I've been back home in Chicago for two weeks, now. If you're a subscriber to the view that good things are worth a little effort, then the flight over would be right up your alley. Our plane had been delayed three hours because of a medical emergency between Newark and Frankfurt.
That meant I had to change my connecting flight from Newark to Chicago. By the time we landed in Newark and I had claimed my baggage and gotten in line to check it in again, I had missed that connecting flight, and had to catch another one... to Midway, instead of O'hare. And
I had only a few minutes to catch that plane, two terminals away.
We made it, though, and even managed to squeeze in a quick call to my dad. "I missed my flight. We'll be at Midway at 10, not O'hare." So, 29 hours after our journey had begun, my son and I were finally snug in bed in my parents' home, air conditioning humming softly in the background.
My son handled it all brilliantly. He is the perfect traveller--better than most adults. Scratch that, he is the perfect child.
In the meantime, my husband is still in Germany, tying up loose ends. We don't know when he'll be here, but the target is by the end of the month. That may or may not happen.
I've been taking things slow. The first thing I did was register my lovel boy for first grade.
Then, last Sunday, my parents threw a Welcome Home/Birthday Party for me (36 years old). It was supposed to be a surprise, but I suppose the effort of keeping it that way was too much to handle, so my mom spilled the beans just a day or two after our arrival. It was a wonderful party, with family and my best friend, J. My husband managed to put a damper on the festivities by overreacting to a conversation he'd had with my mom the day before (about behaving nicely to her daughter while he's here), and called just as we were sitting down to eat to order me to pack up and come home.
He was irrational and after calmly telling him this wasn't the time to discuss it several times, I hung up on him. I told my mom what had happened, desperately trying to control my tears and outrage. She told my father, and seconds later the phone rang again. My dad answered it, chewed out my husband, told him to shape up, and about ten minutes later was off the phone again.
Later on, my dad told me to give my husband a call. He thought things had been worked out. So, when I had a moment of privacy a couple of hours later, I called (though I didn't want to) and my husband was humble and sweet and said he'd misunderstood the purpose of my mother's call. There was no apology, however. And none was expected. The damage was done. He'd managed to sabotage my birthday party (I hadn't wanted to tell him about it, but our son had leaked the information to him that morning), which, way deep down, was probably very satisfactory for him.
The following Saturday, just a few days ago, I met J and her man at the renaissance faire I used to work at as a musician. That experience deserves its own post, so I'll write more on that later. It was a really wonderful time. I couldn't have asked for a better day.
Yesterday, I applied for five proofreading jobs. I didn't find them in Sunday's paper. Rather, I found them on CareerBuilder.com. I have no idea if anything will come of them. Most of them are rather far away, close to Chicago. Since I'd like to stay in the area we're in now, that could be a problem. But I'll cross that bridge IF I come to it. Ideally, I'd like a proofreading/copy editing job that isn't high pressure and tight deadlines. Been there, done that. It's fine when you're single and working long hours doesn't affect much more than your sleep. A very big part of me would like a desk job that's dull and predictable, but gets me home at the same time every day feeling sane, and with enough energy to fit in some classes to earn my teaching certificate. Like data entry. Any data entry jobs out there that pay between $30-40,000 per year? Didn't think so.
Today, I'm visiting an old high school friend of mine. I have to wake up my son so we can be on our way.
...Oh! And how cool is it that I'm actually writing within three time zones of most readers here?
Wow. I'm really here...
