Snow Day

I am a mom.  And I am a full-time high school physics teacher.  And I am a wife. 

Not that what I do is harder than what anyone else does, but being those things takes a whole heck of a lot of time. 

On a daily basis, I focus my energy, trying to accomplish as much as I can while maintaining some sort of balance.  The laundry gets done, the house stays in manageable shape (though, if going by my pre-kid definition, I wouldn't necessarily say it is often clean), necessary shopping happens, dinner gets cooked and eaten and cleaned up after, sometimes I fit in some exercise (although far less recently than any other January in memory, sadly), my kids get attention, and I generally am able to sit down on the couch with John for at least 15-30 minutes when the day is done.  That is, after teaching 80 high school students, grading papers, blah, blah, blah.  You probably don't really care to know what my typical day is like.  And frankly, I don't even want to think about all that I left out in this short paragraph.

But yesterday was a snow day.

The anticipation

And to me, snow days are like a day added on to my life. 

And though it is nice to have the option, in general, I feel no obligation to get anything accomplished on these bonus days.

So yesterday, while I did get a great deal of laundry done, and a trip was made to the attic, and the final Christmas decorations were put in storage, there was plenty that I didn't do.  For example, I didn't cook dinner.  As a rare occasion, we went out to eat a sit-down dinner (read: not fast food) with gift cards that we got for Christmas.

But what I did do:  I played outside in the snow with my family, making snowballs with the snowball maker that Cortlan and Everly picked out for me for Christmas when shopping with my mom (quite an awesome choice, actually) and sled riding with my kids on my lap.  I played on the floor of my basement with the train set and pretended to grill food and make cookies.  I played "Hang on Scooby-Doo" and watched "Between the Lions."  I read many chapters of a riveting book that the librarian set aside for me weeks ago - The Help - while sitting in front of the fire during the kids' naps.  I enjoyed spending time with my family all in the same place at the same time, with no sense of urgency, no feeling like I was misusing my time.

Winter is not my favorite time of the year, but you can't beat a snow day.  A bonus day.