Hestia hates...Tartarus's job

Yeah - but you're all divorced drunks

It was around my birthday earlier this month when I got the telephone call from Tartarus:  'They need me to work another week out here.  Is that a problem?  BTW - happy birthday.'

At the time, it wasn't a problem. Indeed, I need a lead in of about a fortnight to get the house suitably tidy for him coming him coming home from sea and with all the work flooding in for websites, I was secretly glad to have a bonus seven days at my disposal to get the hoover out to suck up the dust wildebeest from the darkest corners of my home.

But working an extra week has its complications: Sonshine has another seven days without his dad.



I broke the news and he was not a happy camper.  Cue much stomping of feet and 'preenage' sighing (that's what I'm calling him - a preenager).  But it was just disappointment that was making him feel like that. He'll get over it, I found myself thinking.

Just disappointment.  He'll get over it

That brought me up short; I have spent my whole life coping with similar 'just disappointments' due to Tartarus's working life.

Want to get married in December? With the Watchnight Service as a precursor to your actual wedding ceremony?  Want to get married in a white cloak? With a fake fur muffler?  Suuuuuure you can. As long as you don't want to marry Tartarus, because he's already married to the merchant navy.

My Christmas wedding had to become a February wedding.  Who the hell wants to get married in February?  Still, the hotel was happy as there isn't much in the way of good celebrations in the middle of winter.

After we got married, the deal was that he would change company - at least change the type contract that he was on so that he was no longer away for six months at a time.  But as the youngest Chief Engineer in his company, he found it very hard to let go of his new power.

And so the six month trips continued.

I suddenly found myself in a twilight world, without sexy vampires, but equally invisible - a married woman with no husband.  How did that work out at parties? Badly.  How did it work out when out on the town with my single girlfriends? Badly.  What happened if I met a nice bloke when I was out with my girlfriends? I was, as Juno (my mother) memorably called it, neither fish nor fowl.  Not part of a couple, but not single either.  It was grim.  So I sat in for months on end and waited.....

And when he came home?

All he wanted to do was go out and party with his friends.

And so our relationship spun apart.

Years later, when we had restarted dating, I promised him that I would NEVER sit around waiting for him to come home again.  We only have one life and I was not going to waste mine.

And yet, here I am, telling our son to get over exactly the same sort of disappointment with his father.

I realise that I am waiting around again.  Back down the list of priorities.  Only this time it affects our son.

I am not a happy camper either.