Over the weekend, mythical wife and I went out of town.  It was a pleasant trip, in spite of the fact that one reason for going was a memorial, but it was still nice to see a close friend despite the circumstances.  The other was in part to a family member’s milestone birthday, and we had a nice little lunch to commemorate.  I spent a tremendous amount of time behind the wheels of cars, and in no help from the insufferably miserable traffic conditions of the Commonwealth of Virginia, and with each visit I make there, I grow more and more resentful of the whole goddamn place and look forward to leaving.

Anyway, we get back to Atlanta after taking the early flight out which meant we’ve been up since 4:30am, and I come to discover that while we were out of town, my microwave stopped working, my Keurig went kaput, and #1 has a death rattle of a cough going on.  I don’t blame anyone for any of these maladies occurring, but it just stinks when negative things occur not on my own watch, and it feeds the general anxiety I have about leaving my home, even though I desperately need breaks and time off.

It’s not that I could’ve done anything differently to prevent shit from breaking, and everyone in care of my home did more than they really had to in order to circumvent busted appliances, but all the same I went the rest of my Sunday back home in this hazy anxious state that feels regret for skipping town, regardless of the fact that I wouldn’t have been able to prevent anything differently.

My awesome mother-in-law already gifted us a new Keurig, which she obviously was under no obligation to do, but the busted microwave sucks, because I feel like I know what the problem is (magnetron) and the part itself is not expensive, but from what I’m researching, the general consensus is to get a repairman on the job, which seemed most likely the case to begin with because I have a built-in unit, and the magnetron is almost impossible for someone who doesn’t know what they’re looking for to access.

After just a few hours back home, and hearing my daughter coughing up a lung, I took her to urgent care in order to get some medications started.  Not that I hold any resentment over it, but such eats into the small reprieve from parenting I get in the day, which means I got no real break at all, despite my fatigue from getting up at ass o’clock.

And to top it off, the sink was full of crap, the dishwasher was never emptied, and I’m just already fried and frustrated with the constant feeling that I have to do fucking everything, and by virtue of not being present at home where I can usually stay on top of the bullshit minutiae and chores, I suffer the pain in the ass of having to do it all at once in order to feel caught up to things.

It’s like, I have a birthday coming up, and I am planning a little bit of solo travel during it, but all I really want, other than for everyone to be safe and my kids to be well taken care of it and remain healthy, is to not come home to a fucking disaster zone, like it seems to feel like every time I leave the house for any indeterminate amount of time.

There’s already a minimum tolerable state that my house fails to meet on a regular basis because I just get burnt out and throw in the towel at being the only person to give a fuck about the general cleanliness of my home, and it always goes to shit every time I leave the house, and nobody but me seems remotely concerned about it, and despite the fact that I’m deserving and entitled to getting breaks too, sometimes it doesn’t seem worth it if a shitshow is waiting for me when I get back, because then any sort of relaxation and good will built up from a break is immediately dunked on by having to resentfully fix everything that went to pot in my absence.

And this is why I sometimes feel like I should just never leave home, and it’s really a fucking shitty feeling to feel.