Meditation and other deep thoughts about Kate Gosselin’s hair

There is a time of day that tastes deliciously sweet … like sun-kissed strawberries bursting with the warmth of summer. Slightly tart. Secretly satisfying crunch of the seeds popping in my mouth.

This time of day also tastes to me like a towering ice cream cone, or piping hot coffee in a big frothy mug, or a thick creamy chowder on a super cold day (in a crusty bread bowl of course).

Mmmm… scrumptious.

This time of day feels like freshly laundered sheets on a cozy bed, or a hot steamy shower after an intense workout. It feels like a peaceful walk on a warm summer night with just the slightest breeze that reminds you it’s getting pretty late.

This time of day falls precisely between the few precious hours when Noob Baby drifts off to sleep and when I eventually give in and hit the sack myself. Most days, this coveted window lasts but three hours. Sometimes, just two.

I’m always torn about how I’m going to savor this small small window of quiet, peace, possibility, opportunity. I’m allowed to have uninterrupted thoughts now. I can be selfish and just sit and zone out like a mombie.

And here is my mombie thought process:

Should I blog? It’s been a week or so….

Should I read? I’ve got a stack from the library…

Should I watch TV? There are like five different shows queued on the DVR with another being recorded right now…

Should I watch a Netflix? We have two that have been sitting here for a couple weeks…

Should I work out? Just a few more pounds to my happy weight…

Should I do one of 500  chores that I’m behind on?

Or should I sit here and start stressing out about what I should be doing right now and not actually doing any of those things??? How ridiculous to feel anxious about the tick-tick-ticking of the clock when I don’t have a stack of papers to grade. I don’t have homework that’s due. The DVR police can’t catch me (right?) .

How silly and neurotic. I should be reveling in the fact that I can lay back on the bed in my sweatpants or underwear or totally nekkid if I want to and count the little bumps on our ceiling. I can mombie all I want!

But, if you spend every waking second with a little person that can’t even form a cohesive thought, but knows damn well how to give you hell in a heartbeat… well, then you know how freakin anxiously important that window of “selfish” time is. It’s probably the only uninterrupted time of day where you can really truly whole-heartedly think about why Kate Gosselin’s new hairdo looks so creepy.

That time is sacred. And it should only be spent on such important matters. Seriously. Creepy. Hair.

My point, I think…. is that I am now declaring it totally acceptable (throw out all that guilt) … moms and dads … for you to veg out – I mean really go off the deep one — when your little one hits the zzzzzs.

Be like me. Forget the honey do’s for a bit, leave the toys on the battlefield, and just space out and enjoy your quiet time. Because unlike other jobs 9-5 or whatever, we don’t have a cubicle that we get to think in, or our own office to retreat to. We don’t have paperwork that we can pretend to review while daydreaming about daiquiris on the beach. We certainly don’t have a lunch break. And even that private bathroom break – yeah, we bring our noobs with us. And if your noob is like my noob, which is very likely, then he’s probably unraveled 85% of the toilet paper roll in the two seconds that you had your eyes shut.

So, we’ve earned it.

And now you know. When I’m not cooking, cleaning, laundering, cleaning, working out, cleaning, reading, blogging or being a good citizen and watching all my Netflix videos, that is what I’m doing. Oh, and for PR sake, we’ll just call it “meditation.”

Namaste.