Important

It is tough to suss out the important parts of life from all the urgent ones.  I live in the land of urgent.  At any given moment there are three or more things that all NEED doing NOW.

Take this morning for example.  Twenty minutes before my hair-cut appointment, I jumped in the shower.  Before the soap on my pouf had lathered the baby started screaming, the phone rang and child #2 and #3 began squabbling.

I looked at my legs.  They looked urgent, in a foresty sort of way, but not important, so no shaving.  A quick shampoo and towel dry later I turned on the television, which stalled my chidren's "fighting and quarreling one with another."  Great parenting, no?  I then picked up the squalling one, who had been fed, changed, burped and snuggled, and I realized that he could go to my appointment screaming, but I could not go naked.  So, for the moment, clothing trumped crying.  And voila!  We have a winner.  Getting dressed was the most important way for me to spend that particular five minutes.

Life, however is not always so clear.  Sometimes the important things start to compete too, and then I have to figure out which ones are importanter and importantest while holding my finger in the dike of the urgent.

And sometimes I get it wrong.  Really wrong.

I was hoping that some pithy bit of wisdom would come to me at this point, but ... I've got nothin'.

When in doubt, turn to 1930's British political propaganda.  The motto "Keep Calm and Carry On" was written to raise morale in event of a Nazi invasion, but I think it applies to every day of this crazy ride.

Ahhhhhh.  This was a nice moment of calm.  Now, to close the computer and carry on ... calmly of course.