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i love my parents. really. really, i do; i'm among the only adults i know who has a good solid healthy relationship with both parents (with, in fact, all family members i know by name). but lately -- on this visit, in fact, which has been in effect since friday evening -- i'm realizing that i like going home to visit them a lot better than i like when they come to visit me. and this evening it hit me (some time between when i realized my mother was something like disappointed and when i found myself unable not to weep just a little at the dinner table) why that is:
i hate feeling like i can't do things by myself.
this is not to say that i actually can't do things by myself. i can't do it all by myself, but who amongst us can; however, my mother came down to help me pack up my old place; my brother and FSIL came down to help me move, along with several of my friends (who didn't have to come from six states away to do it); and my parents are here to, besides visit me, help me get settled in. along with, i still don't have a job, so until someone hires me i'm funded almost entirely by the Bank of Mom and Dad.
and it turns out my mother was really counting on, by the end of the weekend, the three of us having unpacked and put away and hung up and etc. everything in the new place. and the idea that i'd rather get stuff done that i really can't do alone -- hanging stuff that has to be level, but which requires power tools, for instance; i only have two hands -- and maybe handle some of the rest, but whatever, because it was more important to hang out and after all i didn't, like, hire my family to come work for me, was borderline upsetting to her. which, okay, she finds it fun to take a place that's in a considerable state of disarray and make it all tidy and livable.
but: i was feeling pretty good about the level of settling-in i had done by myself. i was pretty jazzed about how little help it felt like i needed, once the packing and truck-loading and truck-unloading was done. and it's not anybody's intention to make me feel like i can't do things by myself; but the instinct to give me a hand, whether i want it or not, rings (i now realize) a bell in my subconscious that sounds like it's a good thing you have people to help you out, because on your own, you can't hack it.
the fact that this bell has harmonic tones of you are jobless and single, and will probably be so forever is also not helpful.
granted: graduating is stressful. moving is stressful. not sleeping more than about three hours a night for five days running is stressful. the fourth week of a girl's hormonal cycle is stressful. so that's four grains of salt, right there -- but that doesn't drown out the chime.
in short, i adore them, but i'm always glad when they leave and i get to remind myself that i can, so, live alone.
i hate feeling like i can't do things by myself.
this is not to say that i actually can't do things by myself. i can't do it all by myself, but who amongst us can; however, my mother came down to help me pack up my old place; my brother and FSIL came down to help me move, along with several of my friends (who didn't have to come from six states away to do it); and my parents are here to, besides visit me, help me get settled in. along with, i still don't have a job, so until someone hires me i'm funded almost entirely by the Bank of Mom and Dad.
and it turns out my mother was really counting on, by the end of the weekend, the three of us having unpacked and put away and hung up and etc. everything in the new place. and the idea that i'd rather get stuff done that i really can't do alone -- hanging stuff that has to be level, but which requires power tools, for instance; i only have two hands -- and maybe handle some of the rest, but whatever, because it was more important to hang out and after all i didn't, like, hire my family to come work for me, was borderline upsetting to her. which, okay, she finds it fun to take a place that's in a considerable state of disarray and make it all tidy and livable.
but: i was feeling pretty good about the level of settling-in i had done by myself. i was pretty jazzed about how little help it felt like i needed, once the packing and truck-loading and truck-unloading was done. and it's not anybody's intention to make me feel like i can't do things by myself; but the instinct to give me a hand, whether i want it or not, rings (i now realize) a bell in my subconscious that sounds like it's a good thing you have people to help you out, because on your own, you can't hack it.
the fact that this bell has harmonic tones of you are jobless and single, and will probably be so forever is also not helpful.
granted: graduating is stressful. moving is stressful. not sleeping more than about three hours a night for five days running is stressful. the fourth week of a girl's hormonal cycle is stressful. so that's four grains of salt, right there -- but that doesn't drown out the chime.
in short, i adore them, but i'm always glad when they leave and i get to remind myself that i can, so, live alone.
