At home with the child – Day three

In the past 30 years of my life, I've learned that when you're under a lot of pressure, when you face difficulties, you shouldn't get scared and give up, or look for loopholes to make things easier. Instead, you need to step up and put even more effort into it. 

Yesterday, I wrote that going out with the child wasn't just a bad experience, it completely broke my "oh, it's so nice" momentum of being at home with the child. Yesterday, I wrote that I most likely wouldn't go anywhere with the child in the coming weeks, and I thought so until this morning, then it occurred to me that I shouldn't be messed with. Especially not by my 1-year-old son, so I decided we'd go grocery shopping. But not just a quick trip to the corner store for a liter of milk, but a proper big grocery run.

I wrote about how tired I was yesterday and how good it would be if I could sleep it off, in which Ádám was, of course, a complete partner, as he woke up every hour during the night, so I managed things with a casual 3 hours of sleep, and that's how we started the shopping day. Tired, but wiser.

I'm writing "wiser" because I realized that until now, I wanted to do everything exactly as I saw Reni do it. I wanted to dress him that way, in that rhythm, putting those clothes on him. But this is a big mistake. Not because Reni doesn't do it well, but because it can be done much more simply, so I started to rationalize.

Yesterday, I struggled the most with the child's shoes; now I found him a slipper and put that on him.

It was on the child in moments, and that was the point when I felt again that these 30 days would work out. They will go the way I organize them, the way I shape them. 

I am taking care of the child now. 

I tire out the child in the morning, when he starts rubbing his eyes, he's already sleepy. That's when I feed him, and then he goes straight to sleep. While he sleeps, I prepare all his things, lay out his clothes, pack his bag, and when Ádi wakes up, everything is ready and we can leave. 

The quality of childcare is only a matter of organization. If I do it well and organize it, I'll make these 30 days significantly easier for myself, but if I do it poorly, I'll be whimpering in a corner by 3 PM.

We went to Tesco in Budaörs.

Usually, when Reni sends me shopping, she always hands me a ridiculously long list of what to buy, what brand, always open the egg cartons to check for broken eggs, and a few other completely unnecessary nonsense things for me, but I accepted that's how it is.

But not now.

I had a list with me again, and I was just about to pull it out, but then I stopped and told myself no. Screw the list. These 30 days are mine, I'm taking care of the child now, I'll buy him what I think is good. I put the list away and picked things off the shelves that I would give to Ádi. Of course, I still followed Reni's basic list of what the child can eat and what not, but now I wasn't on an expedition to find that specific brand.

As I was walking around, I suddenly felt good. I was just passing the cold cuts when I felt that my life was in order, I felt good, it was nice to be here with my son.

And you know what else I felt? 

That I was a damn man. I felt this whole situation, this life situation of being a father, incredibly masculine. I felt 10 times more masculine than when I was being cocky in the nightlife, and about 100 times more masculine than when I lived alone and was banging twenty-something little bitches.

I believe that being a good father is the most masculine thing. While shopping, in a playhouse, anywhere. And I think the same about women. For me, if a woman is a good mother, that is the essence of femininity in my eyes and the most she can achieve as a woman. This might not please some people now, but this is my subjective opinion, this is what I think. I thought this way before, and in light of the above, I think it even more now. 

 The shopping, by the way, was a complete success. Ádi fell asleep in the car on the way home without crying for a second, and if anyone knows Ádi, they know how rare that is.

We got home, I put him down to sleep, and here came a new feeling.

I'm bored.

I simply didn't know what to do with myself. Of course, there would have been things to do, but no matter what I thought I should do, only housework came to mind, which, to be honest, took away my will to live a little, so I did what turned out to be the best idea.

I invited my friends over for dinner. 

Well, I shouldn't have done that, because these friend-inviting dinners now that I'm practically running the household look quite different from how I remembered these gatherings.

I called Reni to say we had guests coming that evening. "How many?" she asked. I said 8. "That's good, and what will they eat?"

Damn it...

I've never cooked for guests in my life, but that's not the problem, the problem is that I can't, and even bigger problem, I didn't want to. I currently find it completely unimaginable to cook dinner for 8 people, and even more so for them to actually eat it, because it surely would have been terribly awful. I called the restaurant, asking if they could make dinner for 8 people. They could.

I won't bore anyone with the further details of the evening, let's just stick to the main point.

If you're running the household, you're the one who has to jump between the kitchen and the table all evening.

I don't understand why food that was packaged perfectly well to be eaten directly from the box needs to be put on a plate.

I don't understand why you can't drink soda from a wine glass; why do you need a separate glass for that? They're not the ones washing up afterwards, damn it. The same applies to the plates.

I'm hungry as an animal, just about to start eating, when the child tugs at my pants. Reni looks at me and says, "Feed him." I can't believe this, I say. And I start feeding the child with the soup I wanted to eat more than anything, all while everyone else around me is eating. Yes, Reni too.

Once the child was full, and when I could have finally started eating, I didn't, because the child had to be put to bed. Leaving the dinner table, bathing, preparing evening milk, putting to sleep.

By the time I got back, all the food was cold.

Every day has a worst part, and today, it arrived after 10 PM, when the guests left. I was about to sit down, exhausted, practically anywhere, when Reni gently reminded me that the table needed to be cleared and the kitchen needed to be tidied up. 

Now that was the worst part of the day, that you get up at 6 AM, you push until 10 PM, and when everything is over, the kitchen is a mess, but honestly, I didn't feel like stopping it. I tidied the table, but I completely neglected the kitchen as it was. I'll do it tomorrow, I say.

Yesterday I wrote I wasn't going anywhere. Then the next day I went anyway, but I'm writing this now to say I will really stick to it this time. For this one month, no one is setting foot in here, because I don't need this circus with the dishes, and the tidying up and all that.

And to summarize what's happened so far.

I still haven't done laundry.

I still haven't cleaned.

I still haven't cooked anything for Reni, or even for myself. Things like ironing, I won't even go into those, because I don't want to hear about them.

However, I'm doing everything I can for the child; he gets everything, is kept clean, always gets food, and I pay attention to his sleep. Dishwashing is also starting to work out, and it's not just about putting it in the machine and it's done. I just thought that was it, but it's not. You put it in the machine, even the arrangement is annoying, and then when everything is done, you have to put it away. When I lived alone, that's why I didn't have a single plate. I bought a hundred plastic plates, plastic cutlery, and paper cups at Aldi, and that was it.

Life was much simpler. I thought I'd play that card again now, but Reni would surely bury me in the garden. I might even bury myself if I have to iron here and change bedsheets.