Part Forty-Three: Career Advice from My Kids
“How’s your exercise program going?”
“About as well as my ‘no wine during the week’ program,” I reply, pouring myself another glass of Pinot noir, curling into my favorite corner of the couch, and raising a toast to Mr. Rugby snuggled in across from me. “Thank you for asking.”
The TV’s cued up to play Austin Powers: The Spy who Shagged Me, and we’re just waiting for Mr. Happy to wander out of his room and join us. Can’t have family movie night with a member of the family missing, right?
“What happened? You were exercising every morning.”
It’s difficult to explain my lack of exercise – and energy to exercise – to Mr. Rugby. He eats right. Hits the gym every morning after breakfast. Goes to work, and then hits the pool when he gets home. I’ve never seen abs like his. Or biceps. Or triceps. Or, well, you get the picture.
I recall being just like him. Not ever with those abs, but being in great shape. When I was younger and had all the energy and discipline in the world. Now, it just feels like another job.
And I don’t want another job.
I have two that pay me and suck me dry. A third – everything related to Mr. Happy – which I do pro bono and pay through the ears and, all of a sudden, this. This newsletter. Writing this is my favorite job. And if I’m awake at four or five in the morning, and I have a choice between pumping iron and pumping out words, I’m going with words every time.
“I had to make a choice,” I reply to Mr. Rugby as Mr. Happy finally makes his appearance, plopping into the LaZBoy next to the couch with a cat on his chest. “It was Life On The Inside, or fight fat that’s showing on the outside.”
“So you went with the book,” he says, giving me the side eye. “What about your closet full of clothes at home?”
“For starters, it’s not a book. It’s a newsletter,” I reply, giving him what I hope is a side eye but since I’m seeing double it’s more like crossed eyes which might mean I need an eye doctor or a little less Pinot noir.
Eye doctor. Definitely.
“And secondly, I’ll deal with my clothes when I get home. I have a plan.”
He rolls his eyes and clicks the remote. Mike Myers as Austin Powers fills the screen. No one cares about my plan which is fine as it’s barely formulated and I haven’t run it past Rob yet so it’s better I don’t share it.
Until intermission.
Mr. Rugby needs ice cream, Mr. Happy wants popcorn, and my glass has gotten a little “lite,” as they say, whoever they are, so we pause Mr. Powers and go to the kitchen. We’re talking about the movie but really, we’re talking about our memory of the movie. Of the time when they were little, and we were at Lake Winnipesaukee and it rained nonstop for four days of our seven day “vacation” – a delightful week during which I cooked and washed dishes and did laundry and made them shower or at least hose off before going to bed and picked up that damn dark cabin every night before I could go to bed – when we watched all three Austin Powers films back to back.
Oh ha ha. All that sex and barely masked innuendo. Shared with our sons who were 12 and five at the time.
What were we thinking? I have no idea, but it crosses my mind that Stu’s probably saved a seat for me in Hell and I hope, for his sake, there’s Budweiser.
Banishing the bad parenting and the I could still kill him for that cabin thoughts from my mind, I take my glass and am headed to the sofa when Mr. Rugby suddenly remembers what I’d hoped he’d forget.
“So what’s your plan?”
Dammit.
I whirl around, a little of my precious Pinot splashing me in the face.
“Plan? What plan?”
“Yeah mom,” says Mr. Happy, pulling the bag of popcorn open and wincing at the steam. “You said you had a plan for when you go home.”
Fuck elephants. It’s my kids who never forget.
“My plan’s not really ready for prime time,” I start.
“Which means you haven’t told Rob,” Mr. Happy adds.
“Because it involves quitting one of your soul sucking jobs,” says Mr. Rugby, drowning a bowl of ice cream the size of a bird bath in an ocean of chocolate syrup, “right? Which you should because all those people suck.”
And they’re off, like I’m not even in the room.
Mr. Happy: She told you about the real estate page?
Mr. Rugby: The real estate page. The landing page. The newsletters she should write in her ‘spare’ time. The six zillion emails they need by noon.
Mr. Happy: That they don’t look at for a week!
Mr. Rugby: They call her constantly. Bitching. Moaning. Demanding. ‘Can you write this?’ ‘I need a new headline.’ ‘Such and such is coming down the pipeline.’ How do you not beat your laptop with a bat, mom?
Who me? I’m back in the conversation?
I sip my wine and reach for the remote. They’re both back in their respective spots. Cat too.
“Work sucks and then you die, guys. So let’s watch the movie, ok?”
I hit play. Austin Power reappears. They don’t make another peep about my plan.
But I do like theirs.
Thank you for taking this long, strange trip with me. I appreciate you and your many comments and emails. If you’d like to read parts 1-42, you can do so here.