My husband and I have just returned home from a wonderfully peaceful mini-vacation in the Finger Lakes. We took five days and assimilated into lake life on Keuka.

Somewhere amid the lazy drifting on the boat and reading on the deck of our cottage overlooking the lake and the vineyards across the way, I was caught off guard by my daughter's cheerleading coach.

Here I was, uber-relaxed, and she's going on about needing a team mom and asking if I would be willing to volunteer. Not being in my right mind about how busy we already are, I said OK. I thought, I'm pretty organized with stuff like that; it shouldn't be that difficult.

The committment didn't sink in right away. It waited until about 2 a.m. That's when the wheels started turning, and the reality of scheduling hit me. I'm very involved with my church's music ministry. That's Tuesdays and Sundays. Come the end of September, I'll reprise my role as adviser for the Skidmore College student newspaper. That takes another chunk of Sundays. And, of course, there's this pesky editor job at The Saratogian. As is well doumented in this blog, this job can be pretty demanding of time and comes with some unpredictability, too.

But, after sorting it all out in my mind, and recalling the excitement in my daughter's voice on the other end of the phone (still in Kansas with relatives), I came to the conclusion that this is something I can and will handle.

Apparently my 8-year-old daughter's mind was working overtime overnight, too. The next day on the phone, she expressed worry for my nutty schedule. "But Mom, you've got worship team and Skidmore and work!"

I couldn't believe this was coming from a kid. All I can say is she's my daughter and prone to overanalyzing stuff. "It will be fine," I told her. "We'll figure it out. I'm not worried about it."

Not too worried, anyway.