Now that I’ve been accepted into the doctoral program (yay!), and I’ve started planning out, oh, the next 5 years of my life, I’m feeling a bit bemused. I was giving myself a pep talk in the car on the way to get the kids yesterday, and made the mistake of saying, “When you finish the program in 5 years (that’s my estimate), Kerem will be…8 YEARS OLD!?” I almost drove off the road. How will I possibly have an 8 year old boy in only 5 years?
This train of thought was supposed to be reaffirmation that I was in the perfect place and time to go back to school–after the kids are born, so there’s no breast-feeding, waking up at night, weekly doctors visits, pregnancy exhaustion, etc. to worry about. That phase is over. But it’s before the kids are into soccer and music and sleepovers and summer camps and all those “big kid” things–so although Kerem’s just started school, it’s school “light,” with minimal scheduling required from me except making sure he has a lunch every day. All this is supposed to be a sign that this is the best, PERFECT time in my life to be going back to school.
That is, until I start thinking about how many classes I need to take, and how many nights I won’t be home for dinner and/or bedtime (probably twice a week) and multiply that by how long I’ll be in school (12 semesters x 15 weeks x 2 nights a week = 360) and figure out that it’s a whole year of nights that I won’t be home!
And then it’s time to rush home to my babies and enjoy the nights that I DO have with them!
