The Family Woman and the professional woman: and never the twain shall meet. And neither shall either be “enough”. Trying to balance “it all” and have “it all”, well, good luck with that. There’s always going to be something that gets the short end of the stick.

Often, that could be you.

Notice, I did not say the family woman versus the professional woman.  But I could have written that.  Yet, most of us can’t just be one or the other, we’re required to do both.

The husband and the kids go to the beach. I stay home and mop the sticky floor.

I’m closing a deal, I check in, the husband says no worries, they haven’t eaten, yet. There’s just one more stop to make on my way home, but I rush it, knowing that they’re waiting for me. Arriving at the hacienda, I discover no, they did not wait for me, I misunderstood, everyone has already eaten and headed for the hills. I didn’t do my best because I rushed… and apparently, I rushed for no good reason.

Attempting to juggle several things at once ends up in neither side being quite happy.

Case in point: this week, two of our kids graduate homeschool high school, and one of our kids is arriving back home after a month away. So moi, nice person that I am, I decide to throw a little celebration-before-the-celebration, buying “welcome home” Balloons and “happy graduation” balloons.

The balloon store has neither, pointing to the fact that if you want to march to your own drummer in life, you might have to settle for being a one-man band.

Or, a one-woman kazoo queen, to be more exact.

I go with a smiley face for the welcome home and a handful of “congratulations” for the graduation and take the balloons, smacking me in the face in the wind, out to the car.

A few more errands and appointments in high-ranging temperatures. It’s difficult to see out the rear window, backing up in parking lots becomes problematic, as the big, bouncy orbs act like slow-mo pinballs in the back seat. Plus, the clerk gathered them all up into one humongous bow, which I will need to detangle at home….

Sigh.

A couple of hours later, I drop everything at home, noticing now that the balloons don’t appear totally full. They’re slightly deflated. Slightly, yet still noticeable to me.

Personally, I would imagine the balloons to expand under hot-car conditions, just as car tires expand in warmer temps. Yet, here were a couple of answers that I pulled up from Yahoo:

“The gas in the balloon would expand when it was warmer, and that would cause the balloon’s surface to stretch, leaving slightly larger pores through which the helium atoms can pass. In addition, the atoms themselves would be moving faster – that is what is behind the pressure that leads to the volume increase, so there would be more interaction at the balloon’s surface – more atoms bouncing against the inner surface of the balloon, and again that would lead to more gas passing though the balloon’s surface.”

“The elastic cloth that the balloon is made is porous. in case you looked on the textile decrease than a severe ability microscope, you will see the tiny pores. For a gas to diffuse out of the balloon, the molecules of the gas must be smaller than the pores. The helium atom has 2 protons, 2 neutrons, and a couple of electrons. The oxygen includes 2 oxygen atoms. The Helium atoms are smaller than the pores. The oxygen molecules are greater beneficial that the pores.”

And there you have the science behind Mylar-!

All that to say: trying to juggle too much generally leaves someone dissatisfied, and often that person may be you.

Sigh.

The main thing is that the balloons are all still aloft and for now, that’s all that matters.

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