The Occasional Solipsist

I work 12 hour midnight shifts at my current job. Its not that busy a shift, but for the most part, I like it. More money, more time off.

I end up sleeping the days between shifts away, but that is tempered by getting to spend a lot of time with Superwife and Trinity on my days off.

I spent my downtime tonight working my way through finishing the novel The Time Traveller's Wife by Audrey Niffenegger. It is an absolutely amazing book.

Its a very unique love story between an extraordinary woman, and a chrono impaired man who bounces around uncontrollably throughout time over the course of their lives together.

After finishing it, (well before in fact) I made a few parallels between the husband, Henry and myself. I feel lately that I am myself a bit 'chrono impaired', forcing my body to adjust between two completely opposite schedules every 8 days, never knowing what day of the week it is. Tonight as I was leaving for work, I asked Superwife if it was garbage day tomorrow, not as a means to try to weasel my way out of it, but because it could have been a Tuesday, or a Saturday for all I knew. The name of the days don't have the significance for me anymore that they do for everyone else.

After finishing the book, a 500 page treatise on love wrapped in the guise of science fiction, I was struck by a palpable need to see my girls. I actually felt a pain in my stomach, as I was thinking about how much I missed them. I so deeply felt the need to wrap my arms around Superwife and bury my face in her long shortish brown hair, or see the look on Trinity's face when she pretends to smell something she doesn't like, her face a mask of exaggeration and giggles.

I took a drive by my house on my lunchbreak, knowing full well that both my baby girl and my wife would have been asleep for hours, and I could hardly see the house for the tears that filled my vision. Probably a good thing I wasn't sharing the road with anyone. I am aware of missing them all the time, but there are times when I miss them so much more its scary.

Anyway, if nothing else, all of this time travelling does remind me of that which is really important. Not that I really needed the reminder, but there are times when even the most important things can get lost in the daily grind. I guess it helps to take a little perspective and imagine looking back later and having missed out on anything, something I want to do as little as humanly possible.

Labels: books, everything else, trinity