Too Much Activities?

Yesterday morning, I took Đạo and Đán to try out Vovinam. While they were training, we had a parent meeting. I raised a question about practice. Since the class is only held once a week, how would they practice at home? I wouldn’t know what to help them. The master suggested that I should join the class as well so I can practice at home with them. Instead of waiting around for an hour and a half, why don’t I just take the lessons? That’s a great suggestion. Even though I would love to use that time to read, I am considering joining. I need the exercise anyway. My only fear is that once I am committed, I will need to dedicate my time to it.

I started ice skating lessons because I wanted to learn and practice with the kids. Now I am more devoted to it than they are. After their Vovinam lesson, I asked them if they wanted to go to the ice rink to practice. They all said no. I didn’t want to force them so I went alone. I practiced for almost three hours. I reviewed all the techniques for Freestyle 1 since I will have a test coming up in two weeks. I also learned the ballet jump from watching Coach Julia on YouTube. My poser was not that great, but I got the technical part down. I felt great and guilty at the same time knowing that my kids were playing video games with their cousins for the same amount of hours.

My wife and I got into a heated argument over her work schedule again. I don’t know how she prioritizes her work, but she always scrambles at the last minute to meet her deadline. On Saturday afternoon, I asked her how she was doing with her work and she chewed my head off. When I didn’t ask, she would say I didn’t care. When I asked, I got an earful. There’s no win in this situation.

I don’t know what her work involves, but she has a deadline at midnight every other Saturday. I suggested that she tries to get her production done the first week instead of the deadline week. It might not be possible, but it would give her less stress trying to meet the deadline. Then again, what do I know?

I thought that getting involved with the kids’ activities would give her free time at home to do her work. By taking them out to eat, she wouldn’t have to cook as much to give her free time to do her work. I took them to hockey, summer school, private tutor, and private lessons, so she didn’t have to and she can do her work. Still, I am not doing enough.

I was considering joining Vovinam with the kids, but I won’t. Now that the kids aren’t into skating anymore, I should quit as well after my group lesson is done. We should wrap up private lessons for Đạo and Xuân since they don’t seem to be enthusiastic about ice skating anymore. Once Đán is done with hockey, we’ll call it quit as well.

I realized that my motivation for doing all of these is to get them off their screen. It would be much easier to let them have their way. Why bother?