Domestication of a Heather

Lately I've been taking a lot of pleasure in the domestic part of life. I'm more efficient cleaning, I'm cooking and baking, I'm folding laundry and taking Bean to the library, getting ready to sign her up for soccer, doing homework, going to Brownies, making lunches, hosting sleepovers.

I'm turning into a soccer mom. And that used to scare me. Years ago, I used to tell Steve, "I'm not ready to be that person. I'm not ready to give up who I am to be a 'soccer mom'."

What I didn't realize at the time, though, is that I didn't have to get the mom haircut, sport the mom jeans, and turn into a suburbian Stepford mom-wife clone. I didn't have to change who I was.

Well, that's not entirely accurate. I think being more involved in my role as a wife and a mother these past few months has caused me to change who I am a little. But I shed the parts of me that needed to be shed. And when I realized that at the core, I am still essentially the same person, it was easy to change things and let go of things that aren't important... or that I can do differently.

My personal life, my home life, it's never been better, and that really impacts how successful I feel. How efficient I feel. How happy I am. I am really happy more often than not these days. I mean, I have my days where my mood plunges into an abyss, but that's a chemical thing rather than being directly proportionate to how things are going in my life.

I think I'm maturing, learning how to make the important things in my life a priority, and that feels awesome.