Alone again, naturally......

And so, my hubby's six weeks of leave are up again, too quickly.

Sonshine and I drove him to the ferry and we had a final hug in the carpark, Sonshine burrowing in at waist height, his small dark head hidden beneath his dad's jacket.

The next few days will be terrible. 
Sonshine will strop about the house whenever I ask him to do something small like putting his school shoes away.  I will send a letter up to school to remind his teacher that he will burst into tears at school for no good reason, other than he's missing his dad.

And I'll not be much better.  No one will leave a cup of tea for me on the corner of my computer desk every morning at 10.30am precisely (our time for smoko).  Toasted sandwiches will not magically materialise at 1pm. There will be no-one to share the parenting duties with when the demands for Wii action exceed the levels that I think are healthy.  I'll go back to thinking that a packet of jaffa cakes is an acceptable lunch.  No-one will run out into the garden at 1am dressed only in a flowery towelling dressing gown  to close the polytunnel doors because I forgot.  There will be no-one to heat up my side of the bed for me while I'm doing my late night tweeting......

Instead, Sonshine and I will spend our evenings eating sugar-dusted  jammy doughnuts in front of The Simpsons, wishing our very own Homer was back with us.

But we both know that if we can just hang in there together, in a week's time, we'll be back in our little groove of two.

I'll move the small table back into the kitchen so that Sonshine and I can chat while he helps me make dinner.

We'll eat odd meals of left-overs from the fridge.

We'll mime along to records in the morning before Sonshine leaves for school.

I will be compelled to learn about the newest Bakugan figures and the latest releases from Lego.

We'll hand feed the baby crows that flutter round the garden like noisy bin bags and protect them from marauding cats with our Super Duper Super Soaker guns.

We'll go for long walks in the park to discuss life, the universe and the mysteries of the seven times table.

My lovely friends will lend me their husbands to take on Surrogate Dad duties.  M  for fishing, sailing and explaining the wonders of the natural world, R for expeditions around the island's farms and wrestling matches.

My girlfriends will make sure that I'm not left to sink into the quicksand that lurks inside my own head.

And just when I'm getting the hang of living alone, Willie will come home again and the delicate dance of role renegotiation will begin all over again