The Rhythm of Now

I have written a few times about rhythm on this blog, and it's probably something I could always write about. Rhythm, for me, is so fundamentally important, especially for developing a sense of security and safety in a small child. The things that we do, day in and day out, the flow of activities, the sequence of events. The times we come together, and the times we are in our own space.

I cannot overemphasise how important keeping the rhythm is for a small child, and my own experience, what with dealing with family upheaval during this year, is the the rhythm saved us. It saved me and my little boy. Because at the end of the day, stuff happens in life, some we call good, some we call bad, but the rhythm still goes on. The meals must be eaten. Sleep must still happen. Outside play and work, inside play and work. The tea trays that mama makes and the little boy eats from. It all still happens, and the simple act of doing the things you do every day, day in and day out, is just grounding. For children and adults alike it is grounding, but it is so important in developing that sense of safety and security in the small child.

So now that it's just the two of us, our daily rhythm looks a little different. For starters, we are removed from the flow of the 'working world'. There is no rush to be out the door, no packing up and leaving for the day. We are in our home, and our day happens fully in our home. I actually love that aspect so much, as there is a deep, deep well of resistance within me to the way the standard working world is set up. And this is how I intend for our rhythm to stay. There will come a time for schooling for my little boy, but again, my intention is that it will happen in the home - there will be no push to be out the door and away from the home for the best part of the day.

Anyway back to our rhythm. We eat earlier now. Dinner is around 5pm, which means my little one can be in bed somewhere between 6-6:30pm. Which gives me time to finish off the day's chores, sit in meditation, and carve out a little time to do something for me. We rise around the 6am mark too, so I know my boy is getting his 12 hours of sleep most nights. An early start suits me; I have always enjoyed the quiet of the early morning, watching the day take form as the sun rises. With the shorter days and heading into winter, we spend a little more time indoors than in the warmer months, but really, not that much. There are jobs to be done outside, animals to be cared for, sandpits to be played in, and gardens to be created (one day I'll even get around to planting things again!). There are dishes to be washed, clothes to be washed, floors to be cleaned. Firewood to be collected, kindling to be gathered. Eggs to be searched for, feed bowls to be filled. Water troughs to be topped up, hay to be thrown about.  There is a lot to be done, every single day.

And some days we hop up to the main street, for a trip to the post office or the bakery. Sometimes the butcher, for eggs mostly when ours aren't quite meeting our needs, and sometimes for a chicken for stock. I still call myself vegetarian, but I do make chicken stock for us. It is confronting and not a job I really want to do but one that I feel is necessary all the same. We spend much, much less time doing big grocery shops, as our needs are so much simpler. We will eat the same batch of soup for days in a row, and if we run out of something, unless it is essential (which as it turns out, is a very small number of things), then we just go without until the next time we go into the big town. And even in doing this, I have ridded myself of a few 'favourite things' that I always had to have. Some things are not compromised; the coffee machine does its' job day in and day out, another element to the rhythm of our days.

This rhythm is good. It is busy, it is a lot of work and it doesn't leave me as much time to write on this blog as I used to have. And that in itself is probably a healthy thing for me. The essentials are taken care of, always. Anything that happens over and above that, is just a bonus. And I wouldn't change a thing - I haven't changed a thing. I am just embracing the strong, strong rhythm that we live every day now.