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Friday, June 30, 2017

Choice and accountability

This evening, after I had all the kids in bed, I sat down for my traditional "dark lunch" (six (small) square meals a day, baby), and Andrew actually sat down at the table with me (!) to have his second quasi-meal of the day.

"Ahhh," he sighed as he stuffed a big bite of quesadilla (totally gourmet meal) in his mouth. "A hot meal with a little flavour to it."

I must've given him a funny face because he got a little defensive and said, "Hey, I've been living off of, like, oatmeal on campus. I was in such a groove today that I didn't even cook it."

"What?! Why?! You know that stuff takes, like, a minute to make..."

"Not when you have to get up and walk from your office to the kitchen," he pointed out. "I was just in a really good place in my writing but I was also hungry so I just opened the packet and sprinkled it in my mouth."

I grimaced at him.

"It was kind of gross," he admitted.

"That's it," I said. "I'm never getting a PhD."

"Yeah, don't," he said. "PhDs are the worst."

You'd think this might stir up some empathy within me and encourage me to, like, pack him a lunch or something domestic like that. But, you'd think wrong.

I'm pulling off three meals a day for five people at home (plus, I'm trying to eat for two), so he can pack his own lunch. He's a smart man, he'll be fine. Plus, there's plenty around the house ready to grab: granola bars, yogurt, fruit, nuts.

Sometimes suffering is a choice.

Like when you choose to eat a raw oatmeal packet.

Or when you choose to pursue a PhD. 

1 comment:

  1. Yes a granola bar, pick the granola bar. Now that Jason has a cafeteria at his job that he can eat at for free and this is the more important part really (his NPs insist they go grab lunch so they get it to go and eat while working) he has gained 10 pounds. There was always lunch food here and our kids manage to fill a sack every week day and be fine but J choose to sleep those extra 30 seconds and that is on him 😂

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