Tom has been away at the Pitchfork Music Festival since Friday. And while my four days alone with three children actually went surprisingly well, I am now, upon his return, prostrate like a limp noodle and may remain that way for some time.
While my children are exhausting just in their day-to-day selves, that wasn’t my biggest challenge. It’s that they lay in wait early in the morning, like hunters, and the minute they hear my feet touch the floor, they come out of hiding at about 400 miles per hour, and don’t slow down until their head hits the pillow in the evening. If I just had 30 minutes to put in my contacts, take a quick shower, check my email, and start the coffee before they ambush me, I would be a far more pleasant person.
But they don’t. So I didn’t. And this all begins somewhere between 6 and 6:30am, so by evening I’m exhausted, but have had not one minute to myself, so then I stay up way too late trying to squeeze in some time to do the dishes and get a little “me” time.
Single parents? My hat’s off to ya.