Dontwanna Day
The other morning, I woke to my alarm and sat up. In an instant, the things I needed to do flooded my brain in-box. The dreary list made me want to dive back under the warm covers for another few hours. Instead of giving in to the toasty impulse, I got my grumpy self out of bed and dressed.
As I did my regular morning routine as a late-forties woman (yes, I’ll be fifty in a few months. Not claiming that decade just yet), I muttered the same thing over and over. To every item and thought from the overwhelming “To Do List,” my internal response was “I don’t wanna.”
It’s March. For a veteran homeschooler, I know better than to be surprised about this kind of irritable musing. February and early March are the toughest times in the homeschool schedule. The holidays are a distant memory, the weather here in the northeast is cold, gray, and bleak, the curriculum books have way too many pages to do before summer vacation, the kids have ceased any sort of niceties to their siblings (even in a normal, non-pandemic time), and you look at the local school bus going by every day with envy. If the weather by you doesn’t resemble the setting for a Winter Olympics, teaching can still be a struggle. Late winter can invoke the feeling of running through mud with anyone. Your inner three-year-old-self complains about everything. If you gave up something for lent, this is usually when you need your absent comfort chocolate, coffee, movies, or cheese the most. Funny how that works.
Do yourself a favor. Don’t carry out any permanent decisions about homeschooling during this time. Really. Just like no woman should radically change her hairstyle by herself with a pair of kitchen scissors five weeks after having a baby ̶ trust me on this one ̶ you need to wait. Pause any long-lasting change until you’re thinking with a clear head. Choices made in haste might lead to months of regret. Soon, sunnier days will make it possible to send the children outside for a bit. If you look at all the work your child has accomplished instead of what remains, it might encourage you and the student. You must, as they say in the original Star Wars, “Stay on target,” and keep going. Sometimes changing things up temporarily can help the situation.
Back to the other morning.
My own internal crabbiness persisted as I struggled to be pleasant to everyone. I thought, I need a ‘don’t want to’ day to catch up on everything.
Ding! Cue the light bulb over my head.
I entered the kitchen. My five homeschooling students and one adult daughter were in various stages of eating breakfast, doing the meal clean-up, or getting ready for work. Excited with the flash of inspiration, I spread my arms and declared, “Happy Dontwanna Day!”
The confused expressions on some, a blank stare from others, and utter silence by all greeted me. “Today we are celebrating Dontwanna Day,” I announced, paused, and smiled. “We will do all the jobs we don’t. Want. To. Do.”
Some children rolled their eyes and groaned. My adult daughter smirked with a combined expression of, “What are you up to, Mom, and I’m glad I’m leaving for work in a few minutes.”
“No, no, no, hear me out,” I said, making this up as I went. “We will . . . make a list . . . of all the things we have been putting off and try to reach fifty items together. It’s a group project.”
“Why?” said the seventeen-year-old. “How is this different from a regular day?” She crossed her arms, visibly annoyed.
“Things keep getting pushed aside. Many days, I argue with several of you to get your stuff done,” I said. “We should celebrate this brand-new holiday and make it fun.”
My thirteen-year-old daughter scowled. “I don’t see how any of this is going to be fun.”
“Trust me. It will be,” I replied with a broader grin.
To say there was a lack of enthusiasm for my made-up celebration might be the understatement of the century.
One life skill I have instilled in my children is the art of negotiation. Competence in this area is helpful in the adult world. I picked up this superpower by helping my mom and grandma sell at rummage sales/flea markets as a child. Customers who wanted to pay a dime for everything no matter the labeled price, taught me to haggle. Lacking that venue with my offspring, they have learned to negotiate in other ways. Dontwanna Day morning, my children practiced their bargaining talent.
The result: sixty missions added to a master list after completion, and I verified the task. If we collectively met the goal, vacation from school the next day would be the reward. St. Patrick’s Day was the following day, and we usually made it a “light” schoolwork event. This was a straightforward decision for me. They think they won. I know I did. Perfect results for our “G6” negotiation.
Everyone had their own index card filled with ideas of what they could do to add to the list. With six of us, ten items from each person would be ideal. I would not be a stickler on that point. I knew some would fall a little short and some would overshoot the goal. My list alone would add twenty plus things. Questions of what to include on the index cards varied by age. Regular farm chores you do daily for the older kids? Not allowed. Extra stuff out in the barn we should do made the cut, as did the shower for the eight-year-old who resists every single time. Mammogram appointment slated for me I have been putting off for some time? You bet that sucker got added.
Within the hour, we completed twelve items that were logged on the list. We were off to an impressive start. The change from the normal routine got everyone motivated. It might have been the promise of the day off. I didn't care. A fire was lit under my crew.
When a phone call from out of the blue sent me on a paper chase for an hour and a half, it led to more calls and emails. If this happened on another day, I might have put off taking care of the issue. It was annoying and a pain, but I put in motion the means to solve the problem immediately. I have no lingering guilt from delaying.
By lunchtime, every person in the house added to the master list. Schoolwork usually pushed off to the end of the week, additional seasonal cleaning, more appointments scheduled, the rabbit hut mucked out, the pile of laundry that had been on the sofa for two days put away, and many other pesky things were completed. The afternoon proceeded as the morning. Extra bonus, no nagging from me. Not a peep.
It took until the younger children’s bedtime to reach the sixty things. We did it! A clean house, the backlog of school assignments and checking work done, and things bugging me to remember were off my mental list.
This new, weird event, initially greeted with resistance, shook us out of the procrastination trap. It worked. The sixty completed tasks made the next day a true vacation. No guilt. No “I should get to XYZ right now instead of reading this book for fun.” It was what I was desperately craving and didn’t even realize. My brain needed time off. Since then, the constant feeling of overwhelm has eased.
I think Dontwanna Day might pop up for all once a season to get us back on track. One day of the week, I plan to have a private Dontwanna morning. Maybe this trick will keep my stress down to a manageable level over the next few weeks. Maybe.