Unbalanced

When Husband is abroad for weeks at a time, I frequently get emails like, “Place sucks, everyone is an idiot,” followed by phone talks that consist largely of his venting about his unhappiness about his work. Meanwhile I am torn between sharing what we’re up to with not wanting to make him jealous (e.g. “We went to the playground and then rode the free trolley around and then did some window shopping and then danced to some live music and then fed the turtles under the bridge and then walked on the beach with the dogs, and that was all after 5 PM!).

Everyone he’s surrounded by is really into this macho work-is-everything attitude that’s anathema to Husband. I mean, he’s brilliant and hardworking at what he does, but at the end of the day he wants to put it aside, go home at a reasonable hour, and be with me and Little Girl (if he’s here), or take some pictures, or play on the internet, whatever. But whenever he’s not working at home, and particularly when he and his co-workers are all in Europe, he has to put in 12-hour days and then several more each evening at bars, at restaurants, hanging around with these men, most of whom he not only is tired of seeing all the time but doesn’t even like to begin with. This evening (his time) he had to go out with the big wigs, despite plans he was excited about to photograph an abandoned mine, where they boasted about all the birthdays of their children they’d missed, made fun of the mere 38-hour work weeks of the staff there, and shared wisdom like, “You can always get another wife, but you can’t get a new career.”

Being the main money-maker around here, Husband just has to put up with that crap for now. But I’m not sure what he’s more excited about with regards to relocating: being closer to his family, or having an excuse to quit his job.