Where has all the coffee gone?

Sometimes, when I look around me all I see is chaos and despair. Today is one of those days that I woke up to a puddle in front of the door because one dog couldn't make it until morning. There are dirty dishes in my sink, the coffee pot has done a runner in the middle of the night (seriously WTF) and the cat beat me to the keyboard. Then I look all around me and I see toys. EVERYWHERE, I see toys. There are clothes on the floor. There are book bags strewn around with their straps grabbing for my ankles to see if I can't fall on my ass. A can of soda that was spilled on my coffee table and left to dry in a sticky splendor.

I can't say that my house never looks like this when I'm here alone (well, minus the absence of caffeine brewing machinery and sticky soda) because it would be a lie. I can say that when I am here by myself, I am prepared to greet my shitastic first floor. It looks like it did when I went to bed the previous night. If I was too lazy to move a book bag off the stairs, at least I know it is there waiting for me in my sleepy stupor. If I decided to screw off and not do dishes, I know they will be there. It is frustrating and upsetting when I wake up to find that a tornado has torn through my home and nothing has been left in the place I last saw it. The shock combined with the reality sucks worse than the reality alone.

I went to bed last night a full hour after I was ready, and at least three hours before what my husband thinks is a normal bedtime. I was tired. I am tired. Having him home is driving me crazy. The children don't listen to me because Daddy is here. The schedule has been tossed out the window because my husband doesn't believe in them. Every single thing that I take comfort from is history right now (the coffee pot is the kicker) and I am having a really hard time not resenting it.

I should be more flexible. More understanding perhaps. In truth...I'm just pissed. He will leave again on Saturday, and it will be my burden to bear alone that the children no longer recognize bedtime. I will have to make them and myself miserable to get back on a schedule. It will be my job to put away all the toys that Daddy kept saying, "they don't have to do it right now..." I am longing for Saturday and dreading it all at the same time.

What a strange and miserable place we are in. My husband is frustrated because the children won't leave him alone, so he can't work in the evenings. I am frustrated because he is like the block that didn't quite fit right and sent the tower tumbling. When we are able, will we ever be able to come back from this place we are in? Will it ever again feel like we are working together in harmony, or are we just going to drift further and farther apart?

This post is awfully pessimistic. I guess that is what happens when I wake up to hours worth of work and no coffee. Throw in an 11 year old with a crappy attitude and you have a perfect recipe for gloom and doom.