Last week at this time I looked around my apartment and went to bed, in tears.   I was tired.  The weather was cold and rainy and I had just finished with a crazier-than-usual-week-in-2020.  Not a bad week, in any way, just a busy one.

I am NOT a natural organizer/cleaner  I love the organization.   I love clean.  I even enjoy organizing.  But it is never at the top of my priority list.    And cleaning?  I love it after it’s done lol.   

There are three main places in my “world”: my home, my classroom, and my car.  If 2 out of the 3 are not a disaster, I’m good.   But last weekend?   I had left on Friday and left a messy room.  I drove home in a messy car and yep, but by the time I was done with my Saturday commitments I was finally able to take in what a mess my apartment was.  

It all looked insurmountable.  It FELT insurmountable.   Usually, at this point, I call my sister.  We chat, I show her my disaster and start working on it while we catch up.   She does the same when there is a mountain of laundry or dishes to slog through.  

But last Saturday, I didn’t even want to do that.  

Besides, I still had lesson plans to do, papers to grade, grades to enter….and that was just the school responsibilities.

I kept telling myself that if I just did a little every day, it would get done…..

And that was the way I got through this week.  Literally 10 minutes at a time.  Set a time.  Do something for 10 minutes.  Something, anything, that would make my life easier by this weekend.   

I wasn’t really operating on faith.  I was operating on “that’s all I’ve got right now.”

And somehow….it worked.   

Is everything perfectly wonderful?  No, but my laundry is done and I’ll have clean sheets when I get back in two weeks.  There is NO food that can go bad in my refrigerator and there are things in the freeze and cupboard I can eat without having to go grocery shopping when I get back.    Did the presents get wrapped before they got sent out?  No, but they’ll get there by Christmas.  

Even with a major Canvas disaster, the grades and all of the comments are done and in.   

I didn’t get thank you notes written, but I have put all of the tags in a pile so I know where to start.   

Ten minutes at a time.   So much better than nothing.  No much better than I thought.   We can do big things in small steps.   Especially if that is all that we can do.  

With love,

Laurie