Getting Started

It bugs me to pieces that I'm getting warmed up and ready to start the day in the late afternoon.

I feel like such a fake going to chapel at 3:00, singing Evening Prayer (admittedly a bit early for that prayer office, but I love it no matter what time it is): "We have come to the setting of the sun, and we look to the evening light. We sing to God the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit..." Everybody else has done the bulk of their work for the day, and I'm just beginning to get started.

Tonight, as I was revved to start cleaning house about 6:00 or so, suddenly a thought occurred to me. It is ingrained in me that you finish dinner first, and then you get on to the big jobs.

We spent nearly 20 years eating dinner mid-day. My body is still adjusting to the change, but I'm gettin' there. But my mind adjusts slower. I used to spend the morning reading to the kids, or exercising, or having family devotions, or doing errands, or going on my paper route twice a week, or messing around with email, or supervising morning chores. And of course, making dinner. But once the dinner dishes were finished (somewhere in the vicinity of 2:00 or 3:00), then we could get serious about schoolwork or housecleaning or gardening or sewing or whatever. That gave us 6-8 hours for the rest of the day, with no big job (like supper) hanging over our heads.

Now, with dinner dishes finished somewhere around 7:00 or 8:00, it does not work well at all for dinner to be the signal for the day to "start." All day long, I know I should be doing this or that, but just can't get the day moving like I ought. Not until it's nearly time for Gary to be home and the family to be together again for the evening.

I wonder if recognizing how much I'm fighting well-ingrained patterns and bio-rhythms will help me fight it? (Boy, wouldn't it be nice if it turns out to be that easy???)