The Silver Lining in Every Cloud

Things are almost back to normal at the Carver-Gunter household.  Eric is still on the mend and out on short-term disability, probably for at least 2 more weeks. Despite being in a bit of pain and having to make regular visits to his doctor, he’s enjoying his time off and has been catching up on his sleep and reintroducing himself to me (we had been seeing each other only about 10 minutes a day, if that, when he was working all of the mandatory overtime of late.)

The best news occurred on Monday of this week. Eric had interviewed for a “normal” day job at his plant several weeks ago. On Monday, he was called and offered the job. After we spent some time discussing the pros and cons of the position, he decided to accept the post. The downside? Less money, as this job has little overtime (which means fewer “boy toys” — electronics, in his case). The upside? Regular 7 AM – 3 PM M-F work schedule, no nights, no weekends, very little overtime, and all holidays off! Wow, it’s hard to remember the last time we actually celebrated Christmas on Christmas Day or ate Thanksgiving dinner on Thanksgiving.

It’s going to be quite an adjustment for us both. I’m so used to being a married single person (i.e. very little time spent with my spouse) that I’m not sure how to be a “normal” couple with Eric with the ability to have a good chunk of time to spend together at night or on the weekends. When we went out for celebratory pizza last night, Eric wanted to talk about expectations in this new phase of our relationship, specifically how much time I would let him devote to gaming. We established some guidelines agreeable to both of us, but the big relief now is that I don’t feel like Eric is being pulled in two directions when he has time off (spending time with me vs. seeing his gaming friends). That tug-of-war led to more disagreements than I care to recount, but it looks like it’s water under the bridge for now.