Like mother, like daughter...sorta.

In attempt to spark up the ole brain of mine, I have started to draw again, read a little more, practice the piano again, work on websites and web design again, take pictures again, think a little more...do I feel any smarter? No, not really. In fact, instead, I feel quite overwhelmed and stretched thin. I used to do all this at once but without work and without school. Enrolling in two programs (principal certification and behavior analyst certification) is no easy feat and work keeps me up at night, like tonight. I know what my potential is when I throw myself into one thing completely and I know when I start to fail when I start doing everything - the hair starts being pulled, I start running around in circles, I don't know where I begin and where I end and ultimately, I drop the ball somewhere. Something gets neglected and something suffers.

I am a lot like my mother who needs to be in constant movement, who always has an agenda. Only my mom was tyrannical about how her schedule was followed and we all had to follow it. My parents worked Monday through Saturday and when Sunday followed - boy, did I dread it. Come Sunday morning my mom would stand at my room door and shout at me at 8am with,
"Aiya, why you still sleeping? You so lazy! Get up! Get up!"

Literally 5 minutes later she'd follow with,
"What? You plan on sleeping all day, you lazy good for nothing! Get up! Get up!"

And 2 minutes later,
"Aiya!! Still sleeping!?! Get up! You have to vacumn, do the laundry, visit grandma, buy groceries, make breakfast, wash the floors, clean the bathroom, walk the dog, bathe the dog, fold and put away the clothes and mow the lawn! You so lazy! Aiya! Get up! Get up!"

She'd also follow all this with sucking her teeth, shaking her head and walking away with disgust. We knew we were in real trouble if she began performing the first task on her schedule by herself because she would start crying and muttering under her breath,
"Good for nothing daughters. Why am I so unlucky to have such ungrateful children? Why they treat me like this? Why they so lazy? All my fault...all my fault... I did something wrong in past life/to ancestors/to gods..."

If we got her to this state, well, that was the end of any kind of enjoyable Sunday for the rest of that day - and possible for the rest of the week.

Although I'm sure my mom had other things in mind while acting this way, I don't want to be someone who is in constant motion for the sake of being in motion. There has to be a functional and enjoyable purpose for me. So any type of cleaning activity is really out of the question for me. But I do feel like I have to do something productive with my time. I just wish sleeping would be a productive activity for me right now....sigh.