Welcome to Monday. This morning while my husband was eating the breakfast I cooked him, he asked what my plans were for the day. Just a casual question that might start a conversation if I had some unexpected answer or something I was planning that I’d forgotten to mention previously. I don’t.

It’s Monday so I’m grocery shopping, doing dishes, scooping litter boxes, finishing the laundry I started over the weekend, and mailing that utility bill he left for me on the counter. “The usual” I say. 

That’s it. That’s my life now and that’s part of what’s got me down. I’m not cut out to be a housewife. It’s boring and so very unfulfilling. But what can I do?

I had to quit my job because doing that and trying to manage this beast of a house was too much for me. I was failing at both. So I quit.

Then I failed at just being a housekeeper because toilets. Now we have a cleaning service that comes every two weeks. That’s glorious, I’ll admit. If my world was turned upside down tomorrow and I no longer had Jim to rely on, I’d have a hard time not having that. I’d be reworking my old budget to fit it in for sure.

Then again, I wouldn’t have this giant castle to clean. Nine toilets. Nope. I’d buy a tiny house in a quiet neighborhood with one toilet and probably go back to living very close to the way I was before I met Jim, but with more cats.

Whatever I would do, it would not include picking up a high stress job in healthcare IT. I wonder what else I could do? Something that would pay just enough. I wonder why this daydream I’m having right now feels very enticing? 

I have a wonderful life with a wonderful man and I never have to worry about finances or cleaning toilets ever again. What is wrong with me?

Continuing the breakfast conversation that we were having, while he eats and I scramble around the kitchen doing dishes and cleaning counters, he asks me to run a check over to our investment firm. 

“Sure thing,” I say. And I’m reminded of that essay I wrote about the day I had to go there to sign our 2020 taxes. I’m emotionally attached to that essay and it’s one of a very few I’ve worked on enough to feel confident enough about it to submit to a few places. It’s been rejected by everyone so far of course.

I say “of course” like it’s a foregone conclusion. Yeah, that’s what getting rejections 95% of the time does to a person. I’ve lost confidence in just about everything I’ve written in the last year, which is actually not much to start with. 

I held true to the notion that I could find the right home for all my writing IF the writing was solid. So when the rejections roll in, I jump to the conclusion that it’s the writing and not the place or the tastes of the people rejecting me. Still I keep trying different places like a glutton for punishment with an addiction to the process. 

Now that I have a maid and only have a few hours of chores every day, what else am I going to do with my time? The lit mag, meetups with people, exercise? That’s all great, but it’s just not enough some how.

Then I feel like I’m being spoiled and greedy. Then I feel like I’m a bad person for feeling like that. Good grief. 

In the good old days I might try to write a poem about the way that I’m feeling but damn I just don’t want to. Or I don’t have it in me. And that’s bothersome too. 

I used to write dozens of crappy poems and it made me feel better about whatever it was I was thinking and I didn’t care that they were crappy or I didn’t know that they were crappy so I guess that old saying is true. Ignorance is bliss.

Now I know too much, and some cockeyed notion about being a published author got cemented into my brain. Do I need that? Do I want that? Is it going to fulfill me in someway to see that book on a bookshelf somewhere, or the bookshelf in my closet? I guess I won’t know the answer to that until it happens. 

And when will that be? Five more months. That’s how long I have to wait until that book becomes a reality. Until I can hold a physical copy of it in my hot little hands. It’s already been a horribly long wait. 

Truth is, I’m done with the waiting. I’ve already turned my attention to the next thing. Getting my daily submission fix and feeding my obsession to have all my poems out in the world somewhere. And lately that’s escalated to pulling together another book (three actually). 

That’s right, I’ve re-tooled my full MFA manuscript AND compiled two additional chapbooks. I finished the shorter two books this weekend and feel satisfied enough with the result to send to publishers. The longer book will be done this week. Just in time for a few November deadlines AND my trip to Austin. 

After that, I’m going cold turkey with all of it. So help me, I swear to the Universe imma be DONE DONE. 

Then what? Who knows. The Universe only, I suppose. Maybe I’ll get a job stocking shelves at Target.

On that note, my time’s up today. The groceries aren’t going to get themselves. 😜

Peace and love, 

~Miss SugarCookie