Chapter 5: Regret

Well this last week has just flown by. Busy season has arrived at work, virus or no virus. Yet somehow they can’t quite find enough use for me to put me back to full-time like I was before maternity leave. Seems pretty skeevy to me, but whatever. They say it’s not related to the fact I went on maternity leave, but it’s awfully suspicious, don’t ya think? I’m trying to be okay with it; I keep reminding myself that the more time off work I have, the more time I have with the family. And I do really enjoy more time with the family. Unfortunately, the less time at work I spend, the less money I have to spend on family activities. It’s kind of a catch-22. I know you don’t have to spend lots of money in order to spend time with family, but it does make things more fun sometimes. I’m kind of running out of free and cheap activity ideas.

              Speaking of cheap, at least gas is still stupid cheap. I used my fuel points to fill up the car today (first time I’ve fueled up a car in over two weeks, and the last one I filled up was the van, not the car). Got my gas for 85 cents a gallon. Filled up to full from a quarter tank for less than $10. I don’t think I’ve ever seen gas that cheap in my life. Last time gas was that cheap was 1986, and even then it was actually a penny more, according to Google.

Ironically, the price matches the octane.

Seriously, when was the last time 

anyone saw that many gallons 

for that little money?!

              Back on the topic of activities. We haven’t done anything super exciting. We have gotten a lot of spring cleaning done. That makes me happy. In the process, we got my hope chest that I got from great-grandma cleaned off and I was able to open it up and reminisce on the contents. Inside, I found the bag of jewelry and earrings I inherited from my grandma when she passed away. I never have been much of a girly-girl, so I never really used the jewelry, and since I didn’t get my ears pierced until just a couple years ago, I never used any of the earrings either. However, I happen to have a daughter who is a very girly-girl, so I bestowed upon her the gift of the heirloom jewelry. She absolutely loved it, and is currently wearing some of the earrings. They look very nice on her and it’s really awesome seeing those earrings—which were some of Grandma’s favorites—being worn by her great-granddaughter. I think Grandma would approve.

              And on the topic of grandmas, and my great-grandma specifically, I sure do miss her. Well, I miss them both. But I’ve been thinking a lot about my great-grandma, maybe because a couple months ago marked the one-year anniversary of her death. But what I really can’t get out of my mind was how stupid I was for convincing myself we didn’t have time to go visit her last time we were in that area. We were right there, but because we were on a field trip I told myself we didn’t have time, we had to do xyz activity and log all this stuff for school. Honestly, what does any of that matter now? The museums are still there. The national parks are still there. My grandma is not. I don’t think I’ll ever forgive myself for that. I know I had no way of knowing she’d be gone in almost exactly three years from then, but that doesn’t matter. I should have known I didn’t have much time left with her. Even at that time she was nearly 97. And deep down, I knew she wasn’t immortal, but I guess I didn’t want to think about mortality. She’d survived three strokes and fully recovered, so why should I worry? Stupid way of thinking, I know. I regret it every day. I’m really sorry, Grandma.

              Anyway, enough on that depressing subject. Although I guess I don’t really have anything more to write about tonight. Maybe this coming week will be more eventful. As always, stay well, my friends.