Ian has been out of town for a week doing Army things. I'm surprised how much the stress of that can still get to me. I think of myself as a fairly calm parent, not prone to fits very often. But a lot of my ability to be that way has to do with sharing the burden and having someone to laugh with and getting a break. Remove the other parent from the equation and my mind becomes a constant scramble of responsibilities, always sure I'm forgetting something, and I become far less patient.
The weekdays with Ian gone have been complicated. Last Thursday in particular was impressively tricky where I had to work, I arranged for the kids to walk themselves to the violin store after school rather than be picked up, I would feed them there, we'd head to the school for the open house right after work, then go straight from there to the Y for Mona's swim team practice. Sure the dog wasn't getting walked until pretty late in this scenario, but it was the best I could do.
