So Halloween turned out to not be so sad after all. First, there was the Haunted House on Friday night, which was a huge hit. Jack didn't get home until almost ten, at which point he had to tell me all about it for another hour. He said he felt a little bad because he had made three girls cry.

"I wasn't even trying to scare them, they just looked at me and started bawling. And I was all, like, it's ok! Don't cry! I'm just a kid, see?"

Then, come Sunday night, imagine:  he wanted to go trick or treating. I should have known. Three hours of virtually unsupervised collection and consumption of free candy.  Hmmm. Who in his right mind wouldn't want to go?  Fortunately, his buddies agreed, and off they went, for a night of reckless abandon.  I'm so grateful for one more year of this, since I'm perfectly, painfully aware that in about four three two years from now, reckless abandon will mean something completely different.

For now, he's still just a kid.

I went back to work a couple of weeks ago, and even though my job is supposed to be part time, during the school day, I have been covering a full time shift for the first few weeks. I don't mind it; there's a little extra money I wasn't counting on for the holidays, and I'm learning my job in half the time, I guess.  But I don't get home until 7:00 or later some nights, and our household routine  is a little out of whack.  Ok, a lot out of whack.  Jack hates it.  Someone else brings him home from wrestling every night and sometimes, even at 5:15, there's still no one home. Don't get me wrong - he's no different from any other pre-teen boy when it comes to being home alone. He's all about that.  He just doesn't like to come home to an empty house. And he told me so.

I'm also going to miss his first two wrestling matches, which wouldn't be such a big deal, if wrestling, like baseball, were something he'd been doing for years. But it's not; this is his first shot at a new sport and I'm going to miss it twice.  Not to mention the two more matches John and I will both miss when we're in Hawaii at the end of the month.  Ouch.

The thing is, I've been kind of a grouchy mom since I started working again, and I think that's what's really bothering him.  I'm not exactly laid back normally, but I'm sure I'm a lot less stressed out and tired than I have been the past two weeks.  I know he feels it.  I mean, I know everyone in my house feels it. I haven't made a very smooth transition back to Mom Who Works Outside the Home.  Tonight, I got upset with him because I was having a party with all my girlfriends - something I'd planned months ago - and he wanted to stay up late since the house was full of people.  John had gone to a friend's house so there I was, trying to negotiate, but ended up getting all grumpy instead.  Now it's 3:30 in the morning and I can't sleep because I feel terrible about the way he went to bed.

Without me.

Mad at me.

I went into his room just now and recovered him with his blankets.  He's taller than I am,  and takes up pretty much that whole double bed, but I know I won't sleep until I tuck my kid in.