End of Summer Days, Daddy Days

The end of summer has been looming around to say the least. Just as a child dreads the start of school, I have been in denial about these last weeks of August as they quickly approached. I’ve been spoiled, you see. For the past 4 weeks, ever since Hubby took the Bar Exam, I have had him all to myself, and with Sam, of course. There’s been no studying, no books, no mock trials, no drilling him with law details, no going off to work/school, no nothing. It’s been wonderful. We’ve split the work load around the house, attended to Sam together (except, of course, for all things sleep related because clearly only Mommy can do that job), and we’ve spent afternoons at the park, the zoo, or running errands together. It all stops here.

Tomorrow Hubby starts his new job, the one we moved here for, and Sam and I are just the two of us again. We’ve done it before, we can do it again. The bad news is that Hubby’s work day is a lot longer than we realized…a LOT longer than I realized. What I thought was going to be him gone for 9-10 hours including travel is realistically going to be 12-13 hours and that’s if we cut out some of the time away by driving him to the train (we have one car). So now we have problems with dinner together, the problem being that we can’t really do it, not to mention the fact that Hubby will potentially be coming home during Sam’s bedtime. It’s all very stressful and complicated…most of you probably know all about it.

In preparation for what is about to happen, Hubby has been trying to give me a little time to myself, probably because he realized when he informed me of his actual work day that I was on the verge of a tantrum. So I sit here now while he is out with Sam on an errand, and yesterday I got to have a Mommy morning. At first I had no idea what to do with myself. Has that ever happened to you? Your husband says, “Why don’t you go out and have some alone time.” Uh…ok…where do I go? What do I do? What exactly is it that I complain about not having time for? I need advance notice of all potential breaks so that I can make sure I have something legitimate to do. So yesterday I decided to go to this bead place and make myself a necklace. I know, it sounds so lame. And it sort of was. I didn’t really like being by myself all that much and frankly beading is really overwhelming. But I wanted to make something that could withstand Sam’s grip so that I can wear jewelry again, part of the whole “feel better about my appearance stop grubbing it up plan.” Afterwards I went to a coffee shop and had my little chocolate croissant and latte, part of the whole “wonder why I feel fat but continuously sabotage myself by pigging out at every possible moment plan.” Actually the woman was trying to charge me $8.00 for this initially, which confused me until we both realized she thought I’d ordered 2 chocolate croissants…….why would she think I was going to eat 2 chocolate croissants myself? I’ll not go there.

In total I spent about 3 hours away from Sam. That’s pretty much the longest I have ever been away from him since he was born. Well, there’s one exception when I was away for about 5 hours. It made me feel like a lunatic. It felt so wrong and weird. I sort of wanted to just keep on going and not go home for like 10 more hours or something, as though if I went home I’d never get out for that long ever again. That was 8 months ago. It hasn’t happened since. But yesterday, as it is with almost every time I get out on my own, I start to feel odd after about 2 hours. I start to look around and notice that all the other mommies have their kids with them and of course they all look so happy about it. I never see the totally frazzled looking woman with the screaming toddler when I am out on a break. No, they are all smiling and talking to each other, going on a walk in their stroller on a gorgeous day. This is all I saw on my walk to the coffee shop and then back to the car. There just comes a point in that time away where I feel an overwhelming sense of longing. I saw women with their kids and was just flooded with a need to look at Sam. And I knew I just needed to see him for a moment and then I would be able to go out for another 3 hours if that was an option (which it so was not), or I just needed to pick him up and get a “big hug” and then I could go on. That longing for my baby, it takes me full force. I just have to get him and squeeze him and…look at him. Can’t go more than a few hours without getting in at least a look.

So that’s what I need to try and remember as our lives are on the brink of change. That’s what I need to remember when I am that frazzled woman and he is all I’ve looked at for the past 10 hours. I just need to remember this: