Redheaded Jill

I saw a really funny meme the other day that said, “Sorry for the poor customer service. I’m understaffed at the moment.” It made me laugh. And then it made me cry. (Kind of.) Because it was so relatable.

There is a hierarchy in life of importance and there is a hierarchy of people. When I am super stressed the hierarchy shifts. When different events happen in life the hierarchy shifts. When I don’t get enough sleep the hierarchy shifts.

Generally it goes Immediate Family > Best friends > Acquaintances, breaking it down even more it might go niece/nephews > parents > siblings > best friends > friends > acquaintances. (Niece/nephews comes first because I’m one of their primary caregivers AND because they’re babies so… they need the most care.)

When everyone is home for the holidays I love it. I love love LOVE having all my siblings together. But when we are ALL together I am a little overwhelmed. It means my bandwidth for others, even my best friend, falters.

This month was hectic and I loved 99% of it. However, as a result of my chaotic state I missed several things. Like knowing that my best friend had to deal with burst pipes on xmas. Or telling my childhood best friend happy birthday, even though it was on my calendar and I thought about it several times.

I have also had less alone time so I’m not responding to messages or emails or texts very promptly. When I drive I catch up on voice messages or video messages, but this last week I’ve not been driving many places on my own.

It has been a super enjoyable month, but I’m ready for a vacation to recover from the holidays.