It can’t be scheduled | Toddling Through the Silicon Valley | Cheryl Bac | Palo Alto Online |

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Toddling Through the Silicon Valley

By Cheryl Bac

E-mail Cheryl Bac

About this blog: I'm a wife, stay-at-home mom, home cook, marathon runner, and PhD. I recently moved to the Silicon Valley after completing my PhD in Social Psychology and becoming a mother one month apart. Before that, I ran seven marathons incl...  (More)

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It can’t be scheduled

Uploaded: Sep 30, 2018
This month our toddler was up at night teething. While soothing her one night I decided to watch the documentary Mr. Rogers and Me. One of my favorite quotes from the documentary was “There are things that you can’t schedule, but if you show up every day you are going to see miraculous things.” Bo Lozoff was talking about meditating in the woods for 40 days and spotting a snake shedding its skin.

During our last trip to the beach this summer, we spotted a sea lion swimming along the shore. My son ran along the beach as the sea lion swam in the waves. This was the highlight of our trip and something none of us could have planned.

Looking back over our son’s early years I am reminded about how many milestones and memories couldn’t have been scheduled. How many I witnessed just because we spent hour after hour, day after day together. While it’s bittersweet to realize I’ll miss more and more of these unscheduleable moments with our son as he goes to school, Bo Lozoff’s quote was a great reminder for me to take a step back and really enjoy this time with our youngest while she is constantly learning new words and making new discoveries about the world.
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Comments

Posted by Mother of 4 , a resident of Palo Verde School,
on Oct 14, 2018 at 9:30 am

Your post just reminded me how difficult it is to schedule anything, particularly for me. Whether it is a doctor's appointment or getting my hair done. Yes it is time to schedule time for me, but usually it has become very hit and miss.

"Me time" is sometimes things I need to get done rather than things I would like to do. It is often time that suddenly occurs rather than is put into the schedule. When it does come, there is that sudden desire of rushing to do 101 things that I have been putting off, but the best Me Time is often just sitting with a coffee listening to the birds and the distant sounds of other kids playing that I don't have to watch or wait for the inevitable mom intervention that will be necessary.

I like to read your blog, it makes me feel that writing a blog is something I wish I was doing. Still I can always comment on your thoughts and let my fingers do their thing adding my 2 cents.

In the meantime, I can enjoy my Me Time, enjoying the couple of hours of unscheduled bliss, and spend my time daydreaming of all the things it would be nice to do while at the same time being thankful for the fact that there are many happy little bodies keeping me away from doing the majority of them.


Posted by Cheryl Bac, a Palo Alto Online blogger,
on Oct 14, 2018 at 3:34 pm

Cheryl Bac is a registered user.

Mother of 4- Mother of 4- Yes, it is challenging to find the right balance. Great reminder that sometimes that best thing we can do is to enjoy the moment and take a breath rather than scramble to check off another item on our never ending to do list. Thanks for being a reader and for commenting.


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