The wall

is what I have hit.

I can think of a few things I should be doing less than I should be writing this blog post, but not many. Messing up the kitchen further would be one. Maybe knitting would be another. Eating the chocolate chip cookie dough that I got as far as mixing, but not baking, would be pretty high on the list. At least I'm not doing that.

I am starting to realize that something in my life is going to have to give. I have, B"H, a bright and active kid and a vocal and active baby. They need me. I have a home, which needs to be at least moderately tidy for our health and my sanity. Everyone needs to eat, and they should have vegetables a heck of a lot more often than they're currently getting them. I have a husband, on whom I am taking out way too many of my current frustrations. And, oh yes, there's that job. From which I just took twelve weeks of leave, with no one really covering my absence.

Right now there simply are not enough hours in the day even for the very basics. I cannot take care of Iyyar and Barak, keep the house running, and do my job. Even if I did nothing else, I couldn't do everything that's being asked of me at work--and I am not willing to do nothing but work.

What's going to give? Well, I'm going to be looking for cleaning help again, that's one thing. Even though it's expensive and we can't really afford it; even though I dislike, philosophically, the idea of hiring someone else to clean up after me and my messes. The reality is that I can earn a lot more in an hour than I would pay someone to clean; I'd rather spend an extra two hours working than six cleaning, because it gives me more time with my kids.

And I'm going to have to have a talk with my boss. I'm sort of dreading this, because I know that a big part of the reason I'm valuable is that I always come through. But I just can't. There are only so many hours in the day, and I'm about to have to waste more of them with the commute and, oh yes, pumping.

I don't know what else to do. I already barely knit, I don't waste time on the Internet unless I'm multitasking (pumping, usually), and socializing is now strictly a Shabbos activity, unless combined with Barak time. We had friends over for dinner tonight who are in for the summer from Israel, and it just torpedoed my day (not to mention my mood). It's after 10 and I have a trashed kitchen, two overtired (but finally both sleeping, B"H) kids, and almost nothing done on the speech I'm working on. Speech #1 of 14. Oh yeah, and I'm supposed to be making a meal for a friend with a new baby, and there are so many things, just random things, that I need to do, like go to the post office and write that letter to the hospital and deal with Iberia and, and, and...

And finish that speech that's open in another window on this computer right now.