I've spent more time in the past 7 days considering the importance of toilet paper in my life than all my other forty-some years on this planet.
Don't worry. I'm not going to get on my slightly crunchy mom rant about how you can use wash rags in place of Toilet paper if it came down to it. By the way, I learned this little trick on both attempts to do cloth diapering in my home. The keyword is "attempt." I was never a successful cloth diapering mom, but that a story for another day.
All these bizarre thoughts have me digging deeper into my head than I have in a long time & maybe some of my conclusions will help you too.
Oh no! I better buy some toilet paper
It all started on the night before the great historic toilet paper sellout of March 2020.
The thing is I don't follow the news. I leave that up to my husband. Honestly, I only listen to about 34.349% of what he says when he is giving me the recap. So, I knew that there was a Corona Virus & that Europe felt its effects in a bad way. That's it.
My hubby & I were laying in bed having our typical nightly conversion. & he says, "You might need to buy some toilet paper tomorrow." This was the start of a bad conversation. To be clear, my hubby was acting like an adult & I was acting like a complete and total asshat. (Yes, I can typically admit when I'm a jerk.)
I woke up the next morning with my hubby's conservative voice of reason in the back of my mind but still started my day off with a BIG eye-roll.
It really happened!
I stopped eye-rolling when I chatted with a friend and found out that the local university was closing its doors for the remainder of the school year & there would be no graduation ceremony for the Seniors all over this virus.
& yes, I called my hubby to tell him & he, of course, said, "See, I told you so!" So, I headed to Walmart & then to Target to buy some toilet paper with the rest of the panic-stricken American Moms. (At this point Walmart was all out, but Target still had some)
You all know that the food hoarding shortly followed. I decided to head out to the stores Sunday morning at 6 am just to see what the new "fully-stocked" grocery story looked like in this pandemic.
I'm here to inform you that I had no problem buying the ingredients to make an apple pie, frozen zucchini spirals (which I will probably never eat), & Great Valu brand Mac N Cheese. Everything else on my "list" was nowhere to be found.
I might have grabbed the last two bags of Mozzarella cheese, but I'm certain no one witnessed me doing any such thing.
Where do we go from here
The thing is we can't merely wish this chapter of life to close. Unfortunately, it just has to run its course.
So here's a little wisdom nugget for you that comes half from real wisdom & the other half from my pretentious need to spew words from my mouth like most women do constantly.
When all your social media scrolling has got you worrying about toilet paper, just look outside. Stop for a second & notice that spring hasn't stopped growing & it's not going to stop because of the imminent pandemic.
OK OK… If you are living somewhere where spring is a bit far off…..think about how much worrying a snowflake putting into creating its beautiful design. The snow won't stop falling & living its best life because of the eminent pandemic either.
Final thoughts on your chaotic life
If all the grocery stores near you were full of empty shelves, it's a positive thing. Hear me out on this! It means that our current economy can afford to drops hundreds of dollars on unneeded groceries. I promise you I'm not making this a political thing. So stop responding in fear & worrying that you won't have food & start living your life.
Luke 12:22-23 – Jesus Turned to His disciples and said, "Don't worry so much about your body—what to eat or what to wear. Life is more than food and clothes.
Maybe your life right now doesn't allow you to spend time with your kids like you want, because of financial commitments & everything else on your long to-do list. But what if you changed your mindset on the current state of the world right now & took all this time at home to start something beautiful.
Yes, it's going to be a rough transition initially. Most sudden changes are rough. Think about this. There is more to life than stockpiling toilet paper & hoarding all the Kraft Brand Mac N Cheese. Turn off the autopilot that you let drive on most days & just consider that you were gifted TIME.
I hear all you moms all the time wishing for more time in your day. You do this ALL THE TIME.
So just stop all the worrying & anxious thoughts just for a second & take a small step towards being grateful for the extra time with your family. Time with your family is one of the few things you can never get back no matter how hard you work or worry about it.
