It’s 7am. My husband is already up, sipping coffee and glued to this phone. He is not reading the news, checking the weather or visiting any kind of social media platform. He is looking at one thing…The Task List.
The Task List is his digital ‘to do’ list. This list is comprehensive and constantly being updated. Anything from washing the car to calling his Dad appears on this list. The mere mention of it sends my eyes rolling back into my head faster than a boring lecture from my mum.
I know it’s going to be a supremely awful day when the first words out of his mouth are ‘we are wasting time, we have so much to do!’. Granted, we do, but I have barely opened my eyes at this stage. All I am capable of doing right now is cradling a cup of tea. These precious few moments before our girl wakes up in the morning are to be savoured not shat on. It’s 7am – I have not wasted anything…yet.
8am and my husband is buzzing round the house, 3rd cup of coffee in hand. Bursting to get out and cut the grass, he paces himself by descaling the kettle – gripping! He then dons his wellington boots, safety goggles and gardening gloves and marches to the shed! The next hour is spent mowing the lawns, front and back, including trimming all edges and giving the weeds a spritz with Weedol.
In the meantime, I’m looking after our baby and preparing breakfasts. Feeding our daughter is not an easy task. She loves blowing raspberries at me, this way, she and I both get to wear her porridge. The day is really starting to run away from us and before long it’s after lunch. Despite the fact he has washed both cars and put stuff in the loft by this point, my husband is still tutting at his list.
I remember when we used to wake up late on Sunday morning, have a full English breakfast at the local pub and chill out. Now I have Go Go Gadget Flap and his digital check list and half chewed porridge flying at me – fun times! My husbands pace is picking up, there is no chat just the occasional draught as he struts by checking off another task. He had to install a new hard drive on my laptop, fix our Internet and build a flat pack wardrobe. He had his game face on. My offers to make food and drink were met with ‘there is just no time’. I have to ignore this because without food, he is a nightmare.
Now all the physical tasks have been completed he moves on to computer based ones. There is always an Amazon purchase to make, statements to look at and download. Calls to parents and friends are replaced with a quick ‘Hey, How’s it going?’ on WhatsApp. Doing the final scroll through his list, he jumps back up…”I need to cut my hair!. It’s hair cutting week!”. Be still my beating heart.
My husband finally stops about 8pm. He moves the tasks left over from today onto next week and takes a breath. I have been waiting all week for some time off from the baby and some time with my other half. Well today was apparently that. I had a great time!
As we both sit in the garden, drained and exhausted, we are definitely in need of a weekend – just not this one.