It’s snowing again, and the world looks peaceful outside. My daughters are still sleeping at 10:30 am, which is typical of teenagers. So things are peaceful indoors as well. Everyone is a little tired since we just returned from four days in Williamsburg, VA, and beyond, where we stepped back in time to the first English settlement in Jamestown. We walked the actual location those first settlers were believed to have lived. More than half of them died there as they were ill-prepared to survive the first year, and their goals were chiefly to ward off the Spanish, which never became necessary, and to find gold, which was a misguided dream.

It’s a humbling experience to realize what grew over time in spite of those early human errors, and to see how resourceful people have been throughout history.

Later, walking the streets of Williamsburg and listening to the interpreters speak about the days leading up to the Revolutionary War was an equally humbling experience. As hard as life was, it also seems from my 2009 perspective (since I walked with a cell phone and a Blackberry in my pocketbook, trying to ignore them both), that it was much more simple. In fact, it was slightly jarring to leave the area and step into a deli where modern life came crashing back.

My daughters and husband and I talked about who is better off, the colonists who worked hard until sundown, or the modern parent who works until she/he can’t stand any more for fatigue? Are we better off that we have all the conveniences that simplify our lives to the point where we can get even more work done?

My grandmother used to say “a woman’s work is never done.” And while she was speaking of cooking, cleaning and laundry, all things I still need to worry about, though my husband is an equal partner in all that, her sentiment is accurate even today. As a working mother for 19 years, it’s true that while I meet deadlines, my work is never done. And all the other parents I know feel the same.

Maybe that’s just life, whether you wash your clothes with a washing board and bar of soap, but only do so once every couple of weeks because you have so few clothes, or you do so with an electric machine that constantly has a load going because each family member has a closet full.

In the end, what matters most is that you make time for your family. The colonists put down their work at sundown out of necessity, and spent evenings around the fire with their children. With our modern technology it’s all too easy for us to spend evenings with each family member off by themselves sitting around their personal TV, computer and other hand-held devices.

As we welcome in the New Year, perhaps a resolution we families can borrow from another era is that we make more time to sit with our children and have conversations like the one my family had on our vacation. Each generation has a lot to share and learn from the other. We just have to make the time to do so. And those are the times our children will remember as well.

I wish you a happy, healthy and prosperous New Year, and the time with your family to enjoy it. After all, you’ve worked hard enough for it.