Confession #22: It's a small, small world.....

Okay, here's an entry with a fair amount of solemnity.  I apologize in advance, but it's a confession that needs to be made on behalf of all the stay-at-home trophy wives out there.

My life at home is very small.  I deal with small clothes, small toys, small forks, small bites of food, and small little hands and feet.  All day long.....small.  It's adorable, breathtaking, and endearing all at once.

In a whole other way, my life at home is very small.  Most days, there is just me and one other little person in my house.  This child doesn't even talk. Some days, it's me, a non-verbal little person, and a unique almost-four-year-old who is learning a lot about life and who he is.  Ultimately, though, think about how few people I interact with on a daily basis.  That number is very, very small.

For those of you who think staying at home is the easy way out, you're wrong.  So very wrong.....

It requires a lot of work in order for me to expand my world from the daily norm:  preparing food (at least three times a day), cleaning up from food preparation, washing used dishes, doing laundry, wiping runny noses, signing folders, picking up toys invisible to the child's eye, changing interesting diapers, paying bills, buying necessities for our family members to be clean, clothed, and constantly fed.

In order to feel like an adult who matters in this world, not only to my children, but to others, I have to work hard.  I annoy working friends with e-mails.  I send text messages to people I think might check their phones while they're at work or at home.  I play Scrabble on my phone and Words with Friends on my computer/phone.  I call my mom and talk to her for an hour because it's very lonely when you're at home, no matter how damn sweet those little munchkins are.  I check Facebook....a lot.  I pin things on Pinterest....a lot.  I make sweet treats for friends just so I have an excuse to leave the house and see them.  I go to Jazzercise and exercise and dance poorly with woman who like to chat and affirm that there is still a sense of humor in this lady.  I make crafty things so I can justify my desire to leave the house, buy supplies, and then explore my creativity.  And when someone wants one of my creations, I feel a huge thrill and rush of success!

Those are all ways I desperately try to expand my world.....because, to be honest, my small world is nice and perfectly adequate and all I dreamed it would be.  I don't regret a single decision I have made.  If anything, this is just a plea to my friends and family who don't understand what it is like to "just" stay at home.  Consider this a small plea to understand and tolerate me when I need to make my world just a bit bigger and brighter.

And if you ever sing the song "It's a Small World After All" from Disney Land, I will punch you as hard as I can.

MWAH!