The Definition of Lumbering

The other day Nico was getting something from his room, but he did it with such a heavy step that Mikey looked up from his homework and said, “Dude, what’s with the lumbering?”

That’s me getting through the last couple of weeks. I’m lumbering like a boss.

We are not moving to Sacramento, which is good news! The bad news is that it’s because someone claimed a hardship and snagged the spot. Adulting is still hard. It looks like we will stay in southern California, I think, though I don’t know in which�capacity. It could mean a different company, or it could mean the same company with a lot of travel. The situation is not ideal, but it’s also not the end of the world. This is what I tell myself as I cycle through what I imagine are pretty common emotions: fear, anger, sadness, apathy, and hope.

This is what�lumbering looks like, if you’re curious.

I’ve been trying to attend daily mass since school started. Every single day I think I’m too busy to go, but I force myself to go and it’s been great. This week I didn’t go because it’s the first week of library and I pretty much freaked out and convinced myself I didn’t have 30 minutes to spare. (I did. Whatever.)

Shortly after hearing about the layoff, I was wondering what I could do to cheer up the Mister. I was sitting in church, waiting for mass to start, when I decided to thumb through the prayers on the Laudate app. That app is great, by the way. I used it all last year when I took the 4th graders to Friday�mass because it has�the daily readings. I use it for daily mass (for the readings) and the Mister uses it for Sunday�mass. Anyway, I took a screenshot of�a prayer for employment and texted it to the Mister. I never heard a word back, but when I got home I found it printed�and taped to the walls of our bathroom and his office. There’s a copy of it�on the car dash now, too. :)

It’s been hit-and-miss on the motherhood front. Some days I’m very tired, very short-tempered. I often feel like I’m yelling all the time because I’m stressed and taking it�out on everyone. Then other days Nico comes into my room and tells me he made a burning bush like in the Bible and Mikey says he wouldn’t change a thing about himself.

But in the end, most of my time is in the library. I’ve decided that the book-bin craze I see in library and teacher’s blogs/instagram are for looks. I can see putting picture books in bins because it makes it easier for the little ones to pick out a book, but lately I’m seeing chapter books and entire series in bins. I tried it to see if I am missing something. I don’t think I’m missing anything. It’s a horrible use of space! In the above picture I can’t fit all The Magic Treehouse books on the shelf if they’re binned. Without the bin I can fit 3 different series, including The Magic Treehouse.

It looks like we may get automation software (finally!) and that, along with an influx of donations and a principal who understands the importance of a circulating collection, has spurred me to purge the library. I’ve donated 20+ boxes of books. I could donate more, but I’m trying to show some restraint. I get a lot of gasps when people walk by and see the boxes of books but, yeah, I have no problem getting rid of books that aren’t used or appreciated. The thing is, a 10,000-volume library isn’t a 10,000-volume library if the kids read the same 1,000 books. It’s�a 1,000-volume library with a lot of clutter.

There you go, my last lumbering 9 days. It’s not much, but I’ll get to where I want to be�eventually. That’s the thing about lumbering–you may be moving slow, but you’re still moving forward.