Not at home now

Recently I took a job with a contractor to work as a communications specialist at NIH. I'm in a tech-heavy division. I thought about changing the name of this blog, and I still might, but for now it reminds me of those great days at home running a house. It was a lot more running around and far more work than I anticipated (getting the kids off to school, entertaining a 2 yr old, cleaning, cooking, managing our bills, writing, looking for clients, dealing with downer-naysayers, volunteering, etc.), but being a stay-at-home mom/writer was easily the most emotionally rewarding, interesting, straight-up fun, and creative job I have ever had. I started my own communications company, and while I'm still working at it, learning ways to increase business, dreaming up story ideas and marketing campaigns was/is fun. Most nights I got about 2-6 hours sleep, but still I was/am working for myself and that makes all the difference.

My company is making some steady money. From it's first year to now, income has increase markedly, but still not enough to stave off a job outside the home, unfortunately.

The last time I did a full-time-commute-to-work-job, I had one child. Now I have two little ones. Everything is so much harder, it's unbelievable. Particularly since I am still freelancing and getting new clients. The work nights after my kids go to sleep [I made sure to tell clients that my work hours were primarily 9 pm to 2 am] are still there, and I still have to get up just as early. But now instead of using the time to get one kid off to school and the baby up, fed and dressed. I rush around getting myself ready, grabbing breakfast and coffee and heading out. My commute is 1- 1.5 hours and it blows! Big time. I usually miss dinner time and breakfast time.

The job is fine, but my ultimate goals remains working productively and successfully from home. Supporting my family without commuting 12-13 hours per week, would be a soulful, wonderful thing. My husband would never consider a commute this long. His work is 10 min. away. But I've been doing bullshit commutes this long since I was 13 and it never gets any better. My high school was 2 hours away by bus and subway. College at Brown was immediately easier because I got back 4 hours of my day. I'm 44 now, subtract the time at college, and some other rare occasions when I lived close to work, and I've been commuting at least an 1 hour for about 25 years - and through 3 VWs.

I'm afraid to add up how much of my life has been spent commuting so I will skip doing the math. Even books on tape and NPR can't make constant traffic interesting. I will say I get more done during the day now that I don't have to jam everything I need to write into a 2-year-old's nap time. When I write now. I move pretty fast. It was a skill I had to develop 'cause I never knew how much time I had before I'd be interrupted. It's training that serves me well.