Sick Kid

It was weird how easily I was able to shift gears this morning from ready to teach to home with a sick kid. Am I finally becoming flexible and resilient? Nah. More likely I’m still in an altered state from dancing and singing all yesterday afternoon. Glorious!

But this state—temporary or not—of being able to accept, without tying myself in knots, the need to NOT do what I was ready and excited to do? To stay home? To give up my expectations? I’m very curious about it while it lasts. It’s a window into how I’d like to be. Shedding the product-oriented,

sleep when you’re dead,

no pain no gain,

move it or lose it,

rat race

mentality that I have been socialized to believe, far more effectively and deeply than this non-doing, pausing Alexander Technique stuff that I’ve been practicing for 15 years.

It is astonishing how much energy it takes to agonize about having to change my plan. NOT doing that and just quietly acquiescing to the reality of a quiet day with a sick kid was amazing.

Wow.

A line of song is playing in my head… “Give in! Give in!” (from “Whatever Lola Wants,” Damn Yankees) What if I just gave in to the inevitable, rather than trying to be and do all the things all the time? What if I didn’t waste so much energy worrying about it?

Does this resonate with you?

Our culture (still!) doesn’t value the “stay home” option, for all the lip service. But maybe if we just let ourselves take the damn sick (or sick kid) day and not stress about it, we’d all be better off.