One day back in October, Petunia decided that she had to do her math homework with her father. I usually require homework to be finished as soon as Petunia gets home from school, because otherwise we have a huge battle over it, making it take twice as long. But on this night, something on her math worksheet piqued her interest, and she wanted the Guv to participate -- so we set it aside.
Meanwhile, the Guv works over an hour's commute away, on the far side of Philly from where we live in NJ. On a good day, his commute to work is under an hour, though his commute home is always well north of that. Recently, there have been a lot more bad days than good days, and it's frequent that he's walking in minutes before bedtime. This is problematic for several reasons, most notably that daddy's arrival home is Very Exciting! This makes children want to Play! Not Sleep! But, of course, it also means that we didn't all have dinner together followed by some family time and Christmas story reading. The situation is frustrating us all. The Guv is a fantastic father who participates in all aspects of the kids' lives -- but this participation is limited by geography.
When 7:45 rolled around on the night of Petunia's saved math homework, I announced to her that we had to do her math homework right now, because Daddy wasn't home and bedtime was nigh. She had a total and complete meltdown. She screamed "WHY IS DADDY NEVER HOME?" at me. While I was tempted to defend the Guv, I offered up a response that I thought would stop the tantrum: "Petunia, he would be home, if we lived in Pennsylvania near his office. But we live here in NJ, and sometimes it takes Daddy a long time to drive home." She didn't respond. She did her homework quickly and went to bed with not another word.
And then, Petunia went to school the next day and told everyone we were moving to Pennsylvania. One of her little friends came up to me after school in tears, asking: "Is it true? Is it true that you're moving far away?" Teachers called me to ask "when?"
The problem is that I like it here very much, maybe even love it here, where we live in this Norman Rockwell American town. We can walk to school and to get pizza, the kids ride their bikes safely along the sidewalks, and we know all of the faces. It's far from perfect -- but it's small and safe. But who am I to dig in my heels when my second grader wants to move? I want Daddy home earlier too. It'd be nice to be able to pop in and have lunch with him, or to drop Petunia off at his office to do her homework in an adjacent office that already bears her homemade nameplate.
So, we're thinking about crossing the border, which might as well be a world away. I'm floundering in a sea of towns and schools and preschools, all of which I know nothing about. Petunia has applied to a couple of private schools, but I just started looking for preschools for Dash today and am finding some to be full already for fall 2008. For the Guv, this move shortens his commute. For me, this affects my entire enterprise as CEO of the household. I have to find the school, the preschool, the church, the doctors, the dentist, and definitely the closest liquor store. This is exciting and exasperating. This is why I'm not in the holiday spirit: I'm too busy with the possibility of having to put my house on the market in the new year, searching for another one, and calling around to figure out where to land this ship. We're going to Vermont in eleven days, and I couldn't be more glad to escape all of the planning, because I'm leaving it all behind, strapping on a snowboard and a devil-may-care attitude, and escaping, if only for ten days. That'll either put me in the holiday spirit or in the hospital...
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