Selfish, One Week A Year

Later this summer my menfolk are heading to the wilds of northern Wisconsin for a week of Boy Scout camp.

Let us now fall to our knees and bow our heads in reverence, allowing the power and meaning of those words to seep into our souls.

A week alone. In my house.

Blessed be and amen.

It is a day fourteen years in coming, something about which I’ve fantasized since those middle of the night feedings…nay, colicky cranky-pants-ings…when Andy was a newborn, solidified when his brother arrived three years later. A day when my beloved offspring would briefly fly the nest, leaving me at home to love them and miss them and revel in my lack of parental responsibility. That my husband is flying the nest with them is just the hot fudge on top of the delicious I’m alone sundae. Don’t get me wrong; I’d give my arm for the two of us to have a week together sans children, but this is one gift horse whose teeth I refuse to investigate.

What shall I do? Where shall I go? Whatever will become of me?

Thanks, Scarlett.

I will read and write (something I’m sure my editor is relieved to hear). I will eat what I want when I want; there will be sushi. I will have drinks on my patio in the afternoon and coffee there in the morning. I will clean my house ONCE and it will stay that way (at least until they return, muddy and sandy and full of stories). I will binge watch shows I rarely have time to watch. I will beat my to-do list into submission. I will stay in my pajamas all day at least once. I will not utter a single word at least one day, except to call the dog. I will garden and I will scrapbook for the first time in over four years. I will teach my summer flute students. I will walk through the house that I love so much and miss my menfolk. But most of all, I will do all these things for me. I will do them without thought to anyone else, for an entire week. I will revel in the kind of blessed silence that is only present when there is no one around to interrupt you, when you know that it is only temporary. I will think and plan. I will take my brain and love it and hug it and name it George.

I will do whatever I want, whenever I want, for as long as I want, for an entire week.

Selfish much? Only one week a year.

What is your selfish alone in the house fantasy?