Very early tomorrow morning I am flying out to spend the weekend in New York City. I'm going up for my friend's fortieth birthday party (eek, my friends are getting old). I'm really looking forward to having some fun.
But as always, there is another side to it. I am freaking out trying to get ready to leave. Why is it so hard to get ready to spend three days out of town? It's only three days!
Oh, yeah. That's right. It's because I have two kids with busy schedules. Who need proper outfits to go with those schedules. And who need to practice violin for a duet for a Christmas concert next week. And who have mounds of homework every night.
It's weird. Although he hasn't been deployed and his job is supposed to be "easier" I feel like my husband is actually around so much less since we moved here. I suppose a lot of it is because his daily commute is so much longer. It used to take him two minutes to pop home and help out with something. Now we don't see him until dinner time every night.
But he's also been going TDY every couple of weeks. It seems counterintuitive that being apart for a week or two every month would be harder than being apart for six months at a time, but in a lot of ways, it is.
My husband just isn't up on what we're doing all the time. He's not as involved.
In all honesty, he has been driving me crazy just a little bit. It's funny because I feel closer to him than ever and our marriage is stronger than ever, but on this one point I want to throttle him.
He's had this attitude lately like he "can't" handle the kids' stuff. He says the boy's math is beyond him. He says the girl's language arts are beyond him. He says he struggles too much to help my son with his speech practice. So he sits in the recliner and watches hockey while I struggle with them.
And I want to kill him.
I know, I know. I should be happy he's here to bug me. He could have been killed by rocket attacks in Baghdad or he could be in Afghanistan right now.
I know, I know, I know.
So it is really awesome that he's forcing me to go to New York this weekend. I wasn't going to. I feel too guilty for leaving my family while they're so busy. But my dear husband insisted I go have some fun and celebrate the fortieth birthday of someone we both really like.
And maybe three days alone with the kids will show him again that he can do anything with them that I can do. And he can do some things better. He is so much better at giving praise than me. He isn't such a perfectionist.
I will also be perfectly happy to walk away from the other shit going on in my life. You would not believe the crap that is going on with the room mothers from my daughter's class. We could star in a reality television series and have enough drama to stay on the air for years. It is ridiculous that grown women would act this way. I am done. With that. With this school. With women, frankly. With everything.
In the last year I have developed an amazing ability to just not care.
I can read nasty blog posts by people attacking everything I stand for, and just shrug it off. Whatever. They're the unhappy ones.
I can listen to people rant and rave and just not care. Whatever.
Just yesterday I told my daughter a story from the bible. I know. You can expect the four horsemen of the Apocalypse any time now. I told her about Jesus saying let he who is without sin cast the first stone.
I couldn't believe it was a lesson she needed to learn because that is so unlike her. It is astonishing sometimes, the sheer amount of things you must teach your children.
That first stone thing is something we could all probably stand to learn (she says sanctimoniously from her soapbox having never called anyone a dumb bitch.)
And so I'm off. To Sin City. No wait, that's Vegas, right? I'm off to the Big Apple to see people who used to be "bloggers" but are now just friends and I am going to turn off my guilt and leave it all behind. For three whole days.
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