Alone again, naturally (#1173)

Topics/tags: Autobiographical, short

This past Sunday, I started this musing. Here’s how it looked that day (more or less).

Just a few days ago, I had my whole family here. One son had flown in from the East coast. One son had flown in from the West coast. One son had driven in from no coast. Michelle even managed to get a few days off from work. It was amazing having everyone home. We chatted, cooked, ate, watched TV, discussed books, played games, caught up, and more. I love being with my family. And I love seeing how my sons interact with each other.

We drove one son back to the airport on Friday.

No-coast son left this morning.

Michelle drove the last son back to the airport this afternoon and then headed off to Albert the Bull’s hometown [1,2].

And so I’m left by myself.

The house feels so damn quiet. It even feels quiet when I put on music. At least I can listen to the Heartbreakers’ Born to Lose without bothering anyone [3,4].

And I can start catching up on the too much work that has built up over the past few days. Uninterrupted time is nice.

But I’d rather have everyone home.

Oh well. Michelle will be back in a few days. We’ll see one son a few days later. A few weeks after that, West coast son returns. I think we’re all back together on December 23 or 24th.

Until then, I should plan on some alone time.

I just wish it felt natural.

On Sunday, I also wrote this note, which I couldn’t fit into the musing.

Today might have felt better if so many things hadn’t gone wrong. One car popped a tire and lost a hubcap. Another needed jumping. Our fake Christmas tree seems to have disappeared. Glass broke. And there’s the hole in the bathroom ceiling that we tried to deal with yesterday.

Lots of work. Family gone. Things went wrong. Not a good day.

Here’s the update I wrote yesterday.

Now it’s Wednesday evening. Monday night and Tuesday night didn’t feel nearly as bad. It helped that I had a lot of work to do. And, well, come home from work to an empty house is a much more normal feeling than the house emptied out.

Now it’s Thursday. Michelle returns home from work tonight. I think I’ll get to see no-coast son again on Saturday. I’m doing better.

You know what? I still have so much damn work to do that I’m not sure how I’m going to get it done.

But it doesn’t matter. I’d rather be spending time with family. And the house feels less empty knowing I’ll see Michelle soon.

[1] Unsurprisingly, I prefer Albert the Alligator.

[2] Given the title of this musing, I wish he were Gilbert the Bull.

[3] No, not Tom Petty’s Heartbreakers. The ones from New York. I’m amazed that both bands could coexist without anyone suing for trademark infringement.

[4] It had been on my pre-family-return playlist. I accidentally played it through our TV speakers one day. The family members present were not pleased. Perhaps others would have been.

Version 1.0 of 2021-12-02 .