revised goals and good intentions
Posted on April 23, 2007
Filed Under kids, parenting, snark |
Tag - I’m it. Ron Davison from R World has asked me to expound on five goals I’ve failed to take seriously. And, after some soul searching, I’m sad to report that not only don’t I have any goals I’ve failed to take seriously, evidently I forgot to have any goals at all, fulfilled or otherwise.
Well actually there was that recent attempt to get my MFA in creative writing but I can’t really claim that as a goal I’ve ignored, it’s more a goal that has ignored me. All the more reason not have goals in the first place.
Aside from that MFA, I can’t think of anything I’ve set out to accomplish. Truly, I’ve got nothing. Perhaps I just have the ability to back off my goals, adapting to failure in a way that conveniently disguises my initial intentions.
For instance there was three years of graduate school and then a pause. I put off finishing my thesis when O was born. I never went back because I was making money in landscape design without the degree. Today, it feels less like failure and more like a subtle change of direction. The goal of achieving a Masters in Landscape Architecture just seemed sort of beside the point after several years of professional practice.
I’ve never declared the intention to run a marathon or a 10k or even a 5k. I don’t do competitions that I don’t have a chance in hell at winning. Instead I make more modest attempts at fitness. I’ll resolve to jog the route that has four crushing hills and try not to slow to a walk. And I’ll start off with energy to spare but then, on the third hill, I’ll convince myself that running two of the four hills is good enough and I’ll be content to walk the rest. I mean really, I tell myself, just getting out there five days a week is adequate, laudable, even heroic.
And there are little stabs at weight loss that aren’t really goals but maybe just attempts to stay away from the chip basket while out for Mexican food. Half way through the first Margarita, abstinence gives way to something more achievable, like leaving at least four chips in the basket lined with oil-stained wax paper for the waiter to remove when the entrees arrive. When ravenous and slightly intoxicated, I’m flexible enough to adjust my goals to better suit the circumstances.
Of course their all kinds of resolutions I continue to make about parenting. These are less goals than good intentions. I will care less about messes and more about people, I will scream less and patiently explain more, I will not curse at all in front of my children for the next week and see if I can’t quit the habit all together. But then it’s six o’clock on a Friday and I’m tired and My Better Half has been out of town for a week and the kids don’t like what I’ve served for dinner and sulk loudly about the meal selection and G spills her milk for the second time that day and has to change her clothes before tennis lessons and I just explode with frustration - clenched teeth, profanity, the palm of my hand slamming on counter tops. So no goals here, only some honest attempts at reform derailed by sheer exhaustion.
And I’ve never been delusional enough to set goals of organization. I have grown accustomed to the possibility that I will always have a Monica closet or two or perhaps, several dozen, and probably Monica drawers and cabinets as well. I like to say “out of sight, out of mind” at least when it comes to luggage, mittens, clothing, linens, Tupperware and unpaid bills.
Now you’re it - Slouching Mom, Fenicle, By Jane, Amanda and Allison what five goals have you largely ignored?
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