Small Change

Today I realized that I am annoyed by so many little things in my life that if you summed them all up it would be one big issue. I analyzed these annoyances just enough to understand that they are almost all the cause of the same thing: wrong behavior. As a college student with two teenage children, one husband, three cats, a puppy, and a home to care for, I must economize my time if I am to have any quality in my life. The annoyances are mostly related to things other people in my home do... or DON'T do, as the case may be. I shouldn't have to turn off lights all the time, sort laundry (or even put it IN the basket which I already provided!), pick up dirty dishes, clean up messes, put the computer on hibernate, clean the entire house, etc, etc, etc. (I am getting tired just writing this!) Not only should the people who create these messes and issues clean up after themselves, they should do more around the house toward contributing to the better living environment of the entire family. Thirteen year old boys should be able to take out the garbage without being asked. Fifteen year old boys should be able to mow the lawn. Forty-four year old men should be able to vacuum properly, to INCLUDE the stairs.

I brought this issue up with my husband, expecting to discuss it and come up with a game plan for improvement. The conversation, naturally, did not go in the direction I desired. Somehow, in my addressing the situation, it has been brought to my attention that if things bother me then they are MY problem and no one else's. Hmmmm! Let's see how they like it after they run out of underwear! He also informed me that I expect too much (I'm sorry, but I think my grandfather's generation would be terribly disgusted in us!) from my children, and that I would do better to be like him- resolved to the way things are. Well, certainly the path of least resistance is less... resistant, but shouldn't we BE the change we'd like to see in the world? Aaaah! Here I am again, at resistance. Do I sense a theme? Ha!

I look at my husband and I see a man resolved to never enjoy the things in life he already has. I see a man resolved to believe that the world is generally evil and that there is nothing we can do about it. I see a man resolved to putter through his days with no great lust for life, no Joie de vive. If that is resolve then I'll have none of it, thank you very much. My family may resist me, and there is only so much you can do to re-train a forty-four year old man, but I intend to make my children a lot more autonomous and definitely a lot more helpful from now on. I believe that in doing so they will not become so overwhelmed in the future nor feel so helpless to enjoy life to it's fullest. They will know how to care for themselves, they will not be afraid of hard work, and they will have the motivation to be the change they wish to see in the world.

I told you resistance wasn't futile!