The last several weeks have been as close to insane as I'd like to ever get. I've been working long hours at work. I'm lead on two projects at once, each competing for 100% of my time. I'd like to think I've done well, but the Bible was right. I cannot serve two masters. But I don't love the one and hate the other -- I'm ready to chuck both and set out on my own. Neither gets the time it deserves.
Of course I can't leave my job; there are better days on the near horizon. I'll finish these projects and a new one will come to take their place.
Add to this the impending Easter weekend, and the Cantata that has to be sung, the pressures at home, the Son I hadn't seen in weeks... It all built up. At one point, on Thursday, someone turned a practical joke on end, and I thought I was in big trouble at work. Thank Heaven they were kidding! But it brought me to my limit. I was at my emotional bottom. The three-day weekend came at just the right moment for me to collect my thoughts... Or so I thought.
On Monday after Easter, my Wife and my Son were to leave on a bus to go visit Der Mouse in Florida. So the weekend was a blurred mass of shopping and packing and preparing. My wife's Birthday would be on Monday (My April Fool!) as well, and I wanted to take her to dinner. There was too much on her mind to really enjoy it -- I should have seen it.
So Monday came. So did the Bus. And I was left at home. Alone. I honestly think this is the first time since my daughter was born -- 20 years -- that I've had to spend a week alone. We get so used to people around us, caring for the house, doing the laundry, cooking meals. And suddenly, when I come home, EVERYTHING is exactly where I left it. Nothing is done. And I hear... silence.
Silence like I've not heard in 20 years.
I realize I haven't even spoken out loud all night, because there's nobody to hear me.
I do laundry, not to make her happy. Not to have clean clothes. Just because I can't think of anything better to do with nobody!
Wow. This is weird.
The first night I was in a frenzy -- doing everything I could think of. Clean up the kitchen, take out the trash. Laundry. Watch a couple episodes of MI-5. Then head to bed. I turn on the bed warmer on her side -- not because she'll be there, but because I know I'll reach over there looking for her, only to find the bed cold otherwise. No need to stack her pillows. Hard to fall asleep because I know work hadn't gone well, and I didn't have the solution in mind. Eventually, I was out, and it was morning.
Do it again.
Tonight, though, is different. Tonight, work went well, and I got home a smidge earlier. I remembered to eat right away. Last night I waited till 10 o'clock because I forgot to eat. Tonight, I enjoyed the quiet outside, but I think I enjoyed the quiet inside even more.
I can do this, and I know it.
But I will be so glad to have her home and in my arms. To have my Son to look up to. :-)
I will be glad when they are home.
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