Johnnie Saturday Half Day And Then Clearing

I will say it was a very rare thing indeed that I hear someone other than myself get up and use the bathroom in my apartment, at least on a Saturday morning. That would be Johnnie of course who had spent a rare Friday night with me. I don't know if it was Lisa trying to be fair since she had had him all week, or she simply was too tired to deal with him, or Johnnie himself asking. I'm betting it's the latter two. And I didn't care. I was happy to have him in-house after such a long week of not seeing him. What happens when I don't see him? For one, there's less laundry LOL LOL. AND less food in the fridge. Which is why we made no plans this morning other than the routine stuff.  For us, that would be getting a car wash of course. The same car wash I had INTENDED to do last week, before Lisa dropped an emotional bomb on me. I can still hear her..."All you care about is yourself". Well... YEAH. What would possess her to think I still owed her some of whatever it is she expects from me? In another week, I would have left Maplewood for 4 years now. I think we should all be past what is owed and shit. Clearly it had an effect on me and I hadn't let it go just yet if I'm still thinking about it today. But no need for any of that this morning. We're FREE! And so it was that for breakfast, I got Johnnie to try something different. We had breakfast at IHOP, which was literally walking distance from my apartment. It did cost the same as Elysee, I'll acknowledge that. But the difference was that Johnnie got his pancakes. We still got scrambled eggs, AND we got bacon and sausage. AND of course the usual OJ, which Johnnie commented tastes the same as McDonald's. LOL LOL. The difference was that we didn't have to go all the way to Westwood. Which works out just fine since we got the car wash once and for all immediately afterwards. What followed was a trip to TARGET. Significant because Johnnie wanted to get som Pokemon legos. And so I took the opportunity to give him a learning lesson on the value of money. I told him I'd give him $5 to buy something, anything he wanted. But if it cost more than that, he would have to do something, or make something that someone would have to cover the rest of whatever he wanted to buy. We agreed that he should make me some stuff to put on my wall and I could pay for it. And so off to Target we went. And he did buy his Pokemon Legos... for $15. I knew he would get the thing all put together today so it was more like a day project. But he did acknowledge that he still owed me $10. The COOL part was that as soon as we got home, he actually got busy on the art work. "You can't rush art" I heard him say as we got closer to lunchtime. I mean he worked on that thing first thing AND did not watch any videos. I mean look at the art work. On effort alone it was already worth $10, let alone the learning lesson on creating value. And so it was that Johnnie got what he wanted, worked for it and earned it and Dad was pretty happy with the result. Turned out he finished the Lego right after lunch too.  

So why was it that I got a bad taste in my mouth when Lisa called much earlier than I anticipated to pick up Johnnie? As in 3 PM. I didn't expect her call for at least 4 maybe 5 hours. We had even stopped at the grocery store to pick up dinner stuff for the both of us. It turned out Lisa simply decided to come home. On time.  She wanted to take a walk with a friend. Wasn't I just thinking that what she needed was to spend time with friends, any friends, outside of her family and that does NOT include me.  All good and fine until Johnnie and I got into a verbal spat about what to take home. Immediately I went on react mode. Didn't want to send him home with any bags. Didn't even want him to take home his precious pokemon cards I bought him more than 2 weeks ago. I was thinking about what would set Lisa off I guess. And so of course Johnnie was disappointed not to be taking home his cards that he wanted to organize. Why I simply just let him was because I didn't want to give Lisa more reasons to snap at me.  As if it were my problem. And THAT ultimately was what gave me a bad taste in my mouth. I let Lisa dictate my choices and she didn't have to do a thing. In the end I did let Johnnie take his cards. Hid them in his organizer file since he had plenty of room anyway. And when I got back in the house, I went into clearing mode. I cleaned the apartment.  Dusted the living room, let my robo vaccum go to work. AND I cleaned up Johnnie's stuff. I didn't realize how much I had kept. Stuff from kindergarten. Stuff from earlier in the year, his first weeks of first grade. I can't believe how much he has progressed in everything actually! He is one bright kid. And after all that, I was not nearly done there. I cleaned the windows of my car too. I did get a car wash this morning but the insides needed detailing I know. Baby powder all over the front dash. Again I feel like Lisa almost dictated to me what I chose to do tonight.  I did clean my car windows on the inside. TWICE. And then I kept on cleaning - I did full laundry which I don't usually finish until tomorrow Sunday, taking a break only to make myself dinner. Cauliflower pizza crust with Beyond meat and pineapple and mushroom. Just like I had planned originally. And then I did some personal hygiene. I cut my nails on my hands and toes.  Was all this enough to clear my head? It was enough to make me feel better tonight. When I got all that stuff done, finally I did listen to some energetic audios to balance and center myself.  Should have done those first probably. And so it was an uneven day. But the time I spent with Johnnie? That was the best part of the day by far. And all the negative energy that came after hand-off? I think I was able to clear most of it tonight.  Whew.