baby yoga and other fantasies

So I saw this video on yoga for babies and I was thinking, "Hmm...interesting, I wonder if they have a class for moms and babies around here." And then I remembered that I haven't had time to so much as change the filter in the Brita pitcher in 5 months.

If you are at all like me, you have this fantasical notion that you can squeeze just about anything onto that plate of yours. For example, I am married. I work full time. I am a grad student. I have a 5 month old baby. I blog. I serve on the fundraising board of a nonprofit. I belong to a professional organization. I am active on several Internet discussion/support group boards - I mean, like REALLY active. I garden and make my own baby food.

Know what the crazy part is? There are about 20 other things I am interested in doing that I have to hold myself back from committing to because I simply do not have the time. Like baby yoga. And a PhD. And consulting (ok, maybe I have a meeting set up for next week, but I swear, it is just a preliminary conversation.) And a part time job that would pay really well. I would like to go on Survivor (except does anyone know if they let you bring a waxing kit or at least some tweezers, because otherwise, we can cross that right off the list...close ups on my upper lip and chin after 39 days without maintenance - NO THANK YOU, Jeff Probst.) I would like to make some kind of wearable item for my baby...a hat, a dress, mittens? I would like to read about 17 books. I think it would be interesting to take the baby girl to the chiropractor - supposedly they can correct a whole host of things (like poor sleeping habits!) I would like to download some music onto my Ipod. I would like to sit and pet my cat for five minutes because otherwise he will continue plotting our deaths as payback for the lack of attention. I would like to take an East Coast road trip and visit some friends and their families. I would like to take care of my roots. I would like to go to the NPR web site, go to the Marketplace page and look at a photo of Kai Risdall because I have always wondered what he looks like.

These are all things that are on the list. Some are at the top and written in ALL CAPS with a fat Sharpie. Others are lazily scrawled in by pencil - barely more than an absentminded doodle. I have a great many things I want to do - my brain fires out "what can I do next" ideas AK-47 style. I dream of a 36 hour day. I dream of living to be 200 years old (ideally staying 31 for the next 150 or so.)

But then I look at my little lady. And my marvelous, interesting, patient husband and the poor cat. And I suddenly dream of selling everything we own and buying a little place out in the most remote location you can think of, somewhere in one of those big, square-shaped states in the general middle of the country, where we'll live by a stream and catch fish and grow all of our vegetables and dry our laundry out in the sun. I envision drinking wine we made ourselves from a little vineyard and...then I start to realize I would be EXACTLY the same way out in the boonies. I'd dream up lists of the next little projects. Just because you accomplish it with a shovel and some twine instead of a Blackberry doesn't mean it's any less ADD (which my husband is convinced I have.)

Some people think I'm discontent, but really that isn't it. I just like so many things and am interested in so many things...I feel like life is racing away from me...I have to hurry if I want to try it all. I hate feeling like I'm missing something - that's the real issue. I love the way things are right now. I just want to hit "pause" and run over and try something else for a while. Oprah says "Live your Best life." I totally want to. But which one???