My nephew's school expulsion has changed the structure of my days.  Some of those changes are ones I like.  Because I am not driving him to school where the day's instruction starts at 7:15 I can sleep later than six.  I now wake without an alarm clock and find that seven o'clock is when human beings are designed to wake up. 

Some changes are less clearly good.  I'm not spreading the news of Nephew's state of disgrace to the rest of the family and since all of the upset is so much on my mind, I don't call Rose or my sisters as I used to.  When Rose calls me I stick to safe subjects and stay as quiet as possible.  Rose has commented on the change in my habits and I plead all sorts of different reasons for it, knowing that I'm not meeting my daughterly responsibilities and knowing that I am not going to change until Nephew's life is back on track.

Deceit has led to another change to my normal habits.  Before mid-February I'd come home after work and take an hour or so before going to pick Newphew up from school.  N would have prefered me to come directly from work, but I knew that a cushion of time to myself is vital to my being fit to live with, so I said I couldn't come for him any earlier.  Now that he's home (again, all the long day long), my coming right home would betray my scheming ways so I hide out for an hour or two every day before coming home.    I knit (at Starbucks), I draw (at Starbucks), I read (at Starbucks), I people watch, I write, I stare out the window (all at Starbucks) and sometimes I even go places that are not Starbucks.  The ladies at the little yarn shop are used to my showing up every couple of weeks, my car is often in the parking lot at the driving range, the only car there since snow only recently receded from the range and the muddy ground is still too soft to take a storm of golf balls. It's a good place to sketch and to keep track of which birds are arriving back from winters spent in the warmth of the South. 

I come  home at a different time every day and my vague answers to questions of when I start and get off of work have succeeded in discouraging the question being asked at all.  Yes, I feel guilt about my sneaky ways.  The only thing that would feel worse would be not having any time to myself at all so until Nephew is granted re-admission to school my lazy ways will continue.