I’m not going to sift through my archives for my favorite posts or the highlights of the year. That’s a waste of precious time. We have had a roller coaster year. The highs outnumbered the lows and it was a good ride. Tomorrow we board a new roller coaster. Yes, there will be lows. There might even be loops. It’s still better than a year on a carousel.

I’m reluctant to describe anything negative I see in my community, because then people ask me why I live here. I love Knoxville. I think the bad things that happen here are everywhere else, too. Other people just don’t seem to see what is happening before their very eyes. On Christmas eve, I watched a drug transaction take place in public. In fact, it took place in the exact spot where people wait to be hired based on their appearance to do day labor jobs in exchange for cash. No, I’m not talking about prostitution. I’m talking about construction type jobs. No, I was really talking about the two cars exchanging items and speeding off quickly. I’ve seen the prostitution though. In areas all over town with participants both under-age and too far over the age or rapidly aged by drugs. I’ve seen pick-pockets and shoplifters. Intoxicated drivers are everywhere. Children without carseats. It’s not just illegal activity that I find depressing. I see homeless people absolutely everywhere. Don’t other people see them? Do they choose not to see them? None of us live in Disney World where everything is clean and shiny. Things that are broken are not quickly tucked into underground tunnels for repairs. They are right in front of our eyes. Why aren’t we trying to help each other instead of being distracted by things that just don’t matter? What if our obsession with celebrities was concentrated on helping each other? What if professional athletes had to work second jobs and teaching became a highly competitive and well paying career? What if caring and helping wasn’t attacked as socialism? What if we didn’t have this broken two party hate system and the electoral college? What if 2008 was a fresh start?

Raise your hand if you are ready for your children to return to normal bedtimes. Yes, I know it’s winter vacation. My children remind me of that every time I ask them to do ANYTHING. I asked them when I get a vacation from responsibility. The response was a blank stare. I didn’t get to celebrate my new “December 26th is Moms’ Day Off” holiday. Maybe if more people participated, we could pull it off in 2008. In the meantime, my house is a mess and my children are tired. They don’t seem capable of recognizing it, but they are tired. It doesn’t even matter that my children range from preschooler to teenagers. They are ALL cranky pants by afternoon. It’s not just their moods that are affected by these late night make the entire living room a tent and drag out every toy you own marathons. During the day, I play firefighter and deal with each spill, boo-boo and micro drama as it occurs. It is impossible to make progress on anything, but I try to keep up with the chaos. Once the children are all in bed, I work my way across the main floor of the house and put things in their places. When it’s done, I get to relax. Since school vacation started, I haven’t been able to keep up with the children OR their messes. Every night I collapse in bed exhausted and unhappy that I wasn’t able to complete my evening clean-up routine. I need bedtimes to return! What? New Year’s Eve is a stay up late holiday? Sigh. Can bedtimes return on January 1st?

Even though Doug posted his version, let’s see how quickly I can summarize the past three days. Christmas evening, I got a grand total of two hours sleep. Christmas day, the children were gifted with extreme generosity by all of their relatives and Santa. Poor Sarah (who made straight A’s this semester) had toys that wouldn’t work and a chair that (she thought) was missing parts. She even managed to drop the heavy chair on her foot and broke her itty bitty pinky toe. Tommy spent less time hiding in his room than he ever has in the past. Noah now leaves a trail of air soft pellets everywhere he goes. Those things would be a lot easier to clean if they were metal and I could just sweep the floors with a pin magnet. Of course, then they would be BBs and Noah wouldn’t have so much freedom with them. Amy and Evan have their sleeping schedule completely out of whack, but they make up for it by constantly whacking each other with play swords. Doug and I tried to give each other extra special rewards for an extremely hard year and now we feel selfish (but very happy in a way that Newscoma understands). Christmas evening, my brain turned off around 5 pm. By 6, everyone sounded like Charlie Brown’s teacher and I didn’t care if the children were walking on the ceiling or eating off the floor. Doug took over at 8:30 pm and I crashed hard. Fourteen hours later I arose from my hibernation. Yesterday I stumbled around in a stupor all day. Today, the house is still in total disarray and Noah is having a friend sleeping (they won’t sleep) over tonight. I’m off to make some hammy beans and finish putting the children’s new things away in their rooms. Tomorrow I want to make some design changes on School Matters (which is nominated for a Digital Edge Award).

I am still on my Christmas blogging hiatus, but I just wanted to pop in and remind everyone that tomorrow is “moms’ day off.” Seriously. We planned, shopped, cleaned, wrapped and worried ourselves to bits. Now it’s time for 24 hours of rest. No cleaning. Let the children play. No shopping. You have enough stuff. I might Twitter from bed. In between movies and naps.

From the 1960s and the 1970s and the 1980s.