I woke up this morning unaccountably depressed. It was a bone deep feeling coming off a restless night and punctuated by a low grade headache.
I suspect two causes. The first resulted from of all things an earthquake nearly 3, 000 miles away. Yesterday was a full day of drama for our boating friends. The tsunami generated by the Chilean earthquake rolled out from the coastline and echoed across the Pacific from Japan to New Zealand, Mexico to Australia. While it fortunately wasn't a destructive tsunami as these things go, it was not a non-deal for those in the boating community along Pacific Mexico. If you need to see just how you can be screwed by something as "small" as a meter tidal wave, visit my good friend Behan's blog. Another fellow cruiser, Dennis of Dulci Vida, touched bottom in Barra Navidad where cleats were sprung left and right at the marina. Folks all up and down the coast were chattering on email, news groups, and Facebook.
I can only imagine the VHF traffic on nets in La Paz, Puerto Vallarta, and Manzanillo… but I can imagine. I know the voices and the types of raging arguments that must have taken place regarding where to put the boats and what to do. There would be gloom and doomers and naysayers. The whole day would have been full of chit chat, smart aleck comments and updates from those with 3G access to the news services. And it hurt a little to be land bound, eleven stories up in the middle of an urban center out of sight and out of touch with the cruising community.
The second probable cause of my dreary mood this morning was that today was DrC's first day of work. He was hired as a general ophthalmologist for a county health system in Manukau. Manukau is just south of Auckland. The clinic is shiny new with great, modern equipment, a friendly staff, and more advanced pathology than a doctor in training could possibly desire. We're making money finally. DrC is getting his medical credentials all spiffied up while simultaneously expanding his knowledge in key, growing medical areas. It's all good, right?
But it isn't really. We're coming off of years of spending all day every day with each other. As wrong as it is to say so, today felt like an epic fail... like somehow I'd managed to fail my husband and the girls by letting things get to this point where we had to feed Daddy toast and yogurt, make him a sack lunch, and send him to an office.
So I didn't get off to the greatest start today. However, I made a vow -- quite literally months ago -- that when DrC started working, the girls and I started working even if school and my own job were weeks or even months in our future. We had a long list of tasks to complete by end of day. School, of course, as well as errands consumed most of our time. We also cleaned house and exercise. DrC actually only worked till 2 so he joined us for our afternoon adventure to look at possible places to live. The day got easier as we got moving. By spending every minute following DrC's axiom to "Use your time wisely", I pushed through the heavy sense of loss and wrongness and worked to find a new balance in our new life.
This is only a foreshadow of the dip I'll no doubt experience the Monday morning I wake up and send the entire lot of them off to school and work. I absolutely refuse to cry at just typing it. While there is simply no sense or bandwidth or purpose in trying to find a job before I've got the family settled, work is going to have to be part of my day as soon thereafter as I can possibly arrange. My family is growing up and excited with their new roles. I want new toys and new people, too, if only to serve as distraction.
2 comments:
I just saw that you are living in Pukekohe. I spent a month there one summer in high school as an exchange student. I stayed with a nice family ,who I have ling since lost touch with, but owned a panel beating business (body shop). It was a nice little town then and hope that you are enjoying it!
we have had several years of homeschool, home office, self employed, and unemployed togetherness. I can empathize with the feeling of loss when that goes away.
Glad you like the bookmarks.
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