The First Annual Welcome Fall Dinner (that almost wasn't)

In Georgia, the heat has been unbearable. It seemed that Fall would never come. We had highs of 97 into October. To say that it was “unseasonably warm” would be a drastic understatement. Then, one day, Fall arrived! We had a glorious cold front come through, and you could finally feel that delicious crispness in the air! It was the second weekend of October, and I decided that it was time to Welcome Fall!

Not only was I ready to Welcome Fall, I was ready to have a genuinely clean house! We had been out of town for Fall Break, and I just had not made the time to do a proper cleaning of the house in a while (you know, working mom and all that!) So, I started cleaning on Friday, and I promised my two boys (ages 9 and 5) that we would get the Halloween decorations out after the house was clean. This was meant to be an incentive to get the boys to help with the cleaning, and that did help with their motivation. Now, I don’t know if this happens to you, but every so often I get a bit of a cleaning compulsion. I was not only cleaning, but I was organizing, decluttering, and just basically running around the house like the Tazmanian Devil in a flurry of activity. Seriously, I cleaned out underneath the kitchen sink, under the bathroom sinks, the refrigerator...I was a cleaning machine!

By Sunday, as promised, we got the Halloween decorations out, and even those needed decluttering and organizing. As I’m in my manic state of cleaning, I decide that we need to have a “Welcome Fall” dinner. I was going to boil some peanuts (if you’re not from the South, this probably makes no sense to you, but I promise that it’s part of the Fall experience and is quite the treat), and I planned to grill some Brats, make an outside fire, eat outside on the back deck, and roast marshmallows for dessert.

I was seriously just feeling so happy, ambitious, and every time something got cleaned or tossed out, I just felt more and more accomplished. I also was getting more and more fatigued and, frankly, sore.

By Sunday afternoon, the Halloween decorations were out, the house was clean, and I was feeling quite satisfied. Now, it was time for our Welcome Fall Dinner! This was a reward to myself and a chance to enjoy some family time. I just had to get a couple of things from the store…seriously, I think the list had only 6 or 7 things on it. It should have only taken me 10 minutes at the store, and I took the boys with me so they can pick out their Halloween pumpkins (yes, obviously a better mother would have planned an outing to a pumpkin patch and made it a more magical experience, but I was making all the magic I could!) One of the things that needed to get done at the store was to return a Red Box movie.

Once we get the store, I give the Red Box disc to my son and let him know that he can go to the machine to return it. Before we are even out of the car, my son realizes that the disc is not in the holder, and (for reasons unknown to me) he blames me. He immediately worries about how much it will cost us to take it back late and starts verbally berating me. At this point, I started to feel anger rising, and the thoughts started racing…maybe I should skip this altogether, take this boy home, make him go to his room, get some alcohol, eat some sugar, go to bed…and probably a lot more that I can't identify.

Then, I took a few deep breaths and thought about what I wanted and needed and what was best for the family. I encouraged my son to do the same, and we talked amicably for a moment. I soothed his fears about the late fees. We proceeded into the store, and there was peace for about 90 seconds. Both boys were wired. Once they picked out their pumpkins, they were bouncing around the store like Minions, and they weren’t terribly interested in my direction. Still, we got the few things that we needed and proceeded to check-out.

We got home to freshly boiled peanuts, and I put out some more snacks for the family. Then, I started to build the fire. I had gotten fresh wood from the store to ensure that it was dry and make this process as easy as possible. It must not have been as dry as I thought, though, because the dang fire would not light! I do actually know how to build a fire, so this was quite frustrating for me. Again, I had to stop and think. What do I need in this moment?

Finally, I reached out for help. I was able to walk away from the fire problem and turned it over to my husband. After quite a lot of effort on his part, we had our fire. He was really so sweet. He is definitely the persistent one in our relationship. When he knows something is important to me or the boys, he takes on any task and keeps on tackling it until it's done!

So, the fire was crackling, the brats were ready, and we had our Welcome Fall Dinner! The weather was perfect. The food was good. The boys were able to eat, run around, go bounce on the trampoline. My husband and I were able to have adult conversation. The marshmallows got toasted, and everyone got to bed on time. It worked out, and I hope that this is a tradition that will stick for our family!

Here’s the real lesson that I want to impart. There is no one right way to handle situations like this. I could easily have decided to just bag it at several different points in this story. I could have put the Welcome Fall Dinner off until the next day and declared a sandwich and TV plan for dinner that night. I could have decided to just go to bed early. I could have kept going, which I did.

The best way to figure out your path is to practice mindfulness. There are many specific mindfulness skills that can really help, and I'm sure I'll go into more of them in future blogs. The one that I want to go over today works in almost any situation. It is called “wise mind”. When using this skill, you try to balance the emotional part and the reasonable part of your brain. You allow yourself to focus on your current state in the moment, slow down your breathing, brainstorm some options for proceeding, and think about the pros and cons of these options given your current state. You just slow down and live in just this moment. When you operate from this state of mind, you can’t make a “wrong” decision.

My decision to move forward worked out because I made the decision from my wise mind. When we are working out of scarcity and fear, in our "emotion mind", we’re almost always going to regret those decisions. And, worse than regret, resentment can creep in, too. Resentment is steeped in blame, judgment, bitterness, and the sense that something is not fair. Resentment is a heavy feeling to carry around and almost always results in degradation of relationships. You start making passive aggressive comments, nitpicking others, failing to follow-through with commitments, and just having a sour attitude. The only way to get out of resentment once it has settled in, is to practice true forgiveness. Hopefully, however, you will be able to practice Wise Mind to prevent it from ever starting in the first place.

So, the next time you find yourself with emotions bubbling, resentment building, or frantic thoughts, just stop, take a step back (metaphorically or literally), observe what you are feeling emotionally and physically, take some deep breaths, and proceed from your wise mind.