Missing Body Parts

I'm home this weekend by myself -- and really, literally, all alone, by myself.  No kid, no dog, no guests, almost no social plans.  Which should feel like a relief, and mostly it does.  No one to make breakfast for -- fried egg sandwich or bowl of dog food, no one to urge out the front door for the next gymnastics practice, no one to worry about what he's got in his mouth.  Time to follow some of Stephen Covey's Seven Habits of Highly Successful People, a rare self-help book from which I actually have retained a few of the suggested action items that might help me.  I have time to do those unimportant, un-urgent things that I simply want to do -- to read my book, do my yoga, go for a brisk walk -- and, more important in fact, I actually have time to do the things that are in that crucial furthest quadrant of his chart

-- the important but un-urgent things that usually get swept away, or indefinitely postponed, in the crises of the day.  I've organized my desk so I can see an open space of wood, I've washed the throw blankets on the living room couch that Theo has been crawling all over for weeks, I've figured out 90% of Kanha's summer camp schedule.  In just a few hours, I've regained a sense of mental organization that matches my clean desk -- there's a reasonably large chunk of uncluttered space again.  

What remains surprising to me, after all these years -- almost six -- of being on my own is that I never completely get used to these solo weekends, these respites from the grind of my parenting life. I typically don't mention this to my "married with children and hectic lives" friends, because I know to them it probably sounds like nirvana:  a read book, a brisk walk, a clean desk -- who wouldn't want one of those?  Especially when the last time you experienced it, at least without guilt, was in the last millennium.  But it's as if I'm missing a body part for these couple of days -- not an arm or leg as I'm functioning ok, but the sensation is similar to the "phantom limb" phenomenon that I've heard veterans discuss.  It's as if Kanha is still here, nearby, yet I turn and no, she's not.  She's not here to hear about the day's weather report or look at a funny cartoon I found on the web or ask what she wants for dinner.  I even miss Theo -- I am constantly imagining I'm about to trip over him and keep heading for the front door to let him out until I realize there's no furry ball sitting there patiently waiting.   It seems clear the body part they've actually taken away is a tiny sliver of my heart.  I'm always so grateful when it gets returned on Sunday evenings.  And I'm glad that's only a few hours away.