This week I have a volleyball practice for my youngest child. I also have a shower to rebuild, an orchestra event to go to, and I’m assuming some sort of alien abduction that I have to attend. You know how those things go. They always happen when it’s the busiest part of your day, and you’ve got to get the shopping day. I would appreciate a reminder phone call about the appointment.
The point is, as a parent, I find that my time is at a premium. Everything seems to land on my doorstep and there is never enough time to be all things to all people. This is also the time when my wife decides that she also has other projects that she wants me to get to when I have the time and then we both laugh before popping some anti-anxiety meds.
I could clone myself but that’s a pipe dream. It’s based in sci-fi books that have no basis in reality. Instead, we are going to break physics and actually create more time. It’s the only way that a parent can actually get everything done anymore.
First, I’m going to check out my local library for their “Smashing through barriers: time travel and you!” I don’t know if they have that class, or if it’s just a title for what is really how to use the internet thing, but I’m hopeful I can get some ideas that way. Otherwise, I would never leave my bed in the morning because the day is just overwhelming.
Next, I’m going to ask my mother-in-law because she always has advice about stuff. It’s very useful.
After that, I think I have to go through literature and see how it was done before. Hermione in the Harry Potter series used something called a time turner to attend two classes at the same time. Do you think that is something I can get on Etsy? There is also the Hot Tub Time Machine but I think that only works in romantic comedy situations. I don’t need a new romance. My wife is awesome. I need to be at both an orchestra concert and a volleyball practice at the same time.
So maybe fiction isn’t the way to go and let’s get into the hard sciences. Time travel is very possible if you listen to Einstein. It’s the whole E=MC squared thing. Not to get too deep here, but it’s where energy is transferred into mass which is just a fancy way to say that most parents comfort eat and that seems to help with our guilt for missing things.
But in the theory of relativity, it states that you can time travel. Only, it goes forward and not backward. So, you can’t really be in two places at once. It’s all based on speed somehow. I don’t know, I stopped reading after the first sentence because it’s the whole theory is a bit uppity if you ask me. The gist though is that if you run really fast, time will move quicker, and you can miss it all. This is useful because then all of your kids have an equal share of crap to talk about in therapy years done the road.
Even with all of those really good ideas, I still find myself at a loss for what to do when the week stacks up and I can’t be everywhere or get anything done. This is where we get to breaking the laws of physics. Which are bullcrap, by the way.
Who made these laws? Did they take into account a parent’s busy schedule or were they just enamored with gravity and chunking stuff off high places like a toddler? That deserves a time out. What we need to do as parents is to form a committee and write some strongly worded petitions. If governmental work has taught me anything, it’s that petitions totally work and are not immediately thrown away as soon as they are delivered. This is a super good idea.
So, I’ll take the lead on this. I need someone named Linda to be the secretary. Linda’s are great at writing things down. Then I need a Chuck to handle PR, Millicent to handle customer complaints, and Julie is on snacks. Make sure everyone lets her know if you have a peanut allergy. Finally, I will take as many Karens as we can get because parents need more time. And dang-it if we have to change the laws of physics to do it, then so be it.
This will be much easier than making sure my schedule is well thought out and organized. What am I, a miracle worker? Either which way, I’ll see everyone at the first meeting which is hereby canceled because none of us can find a time to go. We’ll get to it next week.
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This Post is republished on Medium.
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