In which this is really weird.

He’s gone for two weeks, and I have the place to myself. Off managing the integration of a satellite office for work. I can do whatever I want! Including nothing! I don’t even have to make dinner if I don’t want to! I can do absolutely NOTHING AT ALL if I like!

Except the dishes are dirty, there’s still a load of laundry left, the floor could really use sweeping, and the throw rugs haven’t been washed in most of a year. There are also a couple bags of recycle to take out, and the stovetop needs a scrubbing because it’s greasy and gathering dust and looks gross. I should clean all my random shit off the table and do a general tidy. Nothing’s been dusted in months, either.

In other words, there’s a list of chores to do like there always is, this is just another Monday like any other, but now I’m also feeling sad and lonely. He won’t be home at six. He won’t be around at all. It’s just me and the apartment.

There’s still snow on the ground, barely a quarter of the lawns are showing green, and there are no flowers. The trees are barely starting to bud.

I’m not on the schedule at work until Friday. (There’s a new checker in training on the liquor side, so I’m guessing that M. and T. are getting extra hours in the cheese shop to keep their F/T schedules? I dunno. All I know is that I have four days off in a row, which is pretty fucking great, really.)

Except I’m home alone, and there’s nowhere to go, nobody to see. I could go out for a $6 coffee, but I have espresso and dairy here, and I really should finish the whole milk before it has a chance to go off. I could take myself out for dinner on Lyndale or Eat Street later, but I have a couple slices of pizza to eat, plus Indian food from the other night, plus stuff for nachos, plus unused produce that’s almost a week old that needs to be thrown into the Instant Pot before it turns to sludge. (Wow. Not to mention some lentil soup in the fridge, and two or three soups in the freezer.) In short, I have a fuckton of food to eat. No need to go out and spend money.

I could walk over to the art supply store, but nobody needs stationery less than I do.

Could go to the bike shop, but have I really decided to buy a bike this year? I love the old Schwinn, but I didn’t ride it at all last year. I should just sell it on Craigslist. And my work commute is two blocks, and I’d have to find somewhere to park a bike while I’m working. It’s a liquor store on Lake street in front of a bus stop; I bet bikes get vandalized and stolen from there all the time. Better to just walk. Don’t need a bike for my work commute.

I don’t need a bike at all, technically. I mean, I want one. Rides to the lake or the global market are really lovely… during the three weeks each “spring” and “fall” when I’m willing to ride a bike around here.

There just aren’t enough days per year in that sweet spot between 45 and 75 degrees. I don’t mind a little rain, but fuck biking in mud and snow, and absolutely fuck biking in 80+ heat and humidity.

Today would actually be a good day for a ride! It’s 51F and heavily overcast, and while there is snow on the ground all the pavement’s clear, and the Greenway looked free of snow and ice when I walked over it yesterday. Buuuuuut my bike’s got two flats, is too tall for comfort, and where would I go? The park around the lakes is grey and ugly as fuck because THERE IS NO SPRING IN THIS GODFORSAKEN PART OF THE COUNTRY, and I don’t really ride for its own sake–I greatly prefer it as a method of getting somewhere.

(I’m actually surprised it’s in the 50’s out there; all the pedestrians on 28th are wearing parkas and hats, so I thought it was colder.)

Could go to a movie, but I have a fiber internet connection and streaming everything so putting on pants seems like a lot of effort.

Everyone I know is at work so there’s no one to chat with online. Notre-Dame de Paris en proie aux flammes, and my president is a tit.

I don’t want to fucking do laundry.

E. tells me that when her husband travels for work she gets drunk and has a cry the first night he’s gone; I thought that was weird until last night when I got home from work and S. was in Illinois for the rest of the month and I felt heavy-duty sadness and separation; I guess I’ve never been with anybody before I liked to have around more than I liked privacy and space. I was always relieved, before, when whoever I was living with fucked off for a few days or a couple weeks. I didn’t expect to feel so fucking sad.

I mean, S. leaves every closet, cupboard, and drawer he uses ajar, snores sometimes, and often sleeps in the very center of the damn bed, but that’s really the worst of him. (Well, that and his habit of saying he’s “going to order us food” and then having to read multiple menus and “think about it” for three hours first, until I’m starving and end up eating cheese straight out of the fridge.) It’s not unfair to say he’s a bit boring in some ways, but it’s also true that every time I walked into the other room last night and saw that it was empty and dark, I felt absolutely hollow. No hugs or smooches. No “I love you”s. I mean, we chatted online, but he’s not here.

We were apart a few nights last year when I went to DC to see Amma, but other than that we’ve never been apart more than the length of a workday since I got here, five years ago tomorrow. You get used to a person, don’t you.

Oh, and part of what made yesterday and today so melancholy is likely The Curse. This cycle was 44 days long, and I had nearly a week of PMS symptoms (irritability, bloating, cramps) before I finally started bleeding, so there’s a whole hormonal component affecting my emotional wisdom. (If you can help it, don’t start your period the day before your favorite person leaves town for half a month; it’ll make you weepy.)

So, what will I do? Likely fuck-all. I’ve made the bed and a latte. I’m online, at my desk. I’ll probably surf Twitter and stream shit I’m barely interested in watching until I get hungry enough to go nuke something; then it’ll be dark and because I slept badly last night and stayed in bed until mid-afternoon I won’t be able to go to bed early, so I’ll just keep sitting here feeling weird and alone and not even getting anything checked off my to-do list.

Odds are I’ll go get a cocktail or two, wearing a knit hat because my hair’s dirty and I won’t bother to wash it, then come home and fall asleep listening to 15-year-old music on my iPod next to a basket of dirty laundry.