All Alive
Sometimes I think I'm just not cut out for this job. I didn't hear anything from the Spouse after our conversation at 4:30 yesterday. Knowing that he could not do anything about his lack of passport until at least 7am (which would be 11pm my time) and assuming that if things got done it might be at a breakneck pace, since his flight was at 1 pm Spanish time, I assumed that no news was good news, and only bit my fingernails a bit, waiting to hear.
At 2:08 SF time (which would be 5:08 in Atlanta, where he landed) he called to say he's in the US again. I sigh a huge sigh of relief; I have far too much imagination to be happy about a situation like this, even when I'm being soothing and reasonable to everyone else. Since I was just in the middle of driving YG home from school, I hang up the cel phone with a great sense of weights being off my back, and we proceed home. On Wednesdays, Sarcasm Girl gets out at 1:26, so she's usually home by the time her sister and I get in. We get in. No older child. I text her, in case a class ran long. No answer. So finally, feeling like I have just exchanged one Large Weight for another one, I call her. She's fine, at a meeting with friends in a political organization at school, forgot to call, so sorry. I hang up the phone. From the other room YG calls me: she's got a rash on her torso that looks like she's having an allergic reaction to something. I give her Benadryl. All is well.
Is this a test? And if so, have I passed? Jeez.
Update
The guy's plane was two hours and forty five minutes late in leaving; he got in to SF around midnight. I went and picked him up (an easy 20 minute drive including airport congestion time) and he is home, home, home.
At 2:08 SF time (which would be 5:08 in Atlanta, where he landed) he called to say he's in the US again. I sigh a huge sigh of relief; I have far too much imagination to be happy about a situation like this, even when I'm being soothing and reasonable to everyone else. Since I was just in the middle of driving YG home from school, I hang up the cel phone with a great sense of weights being off my back, and we proceed home. On Wednesdays, Sarcasm Girl gets out at 1:26, so she's usually home by the time her sister and I get in. We get in. No older child. I text her, in case a class ran long. No answer. So finally, feeling like I have just exchanged one Large Weight for another one, I call her. She's fine, at a meeting with friends in a political organization at school, forgot to call, so sorry. I hang up the phone. From the other room YG calls me: she's got a rash on her torso that looks like she's having an allergic reaction to something. I give her Benadryl. All is well.
Is this a test? And if so, have I passed? Jeez.
Update
The guy's plane was two hours and forty five minutes late in leaving; he got in to SF around midnight. I went and picked him up (an easy 20 minute drive including airport congestion time) and he is home, home, home.
posted by Madeleine Robins at 2:33 PM
2 Comments:
As my husband and I say to one another, "Parenthood is not for wimps."
Wishing you a weekend that requires no emotional fortitude at all...
In Topsy Turvy, one of my favorite movies, W.S. Gilbert is talking to his wife after the premiere of The Mikado at the end of the film. Gilbert is embarrassed by his success, and says something on the line of "There's something inherently disappointing about applause." His wife, Kitty, who puts up with him, his deaf and disagreeable elderly father, and his weird relationship with his destructive mother, notes that she thinks it would be splendid to be applauded. "Wouldn't it be nice if, at the end of the day, everyone gave each other a round of applause? Well done, Kitty!"
Well, I think it would be very nice indeed. Thanks, guys. May your respective weekends be low on the fortitude scale...
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