Keeping an Even Keel While Juggling!
Many of us live lives in which we feel like we are perpetually trying to juggle half a dozen balls while also keeping half a dozen plates spinning in the end of long thin poles.
It's not easy to keep an even keel while doing these things, and it's even more difficult to make progress on any projects and aspirations you might have that fall outside the domain of juggling/plate spinning.
As I have written before, perhaps the most challenging thing is to simply keep yourself from drowning under the burden of everything that "must" be done, every day. These days, it really feels lie everything is coming at us harder and faster.
Lately, I have been somewhat absent from the blogosphere because there simply hasn't been enough "me" to go around.
Having just dealt with car issues and a broken water heater... our septic system suddenly backed up and required an emergency service call yesterday, just to avoid having sewage back up into the house.
Mrs. Denmarkguy and I had a conversation in which wondered about how "regular folks" are managing to navigate a world in which it increasingly seems like just waking up in the morning likely will involve another $500 repair bill of some kind. Or are these "regular folks" even managing to navigate that world, at all?
A friend of ours — who happens to be a realtor — says that a large part of the problem in the USA is that fewer and fewer people actually view as house as "their home, where they live," and instead purely view houses as assets that are supposed to provide a certain target ROI.
Maybe I'm just completely behind the times in the sense that I have always regarded the pieces of real estate I have owned — three houses in my 65 years on this planet — as my homes. Not saying that it hasn't been nice to be able to the the money back upon selling, but getting a return was never my objective; my objective was to have a place to LIVE.
Evidently, that's a very old-fashioned way to look at things!
In no way related to this, I've been contemplating going back to keeping more of a "daily happenings" style blog like I have done many times in the past.
It was always a good sort of "writing as catharsis" exercise, and I sort of miss it. I have sort of avoided the "daily journal" format here because I figured it didn't add that much "value" to the community and I have always felt that we should "leave a good impression" with public writing.
That said, I have always felt far more drawn to the "Internet of PEOPLE" than the Internet of information... it's the human stories that make it all interesting, as far as I am concerned.
Of course, I really don't need to launch another ball into the air to juggle. We'll see...
Thanks for visiting, and have a great Friday!
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Created at 2025.05.09 00:23 PDT
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I've never got the owning a house thing over making a home. It always seemed to me that people worked to have a house and then to take as much time away from it as possible. I am perfectly happy here on the farm and often don't leave it for days or weeks at a time. I've made the house into a home I love to spend time in.
It seemed to start in the 80's — the era of "Yuppies" — when "rental property" and "flipping" first became a thing. I could never get it to add up that as soon as you moved into a new place, you were thinking about the next place you were heading to.
Your words really touched me, especially what you mentioned about the difficulty of balancing the pressures of daily life with personal ambitions.
Talking honestly about these issues makes us feel that we are not alone.
That balance seems to be slowly getting lost... we're not afforded enough free time for those personal pursuits when we have to spend all our time worrying about how to take care of the daily things.
People do seem to have houses just to live in, as opposed to LIVE in, and I know you know what I mean. A lot of new developments here with no gardens - and they're all dented up to eyeballs to pay for it.
I hear you about how every day brings another bloody expense. Grateful for a husband who is Jack of all trades.
On a lighter note I was relieg teaching Friday and the top of a bottle cap came flying toward me, whistling past my ear and hitting the whiteboard.
"Sorry miss" said a red faced kid, mortified. "I was juggling"
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For some reason, this year seems to be taking a toll on so many of us. Monetarily, emotionally, and physically too. I often say to my husband that I don't know how people are managing these days. Being retired and on a fixed income is hard enough with the constant pressure of rising prices on everything one needs to enjoy life. I can't imagine the amount of debt that young people are accumulating between homes, cars, and health insurance, not to mention the cost of daycare today.
I feel like our generation had the best life growing up with family and a sense of having a home to raise one in, not like today where the attitude is it's just a house. So sad to me. Your post says it all. Juggling seems to be the norm and taking time for oneself goes on the back burner for so many. I hope you find time to muse your days with us again. Much love to you both.