Focus

When I went home to visit, I swore that I wouldn’t want to come back. 

After all, I had been so incredibly homesick that I was sure I’d be so happy to be home that I would start plotting my return. But, by day three, I missed my littles & my love & even my cat. I texted my boss saying I was excited to come back to work. I was working on an article. I was ready to go back to “real life,” while also trying to stuff my best friend in a suitcase.  

 

It definitely wasn’t because I wasn’t having fun. I was having a blast! My friends & I had the best time. There were drinks (including my boyfriend buying me a drink from two time zones away, because he’s adorable), Cards Against Humanity, bad movies & great conversation. But, with the exception of my old gym, where I felt right back at home, I realized that life moves on when you do & my place is in Cow Province. 

 

 
My best friend is planning her own cross country venture. My other girlfriend is running a business with her husband. Everyone has their lives now & we’re settling into them. And me? My life is here, with my littles & my writing & (at the risk of scaring myself back into my groundhog hole & him away) my love. I’m stealing his words to explain how I feel about my life, I hope I don’t get sued for plagiarism. One night, I asked him to find more time for me, then promptly apologized because I am me & he is busy & works so hard. I told him I didn’t want him to take away from his actual life for me, to which he told me that his daughter & I are his “actual life,” and as long as he has us, that’s what matters. Visiting is fun, but I want to live my actual life with my daughters & my writing & with him because that’s the life that matters. 

I like my job. I make good money & my team is super rad. The Federal Election jaded me on my profession quite a bit, with their political bias, so I could be content freelancing for magazines while I work full time…for now. I still apply, but I could be content having the best of both worlds like Hannah Montana did back in the day. My girls are such awesome tiny people & I feel like I’m setting a good example. It’s not perfect, but it is my actual life & it’s pretty rad.  

 
But the best part of being home was talking to my friends about their lives. My best friend is so excited about her potential opportunity. She’d have a new position & better earning potential & she’d be really happy. My other close girlfriend & her husband are so deeply in love & it’s so awesome. My other girlfriend is helping her family find a new office for her family law firm. My former coworker & his girlfriend just bought a house together. My old coaches are thriving in their personal and professional lives. I believe the best part of life is watching others succeed & seeing so many of my friends thriving in their lives warms my heart. Keep on kicking ass my dearest friends, even if I didn’t get to see you. I love that you’re all living life & killing it. I loved catching up with all of you. 

And for me, it was a nice break from the stress of balancing motherhood, working two jobs, a personal life & sanity. My kids were safely in the care of the person that I trust most in this world. I got to enjoy much needed grownup time with all of my most favourite people. But when it was over, it was nice to cuddle up with the person I love most in the world & prattle away about my vacay (while half asleep) as we drove home…

…back to my awesomely awesome “actual life.”