Wouldn't it Be Funny?

Wouldn't it be funny if, now that I'm free most of the day, I hired myself out to homeschooling moms as a tutor/schoolwork supervisor so they could have extra time to themselves? I don't think my kids would think it was that funny. Some of them (I won't name names) are asking (regularly and loudly) to go back to homeschooling. I am standing by my decision to send them to public school despite the teeny incidents involving other children who: eat hand santizer; act like total brats; don't take their meds and therefore are exceedingly disruptive. Yep, in three weeks I've seen each of those things and more! Just ask! I've been telling the stories non-stop and I have them honed so they're pretty funny when you're not crying about them.

Anyhoo.... back to the subject at hand, which, contrary to appearances isn't homeschooling or public schooling -- but hiring myself out. Let me catch you up on what I've been thinking:

I gotta get a job.

I gotta take some time off now that I'm not full-time mothering small children or homeschooling.

I gotta get a job.

There's no way I can work and still deal with the drop-offs, the pick-ups, the homework, the meal-planning, the grocery-shopping, the errands, the housecleaning, the laundry, the Facebook, the coffee-drinking, the book-writing, the...

I need to work to earn money because suddenly I have a kid in ninth grade. Ninth! He's an official high-schooler with official plans to be a college-goer and before you can say "Geez, he's tall! I remember when he was a wee lad!" I'm going to need some resources to at least partially support him in his pursuit of higher education. After all, I want him to be successful and happy so I can finally let go of all the guilt over how bad I think I've botched this most days AND so he can help support Kevin and I on our trips to Europe in our senior-citizenhood since we could never afford it when the kids were growing up.

If I work, I will be miserable and bored because I can't think of one single job I would enjoy that doesn't require another degree or two. And if I take the time to pursue another degree or two - there goes all that time I could have been earning money! And there goes all that money I could have put aside for degrees for my kids! Today, as I poured my coffee, I had a revelation: If I get started now, and work my butt off, I can have a Master's degree before my oldest reaches his junior year. Then I have TWO FULL YEARS of earning before that same kid graduates and requires help with college. But then I remembered all the Master's degrees I'm interested in and how the jobs they're associated with don't pay squat - and how people who use phrases like "don't pay squat" probably won't even pass the GRE. Hell, I couldn't even remember what the GRE was called and had to text my friend for a reminder. I'm doomed.

I've read *several* (read: one) studies that say that teenagers need a parent's presence even more than young children or else they will devolve into sociopaths. If I'm going to work, better to choose something I'm not passionate about and educated for so it's not hard to leave it at the end of the day to go home and supervise the homework and the lunch-making.

If I don't work, I will find myself mid-day on a Tuesday writing a blog viewable by the public which outs me as a bored, neurotic, over-thinker who is CLEARLY drinking too much coffee.