floating boats

recently there was a political analyst who stated that ann romeny hadn't worked a day in her life. while she says she misspoke the subsequent chatter from others made me think about my life as a stay at home mom. the controversy surrounding Hilary rosen's comments should have died away but something our president said struck a chord with me. a loud dissonant chord with a minor 5th and 9th :) he said that "michelle and i did not have the luxury of her staying home". wait...what? come on now. perhaps you do not quite understand like i thought you should. staying at home is not a "luxury" per say. many of us give up, money, clothes, cars, travel, secondary educations, etc., to stay home and raise our kids without making money. this should not make us martyrs, nor should it make us better than anyone else. it's a choice. honestly, it's a choice i get to make everyday. there are days i want to go back to work. i want to leave the chaos and sometimes mundane tasks behind and feel like i am accomplishing something immediately. something with immediate reaction and reward. today was a reminder of why i make that choice everyday. princess grace and i ran errands. an hours long drive to the scout shop to purchase awards for my volunteer work with cub scouts. we came home made lunch and i was going to sew a lamp sleeve (you'll see later). as i reminded her to stay in the driveway where i could see her, the water company came and started pumping out the fire hydrants. . i kicked my shoes off made two paper boats and we floated them down the ditch, seeing if they could make it all the way down the street as we chased after them. we then walked through the water kicking it up. we saved about 10 worms from a sure drowning and placed them in our garden. princess grace found a sling shot stick and made soup out of leaves and hydrant water. all and all it was about 30 minutes of my day, but this is the reason for me. these small moments of mommyness that i get. that i treasure. these are all mine. staying at home is a lot like those boats we floated. there are days when i'm rushing so fast down the water it goes by and the day is over. other times i'll get stuck on a garbage can (as princess grace's boat did) and i'll be stagnant and finish the day only with divine help. what i wish my days were, a boat that floats scenically through the waters stopping for worms and little girls toes and finishing with a great languishing spin at the end looking back at all the fun the ride was. somewhere in there is the immediate reward i felt i needed from work.