Off To Work I Go

I will be heading back to work next week. It has been on my mind for the last few days, circling around in my head. I just had this feeling of anxiety over it that I couldn't quite place.

Until last night.

When it hit me like a brick wall with a spectacular show of waterworks.

I have worked at this company for four and a half years. Basically as long as I have been married.

I was there while Craig was in school, I was there when we bought our first home, I was there when we struggled through infertility. With the exception of the last year, it was where Craig picked me up from every day after work (meeting out on 'hooker corner' as he liked to call it), where he would occaisionally meet me for lunch (but only if he'd been in trouble for something), where he would make his hurried calls to me over his lunch hour just to say hi or to share a story about some client.

He would email me almost daily something ridiculous or hiliarious or just an update on our bank account status ("we are down to $30.12 in our account, Sally, quit spending our money!").

Every time I worked late, which was often, I would get the text message or email from him, "It's 5:15pm do you know where your Sally is?"

But next week when I go back, it will be just me. I am no longer married, I have no darling husband to pick me up and argue with me over who was late and who waited the longest. I will get no surprise emails or text messages telling me I am loved. When I stay late, I will take myself home, back to an empty house, with nothing but dirty dishes waiting for me.

At 5:15pm nobody will be wondering where their Sally is.

When I returned to work after the accident it was about surviving in a place for 8hrs a day where I was told my husband was dead. It was about sitting in that same spot, forcing myself to think about things other than police officers delivering bad news and bosses trying to keep me together long enough to get out the door.

Now when I go back it will be about continuing on alone.

Don't be surprised if you see me toting around some of Craig's emails to get me through the day.

Or leaving by 5:14pm.