La Vie Boheme

I've written this post so many times, over and over in my head. I like to think that's how writers "think". But most writers follow that with actual writing. I've continued to blog in my head, the obvious issue with that being that all of you are not, sadly and joyously, in my head. Imagine that living nightmare , if you would.

And, for my Facebook readers, please know you are reading my BLOG, it just so happens that I embraced our A.D.D.-generation and it automatically imports to FB for you. No clicks necessary! But (warning bells), I'm thinking of changing that.

Today I can wait no longer. Why have I not put ink to paper in so long? Or fingertip to delicate tapping sound?

I need to write that post on our vacation in Ithaca. How it wasn't all that I'd planned. How life happened, and the extra appendage known as Toddler was still that. How I still felt that need to break free of... my own life. When my Mom took us to see Rent, and, upon watching the stunning closing number, feeling the sudden rise of emotion, uncontrollable, unfettered emotion, upon realization that life really is measured in love? That above all else, no matter the frustrations and agony that is the human existence, love is what is measured? What else do we take with us?

My frustration of late, which I share so readily here, has been the one-ness of my life. The constant-ness of being solely in charge of a two-year old life (okay, not solely*. But I don't always have The Village around me when I need it!)

There have been few times in my life when I wanted to be alone. As a kid, I was never alone. I didn't live alone in college. I hated living alone for a two-month period after college, and bent over backwards to get out of that house, and town, to have a roommate again. I wouldn't go get a bite to eat by myself. I would never consider going to see a movie alone. Never, ever. Death!

I have been, and until recently believed myself to always BE, a true Extrovert by Myers-Briggs standards. Preference: People.

Having a constant, two-foot high companion (at times, appendage) definitely has made me yearn for the times when I am completely. And utterly. Alone. Being bossed around by a two-foot-high stack of concentrated energy actually takes a lot out of a person. Let alone a person carrying another person around in utero.

Don't get me wrong. I always respected those confident-looking coffee shop dwellers engrossed in their books. I just wanted to be engrossed in conversation with them.

On Wednesday this week, otherwise known as NewFreedom Day, my toddler went to preschool for 3 hours in the morning. Ironically, as duty would have it I had to appear at the doctor's office, where I jubilantly read the paper in the waiting room. The paper! But in running my requisite solo errands thereafter, I found myself on a bit of a high. An alone high. Happy to just be. Alone. Inconceivable!

The Moms are supposed to hide as the two's come down the hallway from the playground, so we don't distract them from their line-forming concentration. We hid. I peeked. I spotted my toddler, following the direction of the teachers, in a line of two-foot high people. Looking up at times, bewildered. Furrowing his brow, making his miniature way in the world. Obviously pooped from the stimulation that is toddler-hood.

It happened. Tears came to my eyes. I missed him. I missed him so much, in my alone-ness. My reconvening with my independent Self. I couldn't wait to catch up with him. After three hours.


* Because my husband reads my blog.