Author: Rebecca Cuneo Keenan

In two weeks we are moving into our first house. That means we have two weeks to finish installing a freaking kitchen, stripping vinyl tiles off hardwood and then refinishing the floor on the second floor, painting the entire house and maybe even opening up a doorway or two. There are more finicky, technical jobs to be done, too, of which I am only vaguely aware.

That also means that I need to pack all of our belongings into neat, organized boxes while caring full-time for two young children and working part-time. My husband and his father and an assorted crew of volunteer helpers will be doing the reno work, so I need to take care of things on this end.

It a lot, right? It’s more than enough, isn’t it? But then I start to think about how shouldn’t I be feeding the guys who are working? The house is right around the corner from our apartment, after all. Wouldn’t a good wife and mother be preparing home-cooked meals anyway and shouldn’t she just be able to accomodate a couple more mouths? And this is where I do myself in. Because the truth is that feeding two small children a healthy meal is WAY easier than feeding two or three hungry men who have been working all day. The truth is that it would take me all day to plan and shop for and prepare food for everybody and I simply cannot do this.

Of course, I didn’t arrive at this truth until I attempted to defrost an entire pot roast in the microwave and then cook it in the slow cooker while running errands across town with the kids in the car and then running behind schedule and needing to stop at Loblaws for prepared sides to go with the roast. $6.50 for a medium container of green beans! WTF, eh? I then told my husband and father-in-law to come over for a home-cooked meal only to find that the roast wasn’t nearly done. Insert near break down here over the fact that it is now 8 pm and there is no dinner ready.  Potato wedges and beans for dinner! Dig in!

So I think I will buy some sandwich fixings to leave at the house for the guys. Then maybe, maybe, every once in a while I’ll be able to throw a proper meal together for them. But if I can’t, then I’ll just tip my hat to all those women before me who manage to accomplish a full day’s work and feed lots of hungry people and acknowledge that I am not one of them.

And then there’s this blog. It never fails that the busier I am in my personal life, the more it seems to call to me. There is so much I want to write on, so much I’d like to share, and so many ideas I have for taking this little corner of cyber space in different directions. There are also so many PR people and emails and preparations for Blogher knocking on my virtual door these days. And I can’t. I just can’t.

So, insofar that one of the purposes of this blog is to document my failings so that you won’t feel so alone in yours — to break down the unattainable expectations of perfection that we set for ourselves, really — I want to let you know that it was only through a fit of hair-pulling and hyperventilating that I came to the conclusion that I need to take a break. It was only while wading through teetering baskets of clean and dirty laundry, crushed cereal underfoot,  and cardboard boxes full of toys that the kids have “packed,” that I realized that I need to take care of myself and my children and my household first. Then and only then can I think about feeding other people.

And this blog? It’s a going to have to wait. I’ll be back in a couple weeks with more vim and vigor and – hey! – an office with a door that closes. I’ll be posting my Daily Snacks and some reviews and happenings and opinions and reports. I’ll be launching a new page that will be super duper uber cool (I hope) and I also hope you’ll all come back to me then.