I've been working the night shift, 5p.m. to 430 a.m. for the last three weeks. IT'S.BEEN.HELL. But tonight is my last night -- whoo hoo. Anyhow, I don't know if I'm coming or going, the days I am working I don't have a full day to do anything because I have to take a nap and then the next day I come home in the mornings and crash until 10 or so a.m. and then pretty much act like a Zombie for the rest of the day (is Zombie a proper noun?). Jake was in tears the other night because he missed me (don't tell anyone, he is almost 12 after all! And wears Axe so therefore thinks he's a man) and Isaac was excited that I had a stomach ache because he thought I'd get to stay home, when I said that wasn't sick enough to stay home he asked if I could stay home if I had cancer (before you think he sounds horrible, he doesn't actually know what that really means -- he's 8 -- he just wants me home and misses me). This past gig hasn't just been hard on me, but the whole family. So glad it is over after tonight, and if that masochistic maggot that lives in my brain decides to volunteer for the night shift again, I will be calling a hit-man.
Because I have mastered the art of procrastination (uh, yes it is an art!), I've decided to blog instead of working on my paper. Oh yeah, that masochistic maggot ALSO signed me back up for the master's program (damn noisy pushy maggot). Mostly I wanted to fill you in on what happened with my mother-in-law. Remember when I told you about wanting to meet her birth family. She was going back East (isn't it interesting that it's either Back East or Out West -- now that could be a fun history paper or linguistic paper-- ooops, will turn off my inner geek again for the rest of this post) for a reunion and decided to look up her birth family while she was there. This could go so MANY different and potentially horrible ways. It didn't though!
She knocked on her half-brother's door. He answered and knew immediately who she was. She looks just like their mother. There were lots of tears and she met all of her brothers and sisters and a lot of their kids (although her older sister had died the year before). Her brother from her adopted family was supportive about this too. The birth family was so happy to meet her, so sad they knew nothing of her (their father, her mother's husband after Sher was born 'fessed up after he was presented the letter and the family got confirmation that there was another sister that no one knew about). They all assured her that they want her.
Makes me want to cry a bit --- but then I cry at animal rescue commercials (so does Jake, but again, shhh, he's almost 12 and wears Axe).
Can you imagine, living your life wondering why you were not wanted and then find out an entire family wants you -- not based on who you are or what you've done but because you are family -- family.
Family can drive us crazy (have you met my mother?) and some of us, well me...tried to convince my parents and all my siblings that I was adopted or at least switched at birth because in no way was I as crazy as they were. But no one bought it, I look too much like them. Sher was loved by her adopted family, but not sure if she ever felt like she belonged. Just meeting her birth family gave her a bit of that.
It's really quite lovely.
I kinda want to cry again.
Oh, geeze I'm more like my family then I realized.
5 comments:
Congrats on being off the night shift! Isn't it weird when our little boys start wearing all that perfumey stuff? Cute little children, still looking like babies, really, only reeking like grown men.
My eight-year-old is into it now too, following in the footsteps of his elder brother. Urrrgh!!!
Yeah, family is something else. Thank goodness for it, even when it increases the number greys on our heads :)
Oh, I'm glad the meeting went well. That is HUGE!
I hear you about the night shift, last time we had a restructure and had to bid on our jobs my daughter then 10 started crying and said "You're not going to have to work that shift where I never see you again, are you?!?" :)
Good on ya for the masters program what a lot of work.
That is still the best story I have heard in forever....but I am still most touched by the letter of introduction you wrote. From the heart.
Yeah, just say no to that crazy night stuff....whenever possible. However, it does show you are a team player and it should score you some bonus points with management for a week or so.
Grad school? Thanks, but I'll pass.
I did several years of night shifts - great money but I hated it and was miserable as hell. After that we decided that happiness came first.
Glad the reunion went well! These things can be a real minefield.
I used to work at a jazz club as a waitress. Our shifts were 4 pm to 4 a.m. Talk about a mindfuck. You started belong to an entirely differently world -- the world of night people. This was in NYC. It was crazy. An entirely different subculture exists for people who never see the sun. A lot of it is pretty unhealthy, i do have to say. But it was also when I did my best writing. There is some weird creative energy at night. I guess all those cliches about writers staying up until all hours in their tiny apartments really are based in truth.
As for your mom-in-law -- what a great story. It really hits home for me because since I've moved back east (ha ha! after living "out west" so funny!) I've gotten to reconnect with our family after living nearly two decades across the country and far away from anyone biologically related to me.
It has been amazing. Not always "happy," but it really makes you feel that belonging thing in a huge way. The first time we got our kids around their cousins, it was magical. It was like they just... knew. You could see the difference in the ways the kids behaved with their cousins -- whom they'd just met and barely had even heard about -- versus how they behaved with people our family was close to, really good friends, but they weren't "family." The kids instinctively just understood and felt it.
The first time that happened, we were still living in L.A. and were visiting "back east." And I took one look at the kids with their cousins and other relative and said to my husband -- that's it; we have to move back. look what the kids are missing out on.
And he couldn't dispute it.
Glad your night shift is at an end. It's surreal, and people weren't really made to live that way. Though I have to say... sometimes I miss living in that world. I was young and it was strangely cool and dreamlike.
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