Sundays are my day off from responsibility and the only reliably sane day of the week for me. I use the day predictably with almost monotonous routine: I go to church alone; I eat the same take out, fast food every Sunday in my pickup truck while reading the paper; I see a movie; I browse a bookstore, the hardware stores, the antique stores, the big-box home improvement stores and stock up bulk supplies at Sam's Club. I do a brisk 3 mile walk around a lake.
Six days a week I'm the groundskeeper for my 12 acre rural home. That sounds good. It should be pleasant. We have trees and parklike grounds.....on the 'let's see the faces' page I've posted a pic of myself in front of an apple tree with Asiatic lilies around it. But I hate my life. There, I said it. I say it to myself all the time. I'm the caretaker, I've been the caretaker in one way or another since I walked in on a suicide attempt when I was 5 years old......my mother was half in and half out of a window 9 stories up. Yeah. Dad and my two older brothers had walked out on one more of her depressions.....they weren't to know how bad that one was I guess.....but I walked into the room and saw her with "..the monster face..". That's what I came to call the expression she had. OK, she didn't jump. But it was a melodrama and it was hers and my secret......I could never tell.
A few years later the family got more interesting: she didn't come out of her room for about 2 years. Dad slept in the den where we watched TV; I did the cooking, we all pretended nothing was odd. I was 11 years old when it started. The same formulaic pattern kept repeating itself over and over......her barely managing to function without her bi-polar, manic depression consuming her life; Dad pursuing his career; the 2 older boys avoiding the dramas and me being the caretaker in so many ways. Sigmund Freud would have a field day analyzing our family.
OK, I went off to college and lived independent for 12 years, Dad retired and bought this estate, and Mom had a heart attack. Guess who got asked to come and help? I'll be 60 years old very shortly. Dad's been dead since 2001, the 2 brothers are still avoiding us and here I am.
It's a full time job managing this place, the house was built in 1913...it's 100 years old, we've got 12 acres, I planted an orchard, we own a farm, money isn't an issue. And I hate my life. OK, I'm not thinking about checking out or anything, but I really do not enjoy much of anything.
And that's what I'm thinking right now.