There are no little people chattering in my ear; there are no annoying tv shows singing high pitched versions of nursery rhymes.  It is a relief, in more than one sense.

During weeks, months, like the last few, I begin to feel that I have no recourse, no exits, from the cacophony of every day living.  I don’t have a private retreat, a quiet place to curl up and think without being disturbed.  I sometimes resort to lying on the floor of my walk in closet to think.  At least one of our cats is usually curled up there as well, and she makes excellent company.  She lets me idly pet her or just lie beside her.  She does not normally yowl at me for more attention or whine at me to get her anything.  She just seems to like my quiet company.  Invariably, the peaceful quiet is shattered when someone discovers I’m not easily accessible.  Then I hear shouts of “Mommy!!!” echoing through the house until I surface again. 

Sometimes I seek a few moments of privacy in the bathroom.  One would think that I might possibly be able to sit on a toilet without company by now.  I mean, when the kids are tiny, I accept that I will often have an audience when I pee.  By the time they reach three or four, though, I figure they can understand I don’t like company then.  I’m still working on that concept with the four year old though.  I don’t think he’s a particularly slow learner, as I know he’s quite capable of digesting concepts far greater than this.  I think he does have a stubborn lack of desire to understand that he needs to leave me alone sometimes.

My daughter, now nine years old, recently showed an amazing sensitivity to this feeling of mine.  She even suggested to my husband that they do something to help me feel better, since I seemed so overwhelmed this week.  Even she seemed to notice the way that the four year old was hounding my footsteps and being more needy than normal recently.

In just the hour and a half I’ve been out of the house, I’ve made decent progress on a story I started on my Muse blog.  I am debating whether I will post the update there.  I begin to wonder if I should be posting stories on there, for fear that they will be unsellable to publishers later.  (Another excuse not to post?)  Whether or not I post on the blogs, I need to take time to listen to those voices in my head more often. I need to stop making excuses; I need to help my children understand my need for quiet.  In the same way that they usually demand less of me when  I spend time doing what they want, I think I feel less a need to divorce myself from their voices when they give me time to myself.  I think the needs of the four year old have changed recently though.  So a new balance has to be found.