The Plan has revealed an interesting facet of my personality, and an interesting dynamic of my marriage. I'm sure you've heard the adage, "What's good for the goose is good for the gander." Usually those old cliches are spot on. In my case, I preach about the goose and the gander getting equal treatment, but I tend to practice "What's good for the goose is good for the goose and the gander can do whatever she wants because she birthed the goose his gosling." (Ignore the gender inaccuracies in that sentence. It's my cliche and I can do what I want.)
So I've been really on D's case about holding up his end of The Plan. I don't think I'm a super-nagging wife. (D, if you're reading this, stop laughing.) I do harp on some things, but I find that most issues are not worth the hassle. However, The Plan directly impacts every piece of my life. If D doesn't do his half of The Plan, that means I have to do his half of The Plan. Which means I'm doing all of The Plan. And people, I do not have the time to do all of The Plan. There is literally not enough time in my day for me to do all of The Plan.
And when I get home after a hellish day at work, I don't even want to do my half of The Plan. Then I go through a battle with myself over whether I should do my one hour for the day or just crash on the couch. And here's the interesting thing about myself/my marriage: the only thing that gets my mushy tushy off that couch and into my allotted zone for the day is knowing that I had a heated discussion with D about making sure he did his hour for the day. There's no way I could stomach the massive helping of humble pie I'd have to eat if I didn't do my zone. How immature is it that the only thing that is keeping me on The Plan is the deep-seated desire to not be wrong?
And while I'm somewhat on the topic, I need to address what a serious pain packing is. It's never a simple matter of "oh here's this thing that goes into this box over there." Since we're in a somewhat unique situation, every item we own has to go through a rigorous interview process, which goes something like this:
Item: Here I am. Where should I go?
Me: Hmmm. Well, do I use you daily?
Item: No, but I've got sentimental value.
Me: You've got a point there. Since you're so sentimental that I haven't seen you in months, should I bring you to my parents' house or store you?
Item: Well, whatever you do, don't throw me away.
Me: Ohhh, now there's an idea....
Item: NO! NO PLEASE! I'M FROM THAT TRIP THAT YOU TOOK 10 YEARS AGO THAT YOU DON'T EVEN REMEMBER! I'M SENTIMENTAL!
Me: (Wavers slightly, then throws away.)
Try having this conversation with everything you have in your posession. (But don't really have a conversation with it, because then you'll be crazy like me.)
It hasn't been super hard with the basement. I've successfully thrown away many things I didn't even know I had. It's much harder in places like the kitchen. See, we are still actually living at our house. We still use plates and cups and silverware and pots and pans. And it's making me totally bonkers because I know I'm going to be just throwing all those things into boxes all willy-nilly at the last minute since I'm too afraid of packing something we'll need in the next couple of weeks.
And it has to be mentioned that I've developed an acute case of ADD since this process has started. Every time I do one thing, I'm bombarded with a deluge of other things I need to do or think about. Everything is a domino effect.
I need to pack up the kitchen = I need to pack up the spices = I should do something about the food = How am I going to transport all our food to my parents' house w/o all the cold items getting spoiled = I could borrow a bunch of coolers and fill them with ice and pack all our cold items = I don't want to do that, it's just a 10 minute ride, they should be fine = But wait, will my parents have enough room for our cold goods? = Crap, we have to find some way to transport our garage fridge to my parents w/o laying it on its side and leaking fridge fluid (or whatever it's called) everywhere = We haven't even figured out how we're going to work the food situation over there yet = Maybe we could label our food = That's a huge pain, I don't want to do that = SYSTEM OVERLOAD.
That is a typical train of thought for me these days. Anxiety compounds with anxiety until I feel so exhausted that I just want to trade lives with someone. I actually said that to D in all seriousness yesterday. "You know, I bet someone could make a lot of money by just going around and trading lives with people for short periods of time. I would hire them to just come in, get me through the next week by doing everything for me and I'd go off some place and
I would literally pay someone to do that. Except I know that I definitely couldn't afford to pay someone enough money to make it worth their time to come into my life and live it for me at this point.
And here I am, doing it for free. Who negotiated this contract, anyway?
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