A New Path Forward VI

*Note: Copied over from Morning Pages journal vol. 14, personal journal vol. 11, dated 9.29.2024*

The difficulty of coming up with a weekly schedule is the simplicity of the thing.

You don’t want a schedule to be The Job (unless you’re The Rock or something and you hire a person whose job it is to tell you when to step out of the private jet in what clothes at what time and what angle), so you create reusable blocks. Think of any elementary school teacher’s schedule at the front of the class: “Pickup, Bellwork, ELA, Specials, Writing, Lunch, Read Aloud, Science, Social Studies, Math, Dismissal, Clean Up.” That tells you a lot but doesn’t give specifics. That’s because a teacher can take any of these blocks, stick them at any time, then do the work to trace back what exactly they were going to teach that day.

You don’t rebuild the signposts every time you make a road. You take them with you.

What are mine? Let’s lay them out:

Morning Writing Time – Always from 5:20a to 7a, but can pop up other days and times.
Breakfast, House Chores 1 – The morning stay-at-home Dad Mode Activates
Breakfast, Preschool Day – Can’t do chores if preschool is happening. Involves different skills and tools.
Preschool Volunteering – Yes. I’m a volunteer parent and that takes me away from the computer.
Baby C Nap Time/Writing Time – Work while the youngest naps. Not hard.
Household Chores 1 or 2 – Interchangeable, depending on if there’s preschool that morning or not. This actually can be linked up with the next entry…
Individual Play – The boys all play by themselves, letting me do chores, or…
Writing Time – I am going to schedule time to write during the daylight hours. Nap time and Individual Play are key to swinging this.
Group Play – I play with the boys. Bike rides, video games, board games, wrestling, or whatever they want to do.
Marriage Time – Keeping the love alive. We’re currently rewatching MY HERO ACADEMIA after the boys go to bed and it’s great. Need to end earlier, I think. Sleep is valuable.
Travel Time – A holdover from my private tutoring days. Always account for drive time.