Superhuman

Once upon a time, as you may know, I was the maintenance supervisor for a realty company. My job was not to do the physical labor, but arrange for it. Gather quotes and bids, get the funds, oversee that the labor is done to the specifications. I loved the job but the job didn’t pay enough. So I sought other work and while I’m now back in the business, I don’t have much of a hand in quotes and numbers and labor. 

Yesterday a tree fell from our property onto a neighboring community. There was no damage, but the tree needed to be removed. And I got to arrange for the work to be done. Contact the contractor, get the bid, get it to my boss. For a brief second I was back 4 years ago, juggling all of this during my off time, getting chase off to school while arranging for the tree to be removed. I loved every second of it. 

I also remembered what a pain it can be. Once in a while is okay, but I remember what it was like for my phone to be constantly going off, having to make dinner and change diapers with my phone stuck between my shoulder and ear. Having to say, “excuse me for a moment, please,” and muting my phone to threaten my kids to shut up for just a damn minute. Yeah, I don’t miss that. Sure, it made me feel like I was superhuman to be able to juggle it all, and I felt that way this morning. But my kid didn’t deserve to have me tell him goodbye in the distracted way that I did because I was trying to text my boss while he climbed out of the car. Nope. 

You never get these times back with your little ones. Unfortunately for Matt, I held many jobs that required a lot of my off time while he was little. I won’t get that time back with him, and as he grows taller and smarter and older, I miss the little boy that he was. 

So while it was nice to step back into that ultimate multi-tasking role again this morning for a few minutes, I’m grateful I don’t have to do it very often. I might miss something important while I’m busy trying to be superhuman.