Doing Nothing Days

I am the worst boss I have ever had. And ok, so I haven’t got many to compare to as I have only ever had two bosses in my life and one of them was my Dad, but seriously, I am a bad, mean, pushy, slave-driving old bitch of a boss and if it weren’t for the fact that I have no choice, I wouldn’t work for me. Not without union support anyway.
Take today. All is quiet here. Though the sky is a solemn shade of grey I have hung out the washing and watered the plants regardless. In the kitchen a rich, garlicky onion soup is bubbling and squeaking on the hob, and last night my little boy was spirited away by his Daddy so Mommy could work.
Trouble is Mommy doesn’t feel like working. Mommy’s bones are aching and what she really wants is to take a long violet scented bath, rub peppermint oil into her feet and sit perched on top of her freshly made bed, smiling at the pretty,  floral centre of this little old blogging life that is her desk and otherwise completely and utterly ignoring it.
Oh yes, this here Mommy wants to take a day off. Not just from work, but kinda from her whole life.
I want to STOP. I want to let myself waste time. I want to sit here and do absolutely nothing even remotely productive and feel that it is ok: that doing nothing at all doesn’t make me a bad person (I live in fear of being my own idea of a bad person). That I will not have to issue myself a written warning should I fail to write that newsletter, update the sidebar or post something that makes my darling audience tingle with recognition.
I want to pull the plug out of the washing machine. Fear not the disappointed stare of the ironing basket. Fail to bother the vacuum for a single day. Potter not putter. Drift. Languish. Lounge.
We women get tired don’t we? Last week Kath and I dreamt of being admitted to the kind of hospital designed to banish exhaustion. A place where other women laid soothing hands upon our battered souls and spoon fed us soup and poetry. A place where the air was scented with orange blossom, warm baths were run for us, and pillows puffed to just the right degree of fluff. A place where no-one called us Mummy. A place of respite from ourselves.
But in lieu of such a place I am writing this instead. Speaking the words out loud. Hearing how ridiculous it is to deprive myself of these small freedoms, on a day like this, when I am answerable to no-one but myself. Giving myself permission to push my feet into apricot coloured flip-flops and wander down the lane to nowhere in particular. To come home and fill the house with the soft pink glow of lamp-light, sprinkle blue cheese on to home-made croutons for the onion soup,  and read The Solitary Summer all over again, because Elizabeth Von Armin was a woman terribly good at granting herself the freedom to step outside her life and be who she needed to be at any given moment. Despite her Darling Man of Wrath.
Drift. Languish. Lounge. Because some days we have no choice but to stitch ourselves back together with nothingness.
Today is that day.