I read something today that said the most important gift we can give our children as their parents is time.
Not time in the sense of minutes. But time in the sense of presence.
Awareness.
That means not being sidetracked when they are demanding attention, and I’m sorry to say, that includes multitasking.
I sat reading the article over and over again. It was resonating with me, but on a level that the writer didn’t intend.
In a kitchen, time is the great equalizer. It doesn’t matter what your abilities are as a chef, if you cant prioritize, multitask, and delegate, you WILL NOT SUCCEED. Period. It won’t happen. You will continue to be a line chef with good days and bad days. But, in any establishment that is worth a good reputation, you won’t advance. There are too many things that need to be done in a day, and not enough time to get all them all done in.
Ill start with- there are a lot of things I didn’t do well as management staff in a kitchen. I was young, often times the only female in a kitchen, and hella competitive. I had something to prove, and enjoyed finding when people weren’t doing things right and rubbing their noses in it. A lot of figuring out how to manage for me included learning how to work with people, and learning how to speak so that they would listen.
Now that we got that heavily shortened list out of the way,
Enter my momentary ego….
Managing time, I could do easily. I knew how long tasks took. I mean down to the minute how long it should take someone to turn a bushel of potatoes into fries, for example. I knew who was working on which days that was capable of which tasks, and i scheduled accordingly.
I remember looking at clocks on walls, POS machines, and screens, more than I looked some of my line cooks in the face in a day.
Time was ingrained in me as an ever precious commodity. Managing it correctly was my recipe to success. And reversely, i found nothing more insulting than someone who wasted my time.
Find me now, 5 years later, with two children who, like all other children, find nothing more entertaining than dilly dallying.
When I tell them its time to get ready for bed, my daughter starts playing like she is a cow and will get down on all fours and pretend to eat our shag rug as if it is a meadow of spring grass. My son will put his underwear on his head and do an Irish Jig while simultaneously asking for dessert, a glass of water, and no less than 5 bedtime stores and 3 songs.
On my good days, I laugh and play along. Ill give the cow a bath and do a whole late night revue.
On my bad days, Ill hurry them along, keep poker faced, and focus on the task at hand.
Attention, as a mother, is something that is constantly being beckoned for.
Mom, watch this.
Mom, can I have this?
Mom, Cecelia has a Lego in her mouth.
Mom, why is money made of metal?
But all of those questions all at once.
And then of course there are the invisible tasks that occupy so much of your mind as a mother. The ones that you don’t say anything about out loud, but take up SO much of your mental load.
Some of mine include:
Is our well conditioning system going to last one more year, or am I going to wake up to brown water some time this winter?
Do we have enough seasoned firewood to burn from October to April?
Should I go back to work?
Am I depressed, exhausted, or more likely some combination of the two?
Have the kids eaten a vegetable in the last 24 hours?
I know every person has their own variation of worries and questions that replay on a loop in their head. I envision mine as one those old light up Simon Says games. A series of rampant thoughts and worries on a fixed track. Brain says Beep, I say Beep. Brain says Beep, Boop, I say Beep Boop, and so on.
The world has invented social media too. So whatever shred of attention we have left to give, its for most people freely given to the metaverse. We are now mining for our dopamine and serotonin with our thumbs as we scroll.
With all these competing thoughts, personalities, tasks, and expectations, how can time not be the ultimate gift?
I, for one, am going to spend a lot more time reprioritizng my life and asking less of myself so that I can enjoy my children and my motherhood more, and I’m assuming that was the point of the somewhat of a guilt trip article I found myself too invested in this morning.
But how about also looking at the time we are given from others as the true gift that it is?
That friend that never has their cell phone out while you are catching up? Or that person that looks you in the eyes while you speak and lets you know deep down in your soul that you’re being heard? Its a gift.
And isn’t that all our children have to give us? Their time.
We as parents are given YEARS worth of time from our children. This thing that will inevitably end up a precious commodity for them at some point. And here they are giving it to us freely. Endless amounts of attention, and interest, that can feel so suffocating and overwhelming at times when its hyper focused on you.
I’m starting to realize that this gift my kids have been blessing me with everyday since the day they were born is fleeting. My son is only shy of 5, and already I feel him starting to take ownership of his time. Slowly but surely he is now doling it out to his interests that took this long for him to manifest.
And what if one day my children are great at giving undivided attention to their loved ones? All because I silenced the noise in my head and accepted the gift they bury me in unselfishly everyday?
Deep down I will always be a clock watching line chef. Its part of my identity and helped me manage my life in many ways.
But do I think its time to give the gift of time back? Yes.