Like many of you, the downtime I get during any given day is practically nonexistent.
Get kids up, make lunches, get kids up again because they went back to bed.
Wrangle them out the door for school.
Sneak in a quick workout.
Fold 50,000 lbs of laundry.
Answer 631 emails.
Write.
Write.
Write.
Pick up kids from school and head to [insert activity or orthodontist appt here].
Pivot my dinner plan because I forgot to defrost the f*cking meat.
Serve dinner.
Clean up from dinner.
Beg the kids to please have mercy on my soul and get in the shower.
Then it’s my moment. The time of night that belongs to me.
I take my beast of a dog out for a 30 minute walk while my husband is getting the kids ready for bed.
Just me, Biggie, and my AirPods playing all the podcasts I love (especially my fave @somethingwaswrongpodcast ).
I don’t want to talk to anyone. I just want to walk the day off. Decompress. I just want to breathe, because I know I’m in the home stretch and when I get back I can shower and get into bed shortly after.
I know it’s nothing fancy. It’s not a spa day or a pedicure or meditation in a beautiful yoga studio. But for me it’s cathartic. It’s when I take that giant breath we collectively take before the day ends and we get ready for the shitshow to resume when the sun rises.
To the untrained eye, it looks like a chore. Especially to my neighbors who see my dog almost pull my arm out of its socket going after a lizard, squirrel, bike, dog, runner.
But to me, it’s my downtime.
So, whatever you do to end your day, I hope it brings you peace and calm. At least for a few moments until you walk back in the house to that pre-bedtime mayhem. Only a few more hours to go, friends. 
