It Must Be Summer

He and I slept in this morning. Then He went for His morning snuggle with T, saw her safely launched into her day. When He came back, we played -- and it is Tuesday. It must be summer. Finally!

Summer, for us, is a magical space that revolves in an entirely different time mode. Through the months of the school year, our week days begin abruptly at 5:45 AM. We have just a minute or two to snuggle awake before I'm up and headed out to the kitchen to make breakfast and pack lunches. He often takes that time to get His shower. Then, I'm off to the shower and dressed in my "teacher" clothes. I sit with Him to eat a quick breakfast, and am out the door at about 6:45. In the evenings, we eat dinner at about 7:30 (when T arrives home from work), assuming that we are all home for dinner and not off to one or another of our meetings. It is a schedule that is grueling. We have very little down time during the week, and on the weekends I am most often planning for the next week and grading student work. Too, we tend to try and fit in some "Grandpa" time on the weekends along with all the rest of the set of family that we need to try and keep up with as well.

During the school year, we are lucky if we get to "play" on one morning of the weekend. At best, anything resembling SM is going to happen on Saturday and Sunday. When things get really hectic, we can go a couple of weeks between sessions.

Then summer comes. I'm the only one who is technically "off" for the summer, but having me off makes the schedule relax significantly. He still has to go about His business of course, but His schedule is way more fluid than mine. We can play on a lot of the weekdays, once it is summertime.

That's the practical and prosaic description of how this all comes about. Of course, my head and heart care not at all about the practicalities. By the time we reach this point in our year, I've become sincerely "nuts" about the limited playtime that we've been enduring. In my head, the decline in play equates to a growing conviction that He simply doesn't want me anymore. I know it isn't true, but it still feels like the explanation that makes sense. I know that we've both been running different directions, on killer schedules, without any options for months -- but that voice just keeps poking at me:

If there were someone else (younger, cuter, newer, sexier, more
masochistic), He'd find time for her... It is just that you are old,
worn out, predictable, and not that much fun...

Now, I don't know if there is anyone else in the world that runs that "game" down on themselves, but it is a guaranteeed way to make things even less "fun" when they do happen. Having that track running in your head when it is time to get your ass beaten does not help in terms of getting into the right mindset.

So. Summer comes and there is more time. I will be spanked a whole lot more. That is a definite. It began this morning. Paddles and a strap and the cane. I wasn't particularly there, in the beginning, but He was. Right there with me, talking me through the rage and the fear and the doubt -- insisting that I am His and will be His and will, therefore, of course, be spanked. He assured me, by His words and by His actions that all is well between us, and that I have no reason to worry. It took awhile, but I could feel the waves of calm moving through me, easing the tensions, erasing the frustration, letting me settle gently into His arms and His strength.

So, summer is finally here, and it is good.

swan