Not Being Best

My son asked me to throw him a birthday party this week.  He’s turning 6, and so far, I’ve artfully dodged having to make a production out of birthdays.  But he's now been to a few parties, so the jig is up: kids like a bash, and he wanted one too. 

The only trouble is: I don't know a damn thing about throwing kids' parties.  And like most people, I don't like doing things I'm not good at doing.  Plus, I don't have money or time to put anything together, and frankly, having that many small children together in one place gives me the heebie-jeebies in a creepy "Lord Of The Flies" sort of way. 

But I love my son.  So I leaned into the whole thing. 

Apparently, these gatherings include games and activities, probably prizes and themes, and pizza.  Not ours.  Our party involved me putting Aldi snacks, a watermelon, and a few bottles of soda and booze out on a picnic table.  We filled up some water balloons.  Then we put some chairs together for adults and let the kids run around and get soaked.  That was it. 

Was it the best?  I guess not.  But we got it done, and my son was thrilled. 

Reader, the moral of my week is this: while society likes us to believe that overachieving is grand and that we should all hope to end up 'on top' in some self-constructed scale of goodness, that's all just hogwash.  We don't need to attach value to everything we do.  Sometimes, we just complete our tasks.  We don't need to worry whether we did a good or bad job.  We stop comparing what we do to others, and we simply do things the way we know how.

I'm not sure if any of this is helpful for you to read, but I thought I'd share it here, just in case you also have a hard time letting go of trying to get things right all the time.  This week, hold tight to the idea that we don't have to be best.  We just have to be.  See you next Monday. -Em

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