What's the focus?

How strange it is that unusual things come to my attention and distract me from the activities that ought to be taken care of during each day. I have thought them over.
I must learn the ins and outs of my new computer operating system, Linux. OK that's important to give me access to this page. There go several hours a day.
I am obcessed with the writing of an historic novel which requires the use of a word processor and Linux uses Open Office - another tool to manipulate. If I follow James Michener's habit I will write at least 600 words daily. There go at least three hours each day.
The opportunity to influence thousands of children - and adults for that matter - in the way they think of nature and human relationships is open to me any day at McNary National Wildlife Refuge. Scheduled classes are held almost every school day. On the Second Saturday of each month, all year around the Refuge holds a special event featuring some aspect of nature. There go countless hours I find difficult to limit.
All of which means putting off enjoying my own nature connection in my backyard which is overcome with tall grasses that I humiliate with my weed eater, an electricity driven machine that goes where I want it to as long as I handle it properly. Maybe I renew my acquaintance with that technology a few hours each summer month.
Never mind that I live in a house that gathers dust and daily mail and dirty clothes. Now I am sure you live under similar circumstances. You have jobs you attend to daily as I do. I hope you have more good sense than to allow interferences as I do.
Bones of a dead animal, oh dear! I must attend the bones of a raccoon that had the audacity to die on the edge of McNary NWR wetland. Could I leave it alone? Well I did try to foist it off on the experts. I contacted taxidermists but the carcass had decayed too much for acceptance in their domain.
The rotting carcass was left to the hot sun and maggots and predators for over a week. Upon examination yesterday I found bones cleaned and simply crying out to be salvaged for artifacts on the Refuge touch table. How? I ask you? could I pass up such an opportunity? I have the four feet, upper and lower jaws, parts of the spine and pieces of vertebrae (I do a learning unit on family of verebrates), many ribs and leg bones. Predators removed some connecting pieces but I collected samples for which nature supply catalogs charge hundreds of dollars. You see another of my pasttimes is volunteering, therefore those samples are my donation to the Outdoor Learning Center of the Refuge.
OK something has got to give. I do what I can, eating, cleaning my teeth, showering, and my life comes together. One would think a seventy-eight year old would have developed a better sense of priorities than to clutter up her life with so many fun things she has little time to complain.
Naomi Sherer