Feeling burned out

Yesterday was my husband's birthday, a fact which didn't enter my brain when I was scheduling some of the events that currently fill my days.

So, feeling a bit guilty -- though he really doesn't care all that much about honoring birthdays (a fact that's troubled me off and on over the years when my own birthday rolled around) -- I got up, meditated, and then left at 8 to drive over the bridge to the bakery in Poulsbo to pick up the date-filled bearclaws my husband loves.

I hit rush hour traffic (folks on the Kitsap Peninsula who work in Seattle need to cross our island to catch a ferry to work) on the way back, so it was after 9 when I got home, but I'd used the times my car was at a standstill to load "When I'm 64" onto my iphone, so I was able to go into the bedroom and wake him with that song and his bearclaws before heading into the shower: I needed to be at the local broadcast studio at 9:30 to record a podcast about the benefit we're putting on this Sunday for the wildfire victims in Eastern Washington.

The day pretty much continued at that pace: On the road at 8, shower at 9, podcast at 9:30, back home by 11, walk the dog, breakfast, blog, do the writeup and the first round of audio editing for the podcast, take an interview call from the local paper at 2, walk the dog, put together a collection of images and information for the reporter and email those off, snack, drive off to check on our old house (due to close next month) and pick up what mail is still delivered there, draft a writeup for another podcast which needs to go out today, dinner, walk the dog, publish the podcast, then leave for a friend's house to participate in a play reading for a local playwright's new play, back after 10 to walk and feed and walk the dog, then learn that the flood certificate for our previous home has expired and the furnace inspector never noted his inspections on the furnace and the contractor never installed the carbon monoxide detectors he promised. Sigh.

Like this fruit packing plant in the town we're raising money for, I'm feeling a little burned out.  But I like thinking that as we drift back and forth over our days, between burned out and energized, the resulting fluctuations in the light we emanate becomes a kind of shimmer, a sparkle; that to be a steadier light source would actually be a little boring...

And yes, we'll get around to celebrating my husband's birthday at some point.  Like my birthday, and our anniversary, we're holding it all in tension until that house sells.  Once it does, assuming it does, we'll take off somewhere and hold a grand celebration.  But don't hold your breath: it may be a while...