Should I Feel Bad?

Jock is off to a friend's house for the night.

The Bug is out (somewhere around the block, I'm sure) playing with friends.

Coach is currently under his truck trying to fix the *bleeping* thing.

And me.... I sit here in my comfy clothes, doing absolutely nothing. In my defense, I DID do the dishes. And I gathered the laundry. I even looked in the freezer to see what might inspire me for dinner. (Have you ever looked in there, only to hear a chorus of "ME! ME! COOK ME TONIGHT!" from various corners of the forbidden ice land? No? Its just me? Ok then... moving on....) But, and this is where the guilt is trying to sneak in, that is the point where I. Simply. Stopped. Grabbed a bottle of water (which, on a side note, does absolutely nothing to alleviate the feeling of camping out in the backyard of Hell this time of year in Arizona). And sat my (apparently underachieving) self in front of my computer to play with my new blog.

Does the guilt come from the fact that Jock and The Bug are out at friends, when maybe I could be doing some fantastically wonderful parenting thing with them? No. We spent all morning doing football things with them, so I feel we've covered the bonding thing for the day.

Does it come from my not heeding the cry of the dirty socks? Nope. We have pretty laid back laundry in this house. Every piece has reassured me it can wait until tomorrow, if that's my inclination.

No..... what I'm trying not to feel guilty about is leaving Coach out there all by his lonesome, with no one to fetch his tools (and naturally a beer or two!) for him. Not only am I leaving him alone out there, I suspect I'm actually trying to hide from him. See, I'm the parent who let both boys go off with friends, letting them out of "little helper" duty. Did it occur to me at the time that maybe they would be needed here? Nope. Didn't cross my mind at all. (Actually, I think that might have been the moment when I turned around and thought "Oh no... let them go be kids and enjoy some time spent with friends." What was I thinking?!?) You realize that I didn't even start to think I should feel bad until I went out to talk to the food in my freezer and Coach asked me to get him something. That's when it occurred to me that I'd left him with no helper. Except me. And really, folks.... I'd rather do the laundry.

I just hope the stupid truck doesn't fall off the jack on him while I'm in here hiding.