in a couple of hours, i’ll be picking jan up from kindergarten, after an overnight stay. yep, all kids, plus 6 “teachers” spent the night together in kiga. it’s like a sleepover, a rehearsal for a 3-day/2-night camp in summer. we brought jan last evening at 6, together with his sleeping paraphernalia, and he could hardly wait for the night to begin. pizza for dinner, popcorn-and-video afterwards, and he gets to sleep beside two of his favorite friends, and his favorite teacher. i wonder if he missed us at all.
well, with jan away, hubby and i of course took advantage and we went on a date to a tapas place, followed by cocktails. our last date was… let me see… well, surprise surprise… when jan was in summer camp last year. we always tell ourselves we should do this more often, get a babysitter and go out- just the two of us- for dinner. perhaps once a month or at least a quarter. but somehow, we never got round to actually doing it. which is probably what makes events like last night’s really great. given all the major events happening in our lives the last few months, and especially the last couple of weeks, it was really good to have had the chance to chat uninterruptedly and enjoy a good meal over several hours.
it’ll probably sound strange, but i realized how much i miss my husband. weird, considering we live under the same roof, sleep on the same bed, and except for occasional aberrations, see each other everyday. but i guess, unless you make pointed efforts, being a parent puts being a spouse on a lower hierarchy of roles. not universal truth, definitely, but at least that what seems to be happening to us. we became parents first, spouse to each other next. family time was not wife-husband time. it was parents-child time. the spotlight was on jan, and our husband-wife relationship somehow got brushed aside. to a weaker marriage, it would probably have been detrimental, but fortunately, ours seems to be relatively unscathed.
but times like last evening gives me another glimpse of that man, that kind of relationship i had with him before jan was born. it’s not like the man or the relationship changed. they’re still there, still basically the same, just burrowed under the other roles, tasks and chores we have to attend to on a daily basis. and on days like yesterday’s, they resurface, and reminds me what a hidden treasure i’ve got.
