My Husband Left Friday

I can honestly say I knew what I had before it was gone. Did that make sense? What I’m trying to say is the opposite of “you never know what you had until it’s gone.” I’m talking about dear ol’ Nate, my bubby, my Nay-Nay. This has been one LONG weekend without him. I’ve had a great opportunity to reflect on all the reasons I love him being around.

Before this weekend, I knew all of this. And before this weekend, I have tried my best to never take it for granted. My Nay-Nay is a rare catch and I’m so happy to call him my own.

It all started Friday. We had plans to go to his mom and dad’s for dinner with the babies. At 1:00PM it started to snow, but no big deal, plans were still on. By 3:30PM, plans were off. At 5:15PM, he called to say he was not coming home and I knew what that meant. He works for the local electric company and when the weather gets yucky, they are there to make sure folks are getting their power back on. And when it snows, that means it could take days. On Friday, I knew it might be Monday before I saw him again…and it almost is just that. He got to come home Saturday morning for a quick nap and was back to work at 2PM, home at midnight, back out by 7A, and still not home. Luckily, he works in the office. The guys actually working out in the field don’t go home at all until the power is back on. Enough of that…the blog is about him not his work!

I “aggravated-ly” missed him Friday when I had to rush to get the kids fed, the dog in out of the snow, the dog cage cleaned out, and the kids ready for bed all alone. (Thankfully, my neighbor came to hang with the kids while I got the dog and all his “stuff.”) I missed him with my heart Saturday evening when I was cutting up their spaghetti. It was an “awww…” moment.

You see, he is so my partner when it comes to the kids. When he comes home I have dinner ready. He helps fix the plates and get everyone at the table. (And he always cuts up the spaghetti for them just right.) After dinner, he plays with the kids while I clean up. And when I nurse and put JJ to bed, my Nay-Nay is there to hang with Lily. Then, while I clean up toys in the family room, he gives her a bath and puts her to bed. Not to mention all the things he fetches for me and catches for me while I run my evening routine. On the weekends, which this was, he also cooks breakfast and lets me chill with the babies; something I never do during the week because of my morning routine. If we don’t go out, he also will cook lunch or dinner AND clean most of the mess.


Needless to say, some things got left behind this weekend. My normal cleaning routine was a little skewed because if I did all I normally do, a two-year old and an 8 month old might as well have taken care of themselves! Cleaning the kitchen took longer because my Brutus thinks he has to climb on everything. As a result, in between the cleaning of each dish I was fetching a screaming baby from wherever he just fell from. I swear, the bruises on either side of his head are making way for his horns. I am so lucky that my two year old is completely self-entertaining and calm. She would quietly play while I got the baby ready for bed every night. She got stuck with Mommy for bath and bedtime. We would say our prayers for the lineman out working and all the people without power. Tonight, I had to make up a song about Jesus and Daddy helping people that were cold. How funny!

Once she was in bed each night, it came to the time that is supposed to be ours, but he wasn’t here. It was lonely both day and night. Even when he works during the week, we still eat lunch together every day and talk on the phone several times. There was none of that. My companion was gone and I was lonely. At night when he is home, mostly the TV is on and I’m on the computer, but we’re still there together. We talk about TV, blogs, God, family, what irks us, and the small things that made us happy that day. We talk about our relationship and the kids and what we need to work on to be godlier as a family.

And that’s what I’ve missed the most, our talks. We talk about everything. He listens to my jabber even when he has nothing to say. He listens about my day and what so and so said and what so and so wrote in a blog and what happened at gymnastics and what I read that day. He listens because he knows how important it is for me to get it all out of my head.

And to drive the point home, today he told me, “I’m surrounded by all these people here, but I feel so lonely because I’m not with you all.”

And in 45 minutes, he’ll be home. Thank you, God. I’ve really missed him.