Um, hey there. I still have a blog and stuff, it seems. I’m really quite tired of beginning each post with an explanation of where I’ve been. (Something that I suppose could be avoided by updating regularly, hmm.) The actual fact of the matter is, I haven’t felt like writing. I’m tired, okay? And whiny. The shiny newness of living in a different city is wearing off (as I knew it would) and while I adore San Francisco and have no regrets, the day-to-day minutiae have become exhausting and occasionally overwhelming. (Just as they do anywhere, I suppose.)
First off, over these past months I have gained an enormous respect for all the single parents of the world, whether they’re there by choice or happenstance. No matter the reason you find yourself in that situation, there are few things quite as trying as being the sole caregiver for children. Kids – now this is a little groundbreaking, so bear with me – tend to be demanding, ungrateful and less than helpful. I KNOW! Shocking. It turns out that being the only adult available to make sure they’re clean, fed, behaving properly and (reasonably) happy is a tall order. N has always been far better at playing with them – he’s the fun parent. My role is more like a…drill sergeant. I’m great at keeping everyone in the routine – making sure that things are where they belong, lunches are packed, schedules are kept and everyone brushes their teeth. That sort of thing. It’s been a struggle for me to be in charge of entertainment as well. I try to find fun stuff to fill the time on the weekends, but with kids 5+ years apart in age, it can be hard to find something that they both enjoy.
Anyway. That said, we’re doing fine. We really are. I have occasional tantrums on social media (prompting my mother to call and scold me – “You be nice to my babies!”), I complain to family and friends over the phone and through email, and admittedly I often have less patience with the kids than I should. But overall, everyone is okay. We miss N terribly and sometimes rather desperately, but we really are okay.
For the most part. In addition to missing N for the wonderful father and husband that he is, and the stability he provides both as a partner and a parent, it is apparent that I need him around for other reasons as well. Clearly I rely on his rational (read: adult) thinking skills quite a bit. Here, let me give you some examples.
Exhibit A: Extreme Toilet Fail – I’ll spare you the details, but as the upstairs toilet began to overflow in a spectacular fashion I learned that my coping mechanism for such things is to scream obscenities while flailing for the water shutoff. By the time I managed to turn it off, I was ankle deep in…unclean…water, with tears of fury and frustration running down my face. It’s funny now, but at the time I was so upset my hands were shaking. You see, I’d just cleaned the entire house that morning (and done all of the laundry) so OF COURSE the toilet would time its rebellion to coincide with my clean floors. As I was using every towel we own to soak up the mess (thereby creating a ton more laundry) (and props to Lex, by the way, who clearly reacts much better in a toilet crisis than his mother) Misty said tearily from her relatively dry vantage point in the hallway, “Daddy should be here to help us with this.” No joke, kid.
Exhibit B: Wee Hours Mystery Alarm – I tend to suffer fairly regular bouts of insomnia, where I go to sleep without issue but then wake around 2:30 in the morning and am unable to settle back down. This turned out to be a good thing one morning last week, because I was up and surfing the internet when an alarm started blaring. Fortunately it was only four short (if shrill) bursts, and it didn’t wake the kids. By the time my heart rate returned to normal, I noticed that the furnace was making weird sounds. Somehow, because at 4 in the morning it made perfect sense, I decided that the alarm and furnace noise were related. So I went into the (dark, scary) garage using the flashlight app on my phone (yes, there are lights in the garage) (it was 4 in the morning, remember) and found a big switch on the furnace that said ON/OFF. I turned it off and emailed my landlord*, who was able to stop by the next day and diagnose the alarm as a dying motion sensor battery. Turns out nothing was wrong with the furnace other than my own paranoia. Which brings me to:
Exhibit C: I Am An Idiot – Anyone who knows me is aware that I’m not a fan of gas appliances. I don’t like having open flames in my kitchen, okay? And yes, I see now that they cook faster/more evenly/blah blah whatever, but I’m not a cook by any means and so this isn’t a huge deal for me. I’ve learned to cope with the range, but the oven was making an off-putting hissing sound accompanied by a gas smell. For someone like me who is uncomfortable cooking with gas anyway, this sends me directly into the Panic Zone (which is only a short distance from Crazytown, evidently). I convinced myself that there was a leak and if I used the oven we would surely die, and for a woman who feeds her kids frozen pizza more often than is probably healthy this is not an ideal situation. So I called the gas company and after several reschedules finally got the guy out here for him to tell me “Ma’am, this oven is perfectly fine. It’s supposed to smell and sound like that.” D’oh.
Exhibit D: No, Really. An Idiot – I was having a bad day last week. The kind where nothing has really gone terribly wrong, and yet you feel as though it is simply the Worst Day Ever on account of all the small irritations piling up. I’d had a frustrating day at the office, the kids were needy and annoying, it was cold and took us forever to get home. After dinner and a half-assed attempt at cleaning up the kitchen I decided to take a shower. The water started to run cold halfway through, and by the time I rinsed all the conditioner out of my hair I was shivering and miserable. We have two water heaters (no idea) and have never run out of hot water before. I went upstairs and tested the kitchen sink. Sure enough, that water was cold as well. So I called my mother to complain, as you do. “…and then we almost missed the bus and after dinner I took a shower and it was COLD and clearly there is something wrong with the water heaters because this has never happened before and I don’t know how the pilot lights could have gone out on both and waaaaaaaaah!” I was so dramatic that she gently suggested calling the landlord and I sniffly agreed to do so. Before finding his number I decided to check one more time and voila – hot water. Evidently I had…wait for it…used it all, in what retrospectively seems like a rather LONG shower. So.
It has become abundantly clear that I have very little business being in charge. Of anything. (Shh, don’t tell my new employers.) In other words, it would probably be to everyone’s advantage for N’s job situation to resolve itself fairly soon. Gaaaah.
*My landlord Jerry** apologized profusely for not answering my email until almost 8am. I was like, Dude, I emailed you at 4:30 in the morning. I wasn’t really expecting an immediate response.
**Jerry looks uncannily like William H. Macy.
