Dreams

When we said goodbye to our au pair, the kids were sad. The cats were sad. I was sad. The house was sad. (It immediately fell into messy chaos.) Our new au pair arrives next week. In the meantime, Fritz and I are tag teaming the day, with Fritz working very early hours and me working later hours; thus, I drop the kids off in the morning and Fritz picks the kids up after school in the afternoon. There's really nothing else to do – no other way to do it – and the only thing I can say, is that it is better than last year, when we did the same schedule, except Trixie was in school for even fewer hours.

I am so tired, internet. Work is intense; and sadly, there's a fair amount of stress for Fritz at work as well. The kids are okay, considering that they just started a new school year and lost their much loved au pair. Which is really me saying that the kids are not-so-okay. I don't know, I don't know. We might be well on our way to becoming some of those people who decide to make a radical life change: you know, the ones who sell everything and live in a camper? Or join a cult and move to a remote island in the South Pacific? Or quit their jobs and open a coffee shop on their credit cards? Or something. Right. At work, we had an informational session on our 401ks and all I could think about was how far away from here would that money get me?

Short term I cope with the stress by day dreaming on my commute about an alternative life, in a parallel universe. Even this feels a little indulgent. Today, I scolded myself for using my commute in such an irresponsible way. I should be thinking about work! Or Noah's mysterious disappearing homework! Or planning the weekend! Not daydreaming about traveling.

Then I thought maybe I could convince my subconscious to just incorporate my daydreams with my regular night dreams. Have you ever tried to control what dreams you are having? It doesn't really work for me. At least, not yet.

When I was a sophomore in high school, I dated a senior. He eventually went away to college, and, of course, we broke up, and I thought I would never see him again. My life was continuing more or less that way; ie, I never saw him. And I was so determined NOT to make myself a pest, NOT to TRY to see him, even though I really wanted to see him. So finally, months after our break up, I decided that maybe I could see him in my dreams.

I tried to bargain a bit with the universe, hoping that the universe would let me have dreams about him. Then, I started having dreams where I almost saw him... but not quite! He was there, he was close, but as soon as I caught a glimpse of him, he would disappear. Or I would open my mouth to speak to him, but then I couldn’t actually see him. This went on for years, and it was maddening, although it was just a series of dreams! In fact, every now and then - 25 odd years later, thousands of miles away from high school, he still occasionally haunts my dreams as a person present, but unseen. The frustration of dreaming about a person who you want to see, but never can; that was annoying! Continuing to dream about a person who you never really see, even when you no longer want to – I guess now he's just a symbol of unfulfilled wishes – that's just obnoxious. And it was dumb to originally think I could somehow "dream" resolution.

Which brings me back to the present, where I simultaneously feel that 1) I should be not be daydreaming and 2) night dreaming isn't an alternative and 3) maybe I should just stop the dreaming altogether and make it reality.