girlfiend

Last night someone twittered something about how it was Sunday night already and I was truly taken aback because I didn’t even realize it was Sunday. I could have sworn it was just any other week night. Now it’s Monday and it doesn’t really feel like Monday as much as it feels like Tuesday, Wednesday, or Thursday. It doesn’t feel like a Friday though. Fridays feel a little more hopeful, like there is some room to breathe. But it’s Monday, and it doesn’t feel like a Monday because another weekend went by where I just didn’t get a break.

I spent Saturday at the neighborhood clean-up with both of the boys, picking trash up off of the sidewalks, pulling weeds and sweeping up debris, while B did the neighborhood clean up at the park working on the garden 100% child-free. Sunday was spent at home with the boys while B was out in the driveway working on his boat until he left for the lake to put his boat in the water. Another weekend where I’m solely in charge of childcare. If mothering is my full time job why don’t I get a break on the weekend? Why didn’t I participate in the neighborhood clean up without a stroller and three-year-old to manage?

To be fair to Boyfiend, I got an hour to go to the gym on Friday. And he gave me a little break around 7 last night when he gave the boys a bath and put the Fiendling to bed. He also let me sleep in yesterday, after I begged him to the night before. But in the grand scheme of things, an extra hour and a half of sleep and a night off of putting the 3 year old to bed isn’t much of break.

It’s not just this past weekend, it feels like all the time. I’m not blaming B. He’s not off in Atlantic City with whores and cocaine. Most of the time he’s working on things around the house. He has been up early several weekend mornings to procure free firewood for next winter and spent an entire weekend splitting the logs. Even if he’s off doing things for himself, like this weekend with the boat, and bike rides with his brother I don’t begrudge him the time. He should have time to enjoy himself unencumbered. But where’s my time?

The problem is that I don’t know how to carve it out for myself anymore. I feel so completely shut off from my friends who don’t have children, and none of my friends from before I had kids have children. None of them. Most of them don’t even call me anymore. I ran into Junkiegirl twice over the past week and we talked more on the street in front of the laundromat than we’ve talked in the past six months. I don’t think it even occurs to her to ever call me to hang out because I haven’t been able to for so long.

My new friends, the ones who have children, spend weekends with their husbands and kids together. And I call them friends, but when I think about it have I ever actually spent any substantial time with them without our kids involved? Of all of the women I spend time with, I don’t even know that we’d be friends if we didn’t have kids. What common interests do we have? What shared experiences? Aside from my book club and the occasional “girl’s night out,” (and my god, I hate that it’s called a fucking girl’s night out when someone organizes it. I find the description to be trite and mildly offensive) I don’t know any of them.

When I have a few hours to myself on the weekend I spend it the only way I know how- at the gym or at the supermarket. It’s pathetic. B suggested I take a day and do something, but what? With whom? Where am I supposed to go and what am I supposed to do? What did I even do before? I want time to myself, but I don’t want to spend it all by myself.

Anyway, it’s Monday. I’ve got another five days without a break in front of me. I have to go fish a used tissue out of the baby’s hand.