Thursday, January 11, 2018

The Perfect Schedule

Continuing in the same vein from before Christmas about time and time management, manager and maker schedules, and whether I have Executive Function dysfunction or am just totally overwhelmed, I want to talk about a daily schedule. More specifically, my ideal daily schedule. Part of the trouble I have had over the years has to do with the fact that my daily rhythm is at odds with the rest of the world. I tend to claim to be a night owl, but that's not really true. I can't go all night, but the morning may as well not exist so I claim the night as default. I have an odd body clock that falls into neither camp and I spend the day fighting my natural inclinations.

If I had my druthers, here is my perfect schedule:

I would wake up between 8 and 830 and sit in bed reading, drinking coffee, chatting on FB, and related easy-going activities until around 930. I would get up and eat a bit of breakfast, yogurt or a croissant, perhaps. It would now be coming on towards 10. I would get dressed, maybe shower, make the bed, start a load of laundry. It's now around 11 or maybe 12. I probably want to do some low energy schooling. A little bit of Sam's work, maybe. After that, it's afternoon and I want a big meal. Dinner. Something very substantial. Eating and clean up and a little rest and it is coming up on 2 or 3 o'clock. Now I am ready to start the day! Here is where I hit my stride. I can do all the things. I can readaloud. I can patiently walk a child through math. I want to do household chores. I do not want to stop for supper. I want to work straight through until maybe 8pm when I might have a hot beverage. Then I'll hit another wave of energy and work until around 11pm. Honestly, 11pm is when my energy starts to wane. At 11, I would get ready for bed and relax in bed and turn the lights out at midnight.

It isn't a lazy schedule, but it is backwards from what is expected from me and nobody else seems to run on it. I can dream about it, though.

What would your perfect schedule be?

1 comment:

bearing said...

Oh, this is a fun game.

I’d set an alarm for 6, but coffee would magically appear by my bedside so I could drink it while surfing FB and Twitter and the news for the first two cups. Then I’d go downstairs and write a blog post, finishing as Mark came down; he’d sit and chat with me over coffee for a good 45 min before heading to work. The school-age kids would all wake up at 8:30 having set their own alarms and listened to them ��

They’d have breakfast, as would I (to each their own) and at 9:30 we’d start school. In between helping kids I take care of a few light housework tasks like making the bed and moving laundry.

Lunch around noon: the kids would make something simple and share it, and I’d eat tasty leftovers in front of the computer. Then they’d clean up and go away (screens, or reading, or quiet play) until 2. In my perfect schedule, I’m not too fried to do anything but web-veg; instead I grab a cold fizzy water or a cup of hot tea and curl up on my bed or outside in the sun to read a real book.

At 2 we start school again, with me taking turns working one-on-one with them, and I am done directly helping them by 3:30 or so. We all tidy up together and then they go awat again so I can make dinner in peace, or possibly one child hangs out with me chatting while I chop and stir.

Mark comes home, the dinner is put in a device that keeps it at a safe temperature, and we all go to the gym together where I swim a mile and shower, and then we come home and get dinner on the table. We have a bottle of wine and after the kids leave the table we finish it.

And also it’s Phase III.