Tomorrow I leave for my getaway to Miami and I have managed to get myself to a place of equal parts excitement and worry, which, all things considered, ain't half bad. I cannot wait to soak up the warm weather and rest, read and relax...and maybe do a little writing as well. But the thought, the reality of being away from my family for three days is just plain sad. I know I am going to miss them terribly, but will be back in my role here as quickly as I left, and will regret it, terribly, if I don't make the most of every second I have away to catch my breath and recharge my Mommy-battery. I have never done this before and who knows when it will happen again. The chance, clearly, doesn't come around that often.

So today I make the phone list and the schedule, and get the suitcase packed. Tomorrow I will kiss my babies and hubby, and say farewell. The writing of those words, and the mental imagery they bring, gave me such a pit in my stomach. This is a fundamental difference between men and women. If it were Pete who was going, he'd go and probably wouldn't think about us for the entire time he was gone. Not because he's mean or doesn't love us...just because he knows that when you get time, you take it and run with it. Not me...I'm already thinking about when I'll call, having my cell phone charged so we can text freely throughout the day and finding him online on Facebook at night so we can chat. Who thinks this way? Someone filled with guilt for leaving? Someone afraid of being replaced by others who can clearly step in and do my job as well as, if not better than, me, and casting me in a light of being dispensable? These are the things I think of when I picture myself being away from here.

But, as Pete would say, I have been in the trenches for six and a half years. Not much in terms of breaks or time away. And let's face it...there's a reason that most employers build vacation time into your deal. Because all work and no play makes people go nuts. I have been close to losing my mind on several occasions during the last six years (only a fraction of which have been blogged about since I haven't been doing this for that long), and although I've had vacations with my whole family and have even taken my honeymoon (four years after the wedding) to St. Lucia, there's something different, and just as important, about taking time for yourself, with a friend or all alone.

I think what I feel the worst about is the fact that Pete needs a weekend like this as much, if not more, than I do. And I feel like a spoiled brat taking off when he doesn't know if/when he'll get the same time. Now, that's not to say that he won't have something planned and his bags packed by the time I get back. And honestly, I hope he does. We've been so entrenched in this family unit that we've each completely lost the identities of the two people who came into this thing whole. Naturally, we all lose pieces of ourselves when we marry and have children. That's what happens when you give your life to another (and others after that.) But there have literally been times when I know each of us has looked in the mirror and found an image staring back that is damn-near unrecognizable. Not that a weekend in Miami will restore a seventeen-year-old face and body, but maybe a little bit of that spirit. The person who really took life less seriously and enjoyed it a hell of a lot. The girl who took a bite out of life and saw each new day as a gift and knew that that's why it was called "the present." ;-)

So as I finish this post, writing about my stress has done what it always does...gotten me back to center. I do have high hopes for this weekend and my reservations are slipping away as I relax into the idea of relaxing...having no meals to cook, no beds to make, and no diapers to change. Of being able to wake up early, lace up my running shoes and jog along the beach in seventy degree temperatures as the sun rises over the Atlantic three days in a row. Of having time to talk and laugh with my best friend of nearly twenty years. Of sleeping uninterrupted sleep and eating uninterrupted meals. Of reading one or two of the many books I've had on my shelf for years that have gone half-read or entirely unopened. Of going to the bathroom and feeling fairly confident that my BFF will not walk in on me and want me to zip up her princess dress-up costume.

Although, I haven't really consulted with her about what she's packing...