March 11, 2002 - 10:04 p.m.
A recent question from the Guestbook: When do you find time to read?
Believe me, it ain't easy.
Gone are the weekends that I could bring home a book from the stacks on Friday night and return it before the library opened on Monday morning. Gone is the plethora of government holidays spent reading. When you're a Mom, you have no days off.
It's particularly hard with an infant. Sure, babies sleep a lot, but they do it intermittently and there is so much to catch up on while they're napping. It's almost impossible to find enough free moments to string together, curled up with a good book. And babies become toddlers in need of constant supervision.
Recently, I decided that I needed a "quitting time" in the evening. Mine's about 9:30, maybe 10:00. At this point of the day, anything that hasn't been done can wait until morning and I can use the next 60 to 90 minutes (because I really can't stay awake past 11:00 anymore without severe penance the next day) to shower, relax, and read. I don't burn through the number of books in a month that I used to, but at least I'm making some progress :) And having a scheduled block of time for myself everyday gives me a sort of refuge to look forward to.
And now it's quitting time. See you tomorrow.
