More Reaping

Have you ever felt like crap about a situation that you've found yourself in, and you think you've resolved it in your mind until you read something that completely undoes you?  You think you're on the right path of resolution, then someone's perfectly innocent words just put a bulldozer right through it.

My summer sure started out in fantastic fashion.   My trip to New York with my Chorus exceeded all expectations.  The only thing wrong with it was that it was only 5 days.  Five days, and then I had this gaping, yawning hole to fill for the rest of July and August.   On our last day there, a general movement toward getting back home had gripped the group.  I was unreasonably annoyed by it to the point where I had to count to 10 more than once in order to keep myself from saying something I would regret.  I know why I felt this way.  It was simple.  I didn't want to go home.  I didn't want the best part of my summer to end because that would mean that the rest of the summer would have to begin.

Now that I am writing this down, it sounds pathetic, but sometimes the truth ain't pretty.  But there it is.  So, I came home, and I put one foot in front of the other, and I tried to block the coming weeks out of my head.  Then, yesterday I got an invite to a party on Facebook.  It's one of those parties where you are intrigued but you're afraid you won't know anyone there except the host.  So I asked another invitee, a woman around my age, what her thoughts were about attending.  Her answer?   "Saturdays are prime 'home and family' time for us during the summer.  I probably won't go.'"  A perfectly legitimate and forthright answer.  Yet, it reverberated through me to the point that I felt it necessary to write about it.

I wonder what it's like to know that no matter what sort of week you've had, there will always be one day that you can count on to be good?  "Prime Home and Family Day", to be exact.  I think the closest I've ever come to experiencing that was when my mother was still alive and we went to her house for dinner once a week.  I miss that.  I didn't realize how much I missed it until now.   I miss the idea that there are people in the world who care enough about you to carve out a specific time every week for you, and you care enough to do the same for them.   Sacrosanct time.  I can't help but wonder if I will ever know what that feels like again.  

Which leads me back to the ever-present feeling that we reap what we sow in this life that we're given, and somehow I've come to deserve this current experience.  What to do about it?  It really isn't as easy as just "making it happen".  People who've obviously done something right all these years, who already have their "Prime Home and Family Day" always say things like that, along with other unhelpful cliches like "visualize the goal, then work toward making it a reality", etc, etc.   "Making it Happen" is tough when you have no idea where to begin, and worse, when you're not sure if you have anyone to "make it happen" with.

As for that intriguing party, I'm not going to ask anyone else if they're going.  I don't want to hear any more answers like that first one.  You're probably thinking "just go to it."  Ok, and are you the type of person who just goes to parties where there's a 95% chance that you'll know absolutely nobody?  Right.  I didn't think so.  It's pathetic.  Like going to the movies by yourself.  You sit there and try to convince yourself that you're brave and independent, and all along there's this little voice at the back of your head whispering "You're pathetic".  And did I mention that the chances of my husband going are probably 95% negative?   

So, I will resume the task of putting one foot in front of the other, and I will try not to think about the weeks of absolute nothingness that are stretched out in front of me.  Maybe I need to stop reading Facebook so that I won't see the intriguing party invites that I won't accept, and I won't read about other people's family vacations.  But then, if I were to stop reading Facebook, that would just be one more hole to fill.  I don't need one more hole.  I need people for whom I want to set aside "prime home and family" time.   Maybe I can find the witch from Into the Woods, and I can give her the ingredients for her magic potion, and she can grant me my wish, and I can then find out that my wish isn't all that it was cracked up to be.    Maybe there's a positive side to my current situation, and I just have to look for it.  Or maybe not.  Maybe it just is what it is.  Yes, this is a truly pathetic post.  Sometimes, we just have to get it out and get it down in words if we're to have any prayer of moving on.