I 
I 
I 
I 
I
I
I
AustinMama offers up some Daddy props.
- Robert A. Heinlein
Doing too much
There's a Russian proverb that says a thousand throats can be cut in
one night by a running man. At least, that's what Pavel Chekhov
(Walter Koenig) claims in a Star Trek episode I saw when I was about
Keefe's age. Clearly, this had more psychological effect on me than I
might have guessed, because today I often feel like that running man,
with a comparably lengthy if bloodless to do list. When did we turn
into such determined overachievers?
For over 90% of our species history, we were hunter-gatherers. Today,
no more than 0.01% of the world's populace do so, a lifestyle the
civilized world looks down upon as hopelessly backward. Still, despite
their embarrassing lack of DVD players, the average work week in a
hunter-gatherer culture is ten to fifteen hours. Advancements in our
technology and theoretically in our culture are not making us more
spare time: they are taking it away.
We are trying to cram more hours into every day at unprecedented
levels. McDonalds starts serving at 6am or even earlier in some areas,
newspapers shoot for 5:30 rather than 6:30 delivery now, and commuters
attempting to circumvent rush hour traffic have just spread the
congestion into two shifts. At the other end, everything from bars to
grocery stores stay open later, and 24-hour business fuels internet
expansion. As many as 50% of North Americans don't get enough sleep.
For my own part, I'm an involved stay-at-home attachment parent with a
busy nearly-four-year-old who's often up 'till 11 pm or later, a
maddening trait softened by the fact that he's pleasant company and
fairly self-directed much of that time. You who are reading this
likely know, in ways childless folk cannot comprehend, how draining
active little folk can be. In true house-spouse fashion I prepare
three daily meals, wash dishes, do laundry, clean, vacuum, care for pets and keep track of countless items' whereabouts. In trying to
improve the household diet, and with an elder son who doesn't
metabolize refined sugar well, I bake two or three times a week to
provide more virtuous treats. On an ongoing basis we are repairing,
renovating and redecorating our new house. I make time to meditate,
exercise regularly, keep abreast of current events, study various
things that I’m interested in, pursue spiritual practices and have a
social life. Atop all of that, I am working hard to build my career as
a writer, pursuing clients when I can shoehorn it into daytimes, and
writing, normally between the hours of 1 and 4am. I figure I’ve been
averaging less than five hours of sleep a night for more than five
years.
This lunacy carries itself over into my sons’ lives as well. Nine-year-old Keefe’s circle of friends is large enough that we’ve got birthday
parties back to back and sometimes overlapping on every weekend for
months of the year. His school schedule is augmented by a surprising
volume of nightly homework, karate classes three nights a week, guitar
lessons, and more -- all exacerbated by the strenuous negotiations that
are seemingly necessary to get that homework begun as often as not.
Keefe also wants to do everything from horseback riding to breakdancing
lessons, have much more time to play with his friends, finish a bunch
of computer games and see every movie ever made -- particularly those
that I suggest are still inappropriate for him but which schoolmates of
his, whose parents are less regulatory than I, have already seen.
Where does it end?
At least I’ve had enough experience living like this to have worked out
something of a system, and experimented with some habits that do or do
not help me function. I know what caffeine overload does to my
metabolism and restrain myself to a single cup of coffee or tea four
days a week. Of course, my favorite mug is one you could float a jet
ski in, but I still only fill it once. On one of those days, I’ll make
a second boat of rapturous coffee just before tucking children to bed,
and settle in for a long night. That’s usually Sunday, when trash and
recycling have to be organized, the litter box and turtle tank get
cleaned, and I enjoy some solitary time. Astonishingly, maximizing my
sleep doesn’t seem to be the best scenario for my well being. I find
that I am much better company when I sacrifice some shut eye once a
week or so just to make down time. A long soak in the tub, a good
book, a walk, or the occasional game of pool allow me to reconnect with
myself, enjoy a better sense of who I am as an individual beyond the to
do list, and feed the inner part of who I was before life with
children. Similarly, one night a week I always go to sleep shortly
after the kids and get every second of rest I can. My body usually picks
that night for me without discussing it with my brain, but when Hugh
shakes me while I’m reading the bedtime story and says “No, daddy, say
RIGHT words.” It’s a good indication my neurons are getting the hell
out of the way.
Naps are nice. Albert Einstein reportedly got by on regular naps. A
twenty or forty minute nap refreshes more than a two hour one. This is
because it’s long enough to permit your brain an entire sleep cycle,
but insufficient to get all the way into deep sleep, which can leave
you logy and stupid from the effort of swimming back up from those
depths, like mental bends. As a self defense mechanism, my body’s
trained itself to lift my head up and look around for a couple of
minutes after half an hour of passing out on the couch, so I can get
two or three micro naps when Hugh cruises for a long one, and that adds
up. But the biggest factor in keeping me alive and achieving without
enough sleep is diet. In our household I’ve completely replaced cane
sugar with fructose (which doesn’t require insulin to metabolize, and
so doesn’t make you peak and crash as much), pasta or white rice or
flour with brown and whole wheat varieties, cow’s milk with goat’s, and
red meat with, well, whatever else comes to hand. I don’t buy a lot of
processed food, and cook things from scratch. I start each day with a
yogurt shake full of spirulina pacifica, bran, fibrous fruits and
vegetables. It’s truly amazing: in terms of my energy levels, I figure
it’s worth about an hour of slumber all by itself. I graze more, with
snacks every couple of hours rather than three bigger meals or, worst
of all, being so concerned with how well my children are eating that I
forget to feed myself until discovering I am ravenous at dinner, a
torture I seem finally to have stopped inflicting on myself. And I
dutifully take extra B vitamins, iron, a honking-big multivitamin
formulated for my age and gender, and more when it seems necessary. If
I’m going to live a lifestyle that punishes my body one way I’m sure as
heck going to be as careful with it in other ways as I can.
Ultimately, I know that living like this is an unsustainable practice,
but with each day my offspring become incrementally less dependent and
it gets easier to fit my day inside…my day. Although he grumbles,
Keefe can pitch in with an occasional household chore now, and Hugh is
not only making my day easier when he cooks or loads the washing
machine with me, he’s picking up some skills and habits that will serve
him in later years. My multitasking skills have skyrocketed as a
natural result of parenting anyway, and my prioritizing skills along
with them: I’m at peace that a few novels have to wait a decade or more
before I try to let them out, and I’m not going to take up
blacksmithing until the boys are in college no matter how cool it might
be. Maybe, just maybe, the neurons not yet damning me in their death
throes as I write this at 2:17am will be enough to carry me through to
the rest of a century of satisfying and moderately less hectic life
with wit and dignity. And after it all, plenty of time for rest in the
grave.
_______________
Michael Nabert is a Canadian writer who loves to talk and sing, and writes mainly about
parenting, the art of wooing and paleontology. Widely traveled, with an opinion about everything, his friends often describe him as having
"a
deplorable excess of character." He is currently stay-at-home dad to Hugh
(3) and Keefe (9). Send feedback for Michael to: poprocks@austinmama.com
