If we're saving so much time, how come we all feel spent?

I am a decidedly low-tech person. I prefer hanging my laundry on the line to putting it in the dryer; washing dishes by hand to putting them in the dishwasher; walking to driving; train travel to plane travel; writing to calling; wood fire to natural gas. The fact that I have a computer at all surprises me, and if it weren't for the fact that it makes a very handy reference tool, communication facilitator and plant stand I would likely be able to get along just fine without one.

I realize that most people's love of new gadgets stems from a desire to get things done quickly: I don't have time to wait for popcorn to pop in five minutes on top of the stove; I'd rather nuke it for three. I can't wait five days for Aunt Myrtle to get my letter asking her to send money; I need the money tomorrow. And I can't spend the whole day travelling to Toronto; I need to be there and back by tonight if I want to watch Desperate Housewives.

It might just be me, but I suspect that a lot of the time we "save" with every new gadget we add is immediately filled with other things we feel we have to do. We all have computers at work, designed to save us time - but who's working less today than they did 10 years ago? And then, when we get home, instead of taking time to relax with our families, a lot of us shift into Martha Stewart mode, making sure that the gardens look perfect and the house looks perfect - never mind that what's going on inside the house is NOT perfect.

Consider kids. As soon as they're old enough, which is not very old, kids get shunted into enrichment programs, so between the time they spend at daycare, or school plus a sitter, and the time they spend learning how to play the violin/kick a soccer ball/paint like Renoir, they're home just long enough to eat dinner with their parents (during which time they're supposed to debrief them on the events of the day, as long as they don't talk with their mouths full), have a bath and go to bed.

And people wonder why our kids display a lack of responsibility to, involvement in or compassion for their families? How can they be involved in something that has nothing to do with them?

Consider also that on the whole North Americans are getting fatter. That's largely due to the fact that a lot of the grunt work has been taken out of everyday life. People don't walk anywhere, unless you count the trip from their car to the restaurant. No one scrubs floors on hands and knees, they use their Swiffer mops instead (and fool themselves into thinking the floors are clean). They don't cook meals from scratch, they vacuum instead of sweeping, they ride lawn tractors instead of using push mowers, use snow and leaf blowers instead of shovels and rakes. And yet people are consuming more calories today than they did 50 years ago, when everyone had to do a little manual labour each day, even if that just meant climbing stairs to get to their office.

I can hear people's arguments now: but I NEED those time-saving doodads to complete all the stuff I have to do on any given day. What, exactly, do you have to do on any given day? Keep the house and grounds tidy? Feed yourself (or the kids)? Do some take-home work from the office? Watch TV? Are you sure that's the best use of your time?

Truthfully, I suspect that a lot of us want to rush through our daily tasks so we can sit undisturbed and vegetate for a couple of hours at the end. Perhaps if we did less, we'd accomplish more. Sit with the kids at dinner, then have them help with the washing up. Blow bubbles at each other. Turn off the TV until bedtime and see if you get bored. With a little luck, maybe turning off the TV will mean an earlier bedtime for some couples - who wouldn't rather create their own all-time favourite sex scenes than watch some other couple get it on?

Again, I'm not telling anyone else how they should live their life, but if you feel like you're over-taxed or empty at the end of the day, look at where you're investing yourself. It's never too early or too late to rearrange your priorities.

And if anyone wants me for the next half hour, I'll be doing dishes with my kids.

Honey, I'm home...

So my kids came back tonight from a week at their father's. It's funny - the patterns you get into without really thinking about. When you have a baby, you could be sleeping three doors down the hall, but if the baby so much as clears its throat, you're so wide awake and on the job that you could do algebra. You relax a little over time, but that instinct to rush to your kid's side never goes away.

And it takes a lifetime of being with your kids to learn what they like and what they don't; how much of a disciplinarian you have to be and what you can bribe them with. This is where I feel sorry for non-custodial parents - sure, you get to be the "fun" parent and do all the things the custodial parent won't, but when the chips are down it's hard to gain the kind of knowledge of your kids you get when you live with them all the time.

So I was prepared for the kids to have a wacky week with Dear Old Dad. But in that same week, I let my base-level awareness slip: I didn't have to keep an ear open for a kid's cry in the night, so I slept like a log. I didn't have to make sure anyone ate their broccoli, so I didn't cook any. I didn't have to keep an eye open for instep-maiming toys left in the middle of the floor and I didn't have to make sure that people were slathered with SPF 50 suncream before we left the house.

It was glorious.

However, now that the kids are back all my new weaknesses are being exposed. While the kids were running around my nice, neat living room yelling "Cake! Cake! Cake!" I forgot to scan the floor for foreign objects, and a Happy Meal toy gave my instep a Vulcan nerve pinch. Swell. I cut up some apples for the kids - no way they were getting cake-cake-cake. But I didn't get a chance to give them the apples, because they had already bolted for the back yard, had found the hose and were squirting each other. Have you ever tried to get a hose away from a determined 3-yr-old? Even if you win, you lose.

So finally we all squelched back into the house and I announced that it was bedtime. Apparently the kids had learned, over the past week with Dear Old Dad, that "bedtime" was code for "30 more minutes of running around like wild monkeys." I don't know where the darling children I raised went; my best guess is that my ex swapped them out with some mutant hybrid wolverine-children that he engineered in some lab. (He's crafty that way.)

Alright, so once and for all, at 9 pm the kids were secure in their beds (with a little duct tape). Five drinks of water, two lost toys and three stories later, and all is quiet upstairs. That either means they're asleep, or they're cutting an escape hole in the baby gate.

Think Mommy better go find some cake-cake-cake of her own.