Being a teacher doesn't equate to the most pay for a Masters degree, but it's allowed me to take off a lot more time than many other jobs to help out with Shane. It doesn't hurt that I have five years with the schools (including my time as an IA) where I've only used a few days of leave each year. That's all going to come to an end though. Monday is going to be my first day back on the job. I'm 90% looking forward to it. I don't know if I said this before (and I'm too lazy right now to look back and double check), but I will feel safer about my job security when I'm back in the hot seat. As the main bread winner, there was some pressure when I got married, more when we got our house, but now that Shane is here and Carrie is switching to part-time with the possibility of becoming a stay-at-home mom I've begun to really feel the pressure. It was more of an abstract "it would suck to lose my job but we'd still get by" sort of thing before. I'm not in any danger that I know of, but I'll feel better being back and work and 'holding my place.' I want to be a good Dad, and being a good provider ranks pretty high on the 'good Dad' list in my mind.
Last Saturday was nice. My family went out to Cheesecake Factory for my brother Matt's birthday. We had to wait for a little over an hour and a half to be seated (go figure that the mall was crowded at 6:30 on a Saturday). Carrie stayed home to take care of Shane, and after the two-hour mark I started to get anxious about being away for so long. During the pregnancy, Carrie was a bit nutty and relied on my heavily. She'd get nervous and depressed and send me sad face text messages whenever I was gone for too long (For example, I'd get "When are you coming home?" messages when I went to SCA practice for a couple of hours). Then, she had some difficulties with the birth, so I've been used to feeling like an integral part of the goings on around here. It turns out I was the nutty one Saturday. I left slightly early to make sure Carrie was not down and depressed about me being away for so long. It turned out Shane's an able replacement for me. I don't think Carrie even noticed I was gone! If it's ego to think that the world won't turn without you, then that was my malady Saturday. It's good to know that my wife is basically back to normal. She's going to be a great mom. I can see it in how Shane melts into her arms and how she'll refuse to put him down when he's sleeping sometimes.
Wow. I'm surprised I've been able to type this much. Carrie is out doing horse errands, so it's just me and the boy-o. The only thing is, he's napping. I did some dishes, and then I thought he'd be waking up any moment so I've been doing nothing overly important and trying to kill the few remaining minutes of freedom I may have. I've played Puzzle Quest 2, talked to Matt, made a sandwhich, ate said sandwhich, checked through my work emails, written in my journal....how long is this kid going to nap? I just hope he'll still sleep tonight.
I guess I'm going to go look for something productive to do. Once I start, I'm sure that will be when my son wakes up.
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