Well, needless to say I haven't been writing as much. It's been a slow progression into laziness. Laziness is not the correct word. Madness? Madness is also not the correct word. If only there was a unique word to describe how I've been feeling and acting.I am still working. Full time. A little less than I am used to, about 43 hours a week. I still have weekends off, where I expect that I will sleep for a least 48 hours straight because I am so tired from the work week, but I never do. Weeknights I assume I will drive home from work with my eyelids propped open with toothpicks and roll out of my car into bed for the night. I do not.
Something happens when I get home, a second wind. Something miraculous. I start to clean; laundry, dishes, make dinner, washing baby clothes and blankets. Is this the 'nesting' I've read about? For some reason when I heard the word nesting, I always thought it meant sleeping a lot. Like just hanging out in your home (nest) and not doing anything. Now I realize it means getting this nest ready for your egg to hatch. It's an impulse that defies all logic. I am exhausted, I should rest. What the hell am I doing.
So yesterday, Saturday, I woke up at 4:30 am with my husband as he got ready to go to work. We talked for a while and I figured I'd just drift back off to sleep after he left. After all, falling back to sleep is a finely honed skill by now. All the trips to the bathroom every night has really given me a lot of practice. Paul did leave for work at about 5 or 5:30, I however, did not fall back to sleep. I went into the kitchen for some water. And so it began.
There were a couple glasses and a dish in the sink from the night before. I washed them. Without thinking, I then started to give the sink a good scrub down. I went into the fridge for a bottle of cold water, but not before rearranging everything, pulling out and tossing old food and wiping everything down. Finally I had my water in hand and I headed back to bed where my big blind dog was keeping a spot warm for me. Looking at Louie lying there I thought how much nicer this would be if my blankets and sheets were clean. I painstakingly got Louie to wake up and 'scoot over', 'off the bed' and stripped all the blankets, sheets and pillow cases and started a load of laundry. There I realized there were tiny muddy paw prints on the top of the washer and dryer from where a naughty cat had been. I got the cleaner and some paper towels and proceeded to wipe off every square inch of the washer and dryer, then the counter and cupboard and on and on until everything was sparkling in our utility room.
So now of course I cannot go to sleep on a bare mattress. The sun is up and the dogs are hungry. I fed the dogs and came back inside. Before I know it I'm cleaning off the dining room table, paying a few bills and filling out a preregistration form for the Child Birth Center at our local hospital. Folding laundry, vacuuming, dusting the ficken vacuum off! What next? I haven't even made my way down the hall into the nursery yet. Suddenly everything just stops. My energy drops. I've been up for 4 hours or so and I haven't eaten or drank any of that water that started all of this. I make a snack. The blankets are done so I make the bed. The warm comforter from the dryer feels and smells so good that I finally lay back down. I felt like I could sleep for another eight hours.
This nesting business is a strange phenomenon. I am cleaning and being productive without a list or a plan of any sort. Actually while I was doing it, my mind was pretty much blank. Later I went on the computer and update my Facebook status:
"I've been awake since 4:30am. I am cleaning. And cleaning things that clean things. Like dusting the vacuum, and wiping off the washer and dryer. Is this what 'nesting' feels like? Meth, it feels like meth."
Oh, boy I'm so funny. Ha! My brother commented that my mother was doing the very same thing at the same time. If this is nesting, then my mom has been nesting for 40 years or so. She has a especially intense bought of the nesting on weekends and it usually starts before sunrise.
Maybe this isn't nesting at all, maybe I am just finally becoming what I was always told I would some day. My mother.
That used to be a scary thought. I have changed my mind on the subject. I am not ACTUALLY turning into my mother. I am still 34 years younger and live a different life. This is not Freaky Friday or anything. It's a fact that as we get older, we may fall into some similar patterns as our parents. That is why I believe that we need to be conscious and honest about this. If your folks were horribly abusive shit bags, than maybe you should be aware that your predisposition is leaning toward the same.
Fortunately for me, my mothers quirks are pretty minor and she is all and all maybe the best woman I have ever known. Thanks mom for nesting all these years. You took great care of us.
