Retired From Life

 "Wake up Logan." My wife tells me 

I'm laying on the floor resting.

I got home "early" by which I mean on time as I work in an industry which is known for it's overtime.

"Does she really need to go to Jiu-Jitsu today?"

"IF YOU DON'T WANT TO TAKE HER JUST TELL ME!" she says in a raised voice.

Perhaps I should have discussed the subject of this blog post with her earlier: "Is it a bridge too far to ask my mother to take her to a half hour Jiu-Jitsu class four times a week?"

A little context may be in order:

My day starts at 5:00 AM when I groggily wake up after 6-7 hours of sleep where I always wake up four hours after sleep.

My day ends between 9:00 to 10:00 pm when I put my daughter to bed.

During the day the only personal time I can manage is during the drive to work and the drive home when my eyes and hands are occupied with the operation of a 3,500 pound vehicle on a two-lane road with drivers who routinely swerve past the center line and I once saw two bad accidents in the course of my round trip to and from work. This personal time is not an optimal time to say, write a blog post, take a master class or exercise one's abdominals.

The other personal time is when I am forced by the digestive process to take a dump whereupon I can peruse articles by Theodore Dalrymple or critiques of Athenian democracy.

When the day goes long at work it's not uncommon for me to have been gone twelve hours.

The point is that my mom sees it as some huge responsibility and burden to drive my daughter to and from school once a day and take her to and from Jui Jitsu four days a week. 

Today she didn't even pick her up from school.

My mother moved down here when she retired six months early after learning of my wife's illness so that she could "help out." In what way she helps out is unclear to me besides occasionally looking after our daughter on a couple of occasions that I could count on one hand.

My daughter goes to an all-day day-care and the drive to and from said day care probably consists of a thirty to forty minute (max) round trip.

If I get home "early" around 4 PM and still nasty and dirty from work in my uniform and my mother is out I've literally had her ask me "So... Umm are you or Leila taking Shaniqua to Jiu-Jitsu?" In this roundabout way of saying: "I don't want to go, can you take her?" 

It's this way of guilting me into doing it and I have never had the balls to confront her and say "DUDE. I've been at work all day and pay the bills. You said you moved down and and moved in to help out. Taking Shaniqua to Jiu-Jitsu is helping out." 

So add another family member to the list of those who have retired from life.  Boomers really have absolved themselves of any responsibility for anything because "I had to work for a living" they say as if the rest of us haven't had to or don't currently do so. 

People like my mom can't see the big picture. They can't understand what an hour a day means to a guy that has zero time to do anything without cutting into sleep. When I'm home with my daughter I do the best I can to talk, play, sing and interact with her; not park her in front of the TV. 

I guess I'm thankful that I see the wreck that my mother is and the symptom it is of a self-centered "me" society compared to the ones I see from overseas which sacrifice comfort see their family members as an extension of themselves.