We’re back from our holiday travels, and feeling about the same as we always do in this first full week of January. Dead tired.
I know many people find the holidays relaxing and the start of the new year rejuvenating, and I might just be a teeny bit jealous of those people. True, there are occasional naps that happen over that time period, as well as long stretches of lounging around in pajamas past a respectable hour. But those road hours will catch up with you – we put almost 3200 miles on our car (and our bodies) in five weeks. Just the sorting and the packing and the hauling and the stuffing of the car – down three stories and out to the street, then back again, repeat, then repeat again. Our little Volvo with its little trunk and seats gets stuffed to the brim (each stuffing takes an hour or two), and we wedge ourselves in with little wiggle room to spare. The middle days are fun and full, but the road is long and boring and we’re bleary eyed and road food bloated and bickering by the end.
Monday returns, and everyone else in the world seems refreshed, sweet greens juiced, and glowing from the extra workouts. They have organized closets and their holiday decorations are tucked away in rubbermaid bins, glitter and pine needles vacuumed off the rugs. There is a half completed jigsaw puzzle on the dining room table and their resolutions are posted – with visual aides! – and they include “spend more time with the family”, which means around the jigsaw puzzle and not shoehorned into a rest area toilet stall with an obstinate five-year-old continually setting off the auto-flush sensor because she can’t just sit still and finish the job. We always arrive home in the last hours of the last day, to a cold house and an empty refrigerator and an overflowing mailbox with soggy bills. We try to locate four toothbrushes and four clean pillowcases and collapse into bed before the machine starts again the next morning, like it or not.
Last night (a Monday night), I geared myself up to go back out into the frigid temps and pick up groceries for the week. My list was relatively uncomplicated, but even stops at three grocery stores didn’t cover it. The produce shelves were bare, even the basics were gone. Apparently everyone else restocked their pantries over the weekend, and vowed to eat more greens. At ten minutes until ten, on a Monday night, in the produce section of Whole Foods (my third and last resort for the elusive and exotic cilantro and yellow onion, sarcasm intended), exhaustion set in. It felt like everyone else in the entire world had their act together except for me. My closets are a wreck, the swags of greenery on the house have turned brown, the tree is drying out and half the lights don’t work. There is glitter EVERYWHERE you look, and the surface of my dining room table hasn’t come up for air since JUNE. If you opened up a jigsaw puzzle at my front door, and then moved through the house trailing pieces behind you along the way, you wouldn’t even notice them. I’m intentionally ignoring all the resolution lists everyone is talking about at the moment because I just can’t visualize any of them right now. I can’t imagine getting more sleep because I can hardly see my bed. I’d be more present and relaxed with my family, if I could locate them among the piles.
I don’t have a real solution for this situation short of the obvious (and rather miserable) option of staying put for the holidays. I like the holidays. I like our family. Those are pretty significant things in and of themselves. This really isn’t about those things. I just always enter January feeling like the worst version of myself. Worn down, stiff, and snippy, and sort of like I’m missing the party. Getting a good weekend in should help, but it’s Tuesday still, and there isn’t a longer week on the calendar than the first full week of January.
…..
I have no resolutions this year. Last year I set goals, and as M pointed out on one of our car rides – “You kind of knocked last year’s goals out of the park.” Every once in awhile it’s good to set some hard and fast goals and see them through. For 2015 I’m leaning more towards good intentions. I’ve got several of those knocking around in my head. I’ll write them here, as a note to myself, when they get a little clearer. And my house is a little cleaner.
Whenever I get things done ahead of time or when I do them really well, I like to think that I’ve “banked” time or achievement for when I come up late or fall short in the future. I lean on the “bank” to cover any shortages – emotionally at least. No one else really cares about my time/emotion bank, but it makes me feel better. I was on the receiving end of travel – the travelers came to us (my dad even drove the 1000 miles from Texas to visit). I do empathize with the strain of it. Especially the in-laws who peel their kids away from their Christmas loot to drive several hours to get here for Christmas dinner. If it helps, I didn’t really even leave my neighborhood and there are literally hundreds of game pieces/dollhouse parts/LEGOS/puzzle pieces/scraps of scissored paper/pine needles/dirty socks/cups/books/you name it strewn about our house as if there is not a stay at home mom around to pick it all up! Happy New Year. (PS I couldn’t find spinach last week. I feel ya.)
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You know, that does help. 🙂
I understand! I was lamenting to my husband last night about how I never stopped moving yesterday and still felt like I had nothing to show for it- especially since I was sitting there looking at all our Christmas decorations STILL. He tried to be kind by pointing out that he noticed I’d managed to take down and put away all the lights on the outside of our house.
“Afraid not, dear. I just yanked the extension cord out of the socket so they’d quit coming on…”
I will say that the outdoor decorations look so pretty this morning in the snow. I woke up a little more rested and a little less restless. So, progress.
We do the long cross-country drive from Philadelphia to St. Louis each year too, and I recently insisted on getting back on Saturday night and that (and the mini-van we finally yielded to) has made a WORLD of difference!
Having that extra day post-trip is such an awesome thing, I know. I just struggle with taking that time away from the trip and the visit, especially since these days it feels like our time with family feels so limited. So we try to commit to getting on the road early that last day, but that never seems to work either.
We refuse to yield on the car size. I love my small, zippy car for the city driving I do 350 days a year. I just can’t bring myself to buy a car sized for comfort for the 15 days of the year we spend on the road, traveling. We are, however, going to reach a point where our long-legged girls require a little more room in the back seat though. Then I’ll be on the hunt for a small, zippy car with a larger backseat and trunk. I’m sure that magical car exists somewhere!
I love this because it’s honest. I don’t love it because you’re exhausted. Well written.
Seconded!
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I was so delighted to see a post from you this morning. Holidays are so wonderful and stressful all at once. I packed up everything early this year…and I worried I was cheating my children in some way, but I just needed everything tidy again. I hope you can take a day to feel rested. Your posts provide such inspiration to me. Happy New Year to you. (PS, I did great with the Blue Apron meals!)
I’m so glad you liked them. They just gave me three more so I need to do another giveaway. Lately the veg menus have been tree nut heavy so we haven’t done them in awhile, but I do love those weeks with less grocery shopping.
Thanks for the nice note. I’ve been writing this blog for over seven years, and it’s still such a nice surprise that others read it.
I have good intentions to post more this year!
Next year you need to convince your relatives to spend Christmas in St. Louis. Holiday, family, and no travel. My extended family have tossed around the idea of spending Christmas with John & Lisa next year in the Cascades. This way they don’t have to travel to see us (and we can get some skiing in)!
And if it makes you feel any better, we stayed true to our holiday tradition – someone (or more than one) gets sick!
Wow, that is a lot of driving! But worth it, I know. I am exhausted going into the new year, but because work is crazy and I’ve decided I hate it. Our holidays are relatively calm (since my has and doesn’t get them off; he worked Christmas Eve) but I spend the entire break with work over my head. I like the idea of good intentions. I Think my resolution this year is to care less about work, and put myself first more often.
I laughed out loud at your fresh produce plight as we too went to two stores on Sunday looking for the “elusive and exotic cilantro”. No resolutions here. I’m perfect as-is. As are you, if you allow yourself to believe it. 😉 Happy New Year, K M E F. Loved the card!!!
You could rent a minivan for the trip. My brother-in-law actually borrows one when his family of four makes their 4 hour drive to visit us.
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