late nights

One of the good things about international ops is you get to travel a few weeks a year. One of the bad things is that you are on call or working a much longer day all the rest of the weeks of the year. Tonight was a crummy night on call but not really bad or anywhere near terrible--just a few hours. Got paged at 11:30 while starting to snooze/telling the oldest son a story. Minor issue, spirals up a bit, then the fallout and some emails to make sure we do better next time, etc etc. So it's 3am and I'm going to bed. Then I'm lying there awake, thinking the workday needs to be 12 hours, not 8-9, because I didnt' make enough progress on every project I needed to today...a few made progress, but not all. Oh well...worry about it tomorrow.

Then just before I drift off, I realize that I didn't see my younger son today. I hadn't seen him in over 24 hours. Boy that just feels freakin great... I about cried thinking that it's one of those things you always think 'I didn't even see my family today!' but it doesn't actually ever really happen. And then it does. I peeked in him, and he's fine...but I still feel like a lousy parent. I also fed the cats while I was up (They said they have been neglected a lot too, but I don't believe that. Cats lie about everything.), then I put my hours in for the day and read a few more emails of what's happened in the last 20 mins. So now back to bed, it's 3:30.

I would say that someday this will all pay off, but honestly, I like my job and they do take care of me. I just need to stop more often, know when to quit for the day, and keep in mind that there are more important things. The little voice in my head keeps saying 'bad parent' though. Damnit.