It’s Mine!

Daily writing prompt

What daily habit do you do that improves your quality of life?

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Don’t mess with my routine. Get up, get harassed by two cats and a dog to feed them. Let the dog out in the yard. Make the coffee. Listen to National Public Radio while sipping coffee and eating breakfast. Life is good- in for a penny- in for a dime. Just don’t mess with me before I finish that cup of coffee.

So, you think that I am a creature of habit? Maybe just a little. But all that’s stirring in my head while I wander through that routine sets up the rest of the day. It creates the sense of equilibrium I need to drive forward on the day. I plan out what I have to do for the job. What’s lined up for woodcarving gets a review. things the family needs get planned, and lots of self-care routines get the rev up too! All within that first thirty to forty minutes.

Since my wife is a night shifter, she isn’t home when all this happens. When she is off from work, the routine gets varied to include cuddles, kisses, and other good stuff. The cats get to wait!

Among the most important parts of my routine is the fact that it’s self-motivated, not imposed. It’s all mine, and I can choose to vary it, or change it up. It’s not a race track around which I have to run, or a corridor in the house that needs navigation in the pitch dark, and most importantly, it’s not imposed from without.

What’s with that last bit, you ask? I always hated the institutional regime. In the Navy, it was someone else’s ideas of get up, shit, shower, and shave, mess decks (where you eat), quarters, and so on. In my first marriage, my wife had ideas of how the day was to be run, and that was that; try to reasonably object, and get the cold shoulder for two days. The needs of her father, the Cap’n, took precedence. “Daddy wants to sail today, Wes!” That got old.

So I’m a real fan of “it’s my life. ” Don’t like it? Live your own! But of course, the two cats and the dog get their breakfast promptly!