1. I am alone in my college dorm room, a teddy bear and fleece tie blanket support my head as I crunch Cheez-It’s laid back like a greek goddess. I take sips of vitamin water and I wait for the clock to turn to 9:00pm, signaling an entire night's worth of free minutes on my Verizon LG flip phone. I dial my boyfriend, Michael, who is a thousand miles away at a small technology/art university. I know he is out of class, and I know he must be waiting for my call. The ringer resounds until I hear his voicemail message. I hang up, slick my hair up into a messy bun and take a deep breath. I dial again and hang up as soon as I hear “This is Michael”. Irritation flushes my cheeks and tears rise like a slow incoming tide. I have waited all day for this, I think, as I pick at my nail beds, aware of the loneliness settling over the room like a dew. My phone vibrates, I whip it open and spew out, “Hello-where-were-you,” as a single word. “Well, hi,” he says, ignoring my irritation. I got stuck at Chick-fil-A with friends between classes, my next lab starts early so I only have 30 minutes to talk and eat dinner, sorry.” I try not to do stupid math in my head like, 30 minutes out of 24 hours a day = almost no time spent with the guy I love. Like, the volume of 30 minutes is not enough to hold a re-cap of his entire last 24 hours. I wish it could spill over into 45 minutes, an hour, maybe two. I want it to overflow. I want to bathe in it. I want to swim in it. “How was your day?”, I ask. “What do you want to know?” he replies. What I wouldn’t give to be with him right now. “Tell me everything.” 2. I am alone in the kitchen wearing Lewis in a wrap that holds him snug to my chest. The acrid scent of spit up floats up to my nostrils as I sweep up the dry oats Pascal spilled onto the floor. I glance at my phone to see if I’ve missed any texts and bristle at how late it is already. Why isn’t he home from work yet? I’m timing this meal just right. The lid on the pot of boiling pasta begins to rattle and I jump at the sharp hiss of water hitting the flames under the pot. I tiptoe around the scattered plastic utensils and mixing bowls that form a haphazard obstacle course and recoil at the sticky, wet sensation blooming in my sock. What did I just step in? I click off the burner and remove the lid just as I hear the front door swing open. “Good, you’re here”, I say as Michael sets his laptop bag down and removes his coat. “I need help draining the pasta, I’m going to get Pascal settled real quick.” He fishes the strainer from the floor hellscape and gives it a rinse under warm water. He sets it down on the counter and slides two pot holders onto his hands. “I’m ready,” he says. I click the buckle on the green turtle booster seat around Pascal’s tiny waist and push his sippy cup of milk toward him just as Lewis lets out a shrill cry, muffled by my breasts. I shuffle over to the counter and grab a pacifier, the one with a giraffe stuffed animal attached to the end, and offer it to Lewis’ mouth. It calms him long enough for me to hold the strainer as Michael pours the hot, steaming pasta and water over it. I leave them to go feed Lewis in his nursery, and by the time I return, Pascal has only eaten two bites of his dinner. “Daddy, where do you go to work?” Pascal stalls as he picks at his pasta. “Well, I work at an office an hour away with other people in things called cubicles.” Lucky him. I wish I could leave the house and go somewhere without children too, even if it’s in a cubicle. “Is there an excavator there?” Pascal asks with wide eyes. “No buddy, no excavator, just computers and desks.” “Speaking of work,” I interject, “How was your day?” Before Michael can respond, Pascal asks another question. This goes on for fifteen minutes before I give up. After a whirlwind bedtime, Michael settles onto the floor in front of me on the couch, posturing for a shoulder rub. I begin working out a knot and ask, yet again, “How was your day?” His day away at work means that I get eleven hours alone with the kids, and only three hours alone with him at night if the kids don’t wake up and bother us. Stupid math. “It was just another boring day writing code and listening to Anne talk about her adult children while I got my lunch out of the kitchen, nothing exciting really.” “Well, at my job today, my co-worker pooped his pants,” I jest. “Oh, really?” he replies. “Yes, and I had to give him a bath. Later, when we were outside playing in the sand box, he picked up a bug and tried to eat it. I screamed and he dropped it. And then, during nap time, he decided he didn’t want to nap and wanted to snuggle with me instead, but I did record him saying he thinks you should buy me flowers.” “Did he now?” “He actually did! Oh yes, and then the oatmeal you saw on the floor…but I never actually heard about your day, did anything interesting happen?” “No, not really. I want to hear more about your day here. I wish I could be with you all more often. I want to hear more about that poop incident and about how the oatmeal got on the floor…. Tell me everything.” 3. I am alone in the bedroom folding clothes with earbuds in, listening to a podcast without a single interruption from anyone needing something. I have a freshly steeped cup of tea on the dresser, I pick it up to drink in its minty warmth. I hear Lewis yell from the other room, “Dad, watch out, they’re coming!” and I imagine a dangerous situation is going down in the Minecraft world they created together. I keep checking my phone to see if I’ve missed a notification from my friend telling me they’re on their way back from up north so I can calculate how many minutes I have until Pascal walks in the door. He has been gone for two days learning how to fly fish with his buddy. I scroll back through the photos I’ve been sent of a glistening river and proud boys holding giant fish. What an adventure. I wonder what it’s been like. I’m usually the one taking photos of him, capturing that wide smile. I yell for Michael and Lewis to join me in the kitchen to reheat leftovers for dinner. Three out of four of us sit down to eat. That’s only 75% of our family. Stupid math. Is this what it will be like when he leaves for college? Lewis quickly fills in the silent void with a rally of questions, sensing his moment to have our undivided attention. I giggle at his deep thinking and curiosity and defer most questions to Michael, our resident human google. My phone dings and another picture of Pascal next to a steelhead with a big smile and a thumbs up fills my screen. The text below the photo reads, “We are on our way!” My heart quickens. An hour later he catapults into the house with waders dragging behind him and hands me a balled up Culvers bag. Words tumble out of his mouth faster than my brain can receive them. I stop him mid-sentence. “Hey buddy, what do you say to your friend’s mom?” “Oh, yea, thank you so much! It was so fun! Bye!” He tries to start talking again, but I stop him and tell him to put his bag and waders away first. I finally allow him to walk into the kitchen and Lewis runs in to squeeze him into a hug. Michael and I stand back, meet his blue eyed gaze and match his wide smile. “Ok…tell us everything!”
This post is part of a blog hop with Exhale—an online community of women pursuing creativity alongside motherhood, led by the writing team behind Coffee + Crumbs. Click here to view the next post in the series "Love."
Soli Deo gloria,
Sara
Okay this was brilliant and now I have a name for that thing I am ALWAYS DOING - stupid math 🫠
Stupid math. Time just moves so fast.