Rearing, Writing, & 'Robies

The new Three R's are my life are exactly that: rearing, writing, and 'robies.  What's 'robies?  My nerdy term for aerobics, i.e. the Jillian Michaels' DVD I complete every single stinking day and my revved up treadmill training for that 5K.  The rearing--duh--is Ellie. And the writing--also, duh--is my job. And my hobby, consequently.  It just so happens to be the same noun.  And verb. Oooohhh...

See? Word Nerd.

So that's that. My life in a series of disjointed words, similar only in their alliterative appeal.

Giant Word Nerd.

The trouble is that they all demand a lot of my time.  Cramming a 20-hour-a-week part-time job into the nooks and crannies of my day is quite taxing.  Choosing whether to work or work-out? One of life's great rock-and-a-hard-place decisions.  Neither is ever done... I will work every day and I will work-out every day.  If I skip a day? I pick up where I left off tomorrow.  So how do you choose which is most important?  They all keep cycling back on themselves, a never ending hamster wheel of my life (I don't like the term "rat race," hamsters are far cuter and less disease-ridden...mostly.)

But of course, my priorities are already arranged for me, aren't they? That's the part of motherhood that doesn't translate from the pages of What to Expect... You know the baby will come first, always. That's obvious.  But they don't explain to you what it feels like to compartmentalize the rest of your life around the baby. 

And that's why the Three R's of my life are set up in that order.  Ellie always comes first, and with the rest of my time, I write to meet deadlines and I work-out as much as I can every day.  The result is that sometimes I can only get the DVD in and other days, I can find some time for a full hour-long run.  Once in a while.

But what you might notice is missing from my Three R's is the all-important fourth R. One that's probably missing from most mom's priority lists.  Relaxing.  Nope, there's not much time for that.  And within that elusive, missing R lies the time for my hobby.

You try writing a novel and selling it when you only have about two hours a week to really dedicate to your craft. For real.  Go ahead.  It's fun for me, it's good to have a hobby, but why did I pick one so aggressive?  No idea.  I'm an overachiever even in my spare time. How lame.  Or I'm just in love with the idea that I could make people laugh, worldwide, in their own time to Relax.  Sounds pretty nice, doesn't it?

Maybe it will happen. And maybe I'll find space for a Fourth R.  But if basic elementary school curriculums couldn't do it, is there any hope for me?