The Changing of the Guards

Every Friday night, I get my desk back. 

He puts his laptop and charger and headset in the closet while I retrieve my laptop, usually strewn about somewhere (the couch, the coffee table, the kitchen counter) and move it back to its rightful place, under the shelves with the gold candles and fake plants and print that says Create from love, not for love.

We never talked about where my husband would work before he accepted the full-time work-at-home position. I assumed he’d work the same way I do: all over the house, all of the time. Sprawled out on the carpet in the baby’s room, or in the backyard on the outdoor furniture, or perched up in bed against the tufted headboard. 

But, here we are. Some 100+ days into quarantine, as it turns out, my husband does not prefer to work like a nomad, stopping every five minutes to peel an orange in the kitchen or change a diaper in the nursery or spell t-h-e-r-e for the five-year-old drafting a comic book at the dining room table.

Huh. 

He prefers to work at a desk. My desk. The only desk in the house.

***

We’ve had this conversation 82 times. 

I don’t have enough time.
I don’t have enough space. 

There’s a dream swirling in my head. It started as a whisper three years ago, a faint nudge, a gentle voice. Lately, though, it’s getting louder. Especially when I’m in the shower, where I do my best thinking.

A door opens. 
A few ladybugs land. 

I can see the path I’m supposed to step onto, the breadcrumbs laid out in front of me, and yet: I am terrified. Of what? I’m not even sure. Terrified I can’t do it, terrified I’m not good enough, qualified enough, talented enough. Terrified this dream is for someone else, someone Smarter, Better, Wiser. I confess my fears in prayer. I beg the Lord for courage. One day I find a dead ladybug on the porch and wonder if it’s a sign. My husband tells me I am crazy. I am starting to think he might be right.

Three friends offer to help, to encourage, to read, to pray. I offer the same to them; we form an unofficial mastermind. I tell them I am struggling to find time, and childcare, and and and and. One says, “Can you write on Saturday mornings? Have Brett take the kids for a few hours and hunker down?”

I ask him that night. He knows the dream. He also knows what it will take to make it come true. I lay out the plan: 9am-12pm on Saturday mornings. Just me, butt in the chair, at my desk. It’s never going to happen otherwise, I say.

He listens and says, “Of course … is that all?”

Another opened door; another breadcrumb. 
Every Friday night, we’ll trade posts.

I am running out of excuses. 

***

Our middle child did not start sleeping through the night until he was almost 1.5 years old. His entire first year of life is one sleep-deprived blur. 

Imagine two people arguing in bed at 3am, every night, about whose job requires more sleep. 

I have to think tomorrow. 
I have to keep kids alive tomorrow. 

I am not kidding, these are real conversations we had in the dark. Somewhere along the line, months and months into stupid midnight arguments, we fell into a rhythm. 

The baby cried.
I got up. 
The next time the baby cried, he got up. 

Back and forth, back and forth, we’d take turns plodding up and down the hallway across the creaking floor. We rotated night watch: our own version of the changing of the guards.  

***

A few months ago, I took an online writing course. For the first half hour or so, the instructor talked about prep work—the importance of setting up your space, staying committed and consistent, etc. 

And then she said, “Use the yellow tape.” 

If you’ve ever watched a true crime show, you know how it works. As soon as detectives arrive on the scene of a crime, they block it off with yellow tape—nothing comes in; nothing goes out.

They do this to preserve the crime scene. 

“We have to do this with our writing, too,” she said, “Your voice is worth preserving.”

I relay this to my husband, “On Saturday mornings, I need our bedroom to be a crime scene. Nothing in, nothing out.”

He nods, amused.

***

It is Saturday morning and I am writing these words from my desk. To my left is an oscillating fan, offering white noise to drown out the sounds of my children playing on the other side of the door. To my right is a burning candle, almost down to the bottom of the wick. 

I just sent an e-mail about that dream, one I’ve been putting off for eight weeks. Partly because the world’s been on fire, but also, partly, because I’ve been scared. 

It’s 12:17 now. I stole 17 extra minutes today to finish this story. 

Because if this dream ever does come true, I need you to know it happened with yellow tape and the changing of the guards on Friday nights.