I am awake at 3:45 a.m. My brain won’t shut off. I wish I could say I am thinking about something interesting. A problem I need to solve. A product I want to invent. A great blog post idea (clearly not).
But no. I am awake at this painful hour because it just dawned on me, out of the blue, that I think I wasted a ton of construction paper when I volunteered in my daughter’s kindergarten classroom last week. I won’t bore you with the details, but let’s just say I may or may not have cut 160 strips of black and orange paper that were not needed.
Two years ago I used to wake up in the middle of the night sweating about work-related issues. Did I remember to respond to that urgent email? Should we revise our media strategy? Is my client going to fire us?
Now I wake up sweating about kindergarten craft projects.
My how things change. I don’t miss the work sweats one bit. But I can’t help but wonder if, in their absence, my brain is allowing itself to overvalue the importance of those paper strips. OH NO I WASTED CONSTRUCTION PAPER does not exactly seem worthy of a sleepless night.
Then again, in my defense – construction paper is clearly a valuable commodity at my daughter’s school. They have it on lock down in a super special storage room, accessibly only to adults who have a key and pass a retinal scan identity test. Ok fine, that last one isn’t true.
Who knows – maybe I also feel a need to prove myself after my math class/Roman numeral failure. Unfortunately it appears that craft projects are also not my strong suit, but I should’ve known this. I may be the most ill-equipped kindergarten Room Parent ever.
On the upside, writing this blog post has made me sleepy again – I’m guessing that reading it will have the same effect – so now I’ll go back to bed and see if I can squeeze in 15 minutes of shut-eye before my children wake up because they think they should. Curse you, time change.
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Please note that I updated this post to correct spelling errors that are inherent in 4 a.m. writing. Also let the record show that now I am lying awake wondering if there is a different craft project I can propose that would require 160 paper strips…
Banana Wheels 
This happens to me all the time. My brain has to have something to worry about. I used to worry about important things. Now I worry about anything my brain can cling to. It’s got to be a form of insanity, right?
It definitely feels that way.
They certainly do not mess around with the construction paper and art supplies at schools these days. No siree. I am thinking some kind of paper maiche project should fix you right up! ;)-Ashley
Paper mache! Of course! Genius.
I hate that feeling. Back in the day my dreams were related to my waitressing days. The totally sucked because I would run back and forth in my dreams all night long and feel like I had no break from that awful place when I had to return the next day.
Gah – I totally had waitressing nightmares back in the day. I was a terrible waitress, so that might have been part of my problem.
We are killing trees over here left and right with how much copy paper my kids go through. Drawing after drawing of pretty much the same thing.
I hear you. My kid once drew 23 pictures of Mary Poppins on 23 different pieces of paper in one sitting. All the same.
Did you stuff the paper strips down your shirt, cross your arms over your body and slither out the door to your car? No reason for asking….
I have mastered the art of the sheepish slither.
Until you start stealing glue, I think that you’re safe. But given the current ecological situation with trees and the importance placed on the construction paper stash at the school, I understand your concern. What gets lost in all this? You are a freaking ROCKING room mother, my friend.
But in all honesty, I always dream about or end up stressing about work when I’m in bed. And the shower. When I’m there I’m not even super stressed out, but at home? It wakes me up. I hate it. Why do things have to cost money?
I’m sensing a trend. Perhaps bloggers are all just people who can’t sleep.
They haven’t shown me where they keep the glue yet.
Actually, I’m a very good sleeper. I LOVE sleep, which is why I get ticked when I wake up in the morning stressed about work already. YOU WILL NOT TAKE MY SLEEP!