Deserving Couch Potatoes
Last night, for the first time in as long as we can both remember, maybe over six or eight months, Hubby and I sat down on the couch for an hour and watched television.
Together.
While drinking wine.
And conversing.
Without interruption.
Miraculous!
We completely ignored the overwhelming mess, unanswered emails, complicated tax issues, and our respective writing deadlines. This morning at dawn when I stumbled down the stairs with Babyboy, I saw the dishes piled in the sink, the living room cluttered with toys, the dining room table strewn with unopened mail and kids’ homework pages and unread newspapers…
I thought: It was worth it.
What did we watch, you wonder? What entertainment so caught our attention that it completely distracted us from all the week’s crap?
Nothing in particular, really. We flipped from “Diners, Drive-ins and Dives” to “The Dog Whisperer” to the latest election fiasco coverage to the latest sports fiasco coverage… We sat on the couch chatting about what we were seeing, a lighthearted running commentary on… nothing at all serious.
It was GREAT.
The week was heavy in many ways. On the home front: Babyboy was quite sick the beginning of the week, again. He was up at night coughing, and unable to go to school. In addition, his school progress reports came out, and we had his parent/ teachers conference, with concerns on both sides. He’s missed so much school. He’s having great difficulty getting back into the routine. There’s a kid who’s been picking on him. Plus, we have to pick his first grade curriculum pathway: Science/ Technology/ Engineering/ Math, or French Immersion? (This is a no-brainer, actually. But we did have to attend two separate information sessions on the topic this week.)
On the work front: For two weeks, I’ve had an unusual number of inpatients. These are patients of mine or who I am covering who are admitted to our hospital. Equally unusual is how sick and complex they all have been. Every day that I’ve been in the office, as soon as I’ve finished with my outpatient clinic, I’ve gone to the floors to check in with my inpatients. Every day, for every one, there has been stuff going on. Team decisions on treatment, controversies in diagnosis, delays in diagnostic tests, discharge plan complications, family discussions… I’ve consistently been at work much later that I would have otherwise. Inpatient care is exciting work; it’s been rewarding to get involved; and I feel that my efforts have been appreciated. But the work/ life balance has been off, for sure.
We deserved to sit on our asses and do nothing.