
Today, I spent the day (literally six hours, was supposed to be three) at our local Chevy dealership having maintenance work done on our Suburban. It's four years old now and only has 32k miles on it. They actually chastized me for the low mileage saying my short shopping trips were wreaking havoc on the engine until I reminded them that with three small kids, Target is about as far as we get most days and that I doubted our car was in the shape they stated.
Losing the entire day was frustrating, but I'd planned ahead and really used the time to my advantage. I brought a cookbook and flagged different pages for fall recipe ideas, creating a loose menu plan, trying to take advantage of certain food items so stretch my time and our budget. For instance a roast chicken one night might become part of the next night's tortilla soup. It's not a new concept, but it's one I really haven't pursued before.
I also brought my much-used yellow folder stuffed full of news clippings, organizational tips, magazine articles, newsletters, etc. I don't know if you're like me, but I save everything and often run out of reading time. So into the yellow folder it goes, until such time that I can pull it out and give it the attention I originally planned. I had articles in there from April's Earth Day, and it felt good to read and then purge. I followed this system while a working girl and it's served me well, though I'm pretty sure my folder won't be quite so full going forward seeing that I have car pool lines in my immediate future!
The biggest bonus of the day was filling out my new pocket calendar. I didn't really need a new calendar but noticed a great pink one in Staples the other day that had my name all over it! Gotta have my pink! I've mentioned before that September is the start of things for me... much more so than January, and so I tend to use an academic calendar to keep my life under control. I've gone back and forth for years debating electronic verses paper, but find paper fits my life (and purse) right now (though I do miss my old Palm Pilot every so often).
Left with extra time (six hours is a long chunk of time) and the boredom setting in, I cleaned my purse, purging old receipts and lollipop wrappers and discovering nine (yes nine) Hot Wheels at the bottom (it is a big bag, but really!). In between people watching (oh, the people watching I did) I made a list of Fall goals, which included creating a formal playroom, fixing up Will's big boy room, and switching out some bedroom dressers (anyone want to help me move them?). I even read some chapters while peeking at a few classic Law & Orders (my all-time fave).
The day felt wasteful and was definitely frustrating, but I accomplished small tasks that felt good. I reminded myself, while sharing space with a newborn and her first-timer mom, that it wasn't that long ago that I couldn't leave my nursing baby [whichever one it was at the time] for more than an hour or two and that this still rare solo time was meant to be enjoyed. And so I did.
And now I wonder, what would you do if temporarily trapped in one place away from home? Would you read, would you knit, would you chat on the phone? And would you like it?