"Your mother must have been quite a slave to your education, Miss Bennett..."

I can't believe I am the same person who thought life was going to get easier with my children in school. I don't know if it's just the sheer quantity of children I now have, or the fact I have to have 4 of the 5 in 3 schools in 2 counties, 5 days a week. (Please don't ask me to repeat that, it's late) That being said, I actually am very happy with their circumstances. Jack brought home an assignment for English the other night that I don't think I could have tackled until I was a junior in High School. He is feeling the pinch of higher expectations, but that pinch sent me spiriling into depression my first semester of college, so better to get over it when you're in 6th grade, right?
I have definately entered a new phase of motherhood. It is good. I mean, the whole handful of toddlers was NOT my forte. I need people that can use a toilet independently. (Although, I suddenly appreciate the value of having my most pressing appointment be naptime.)
On the other hand, I have always had a certain disdain for people who always whine about being "so busy!". The implication of that response has always made me feel that somehow what they are doing is so much more important than what I'm doing, and they'd love to share it all with me, if I was important enough to spend time explaining it all to me. Similar to the way I feel being late is like saying, "What I was doing was more important than being here, with you."
So, I am bravely resolving to not whine. If you had told me a year ago that I could have my children in the type of schools they are now, with the only tuition being "my time" to transport them, or volunteer at the school, I would have jumped with joy! So here goes.
Someday, hopefully, a great distinguished person (such as Lady Catherine Deberg) will say to one of my children, "Your mother must have been quite a slave to your education."
And they will reply, "Yes. Yes she was."