I Don't Know What I'm Missing...

There's a feeling I get when I look to the...East.

...But there's something missing.

The other morning, when I came downstairs at 5:30 on my way to the gym, the house had a "School Day" smell and feel to it.  I'm not even sure what that means, other than some mornings when I come downstairs, there's just something about the air and the light that makes me feel like I should be launching into Go Mode, making sure a library book is packed in a backpack, checking the weather to confirm appropriate outdoor gear, and making sure I get to crackalackin' down in the gym so that I can be back upstairs, all worked out, so I can get Zoe off to school for the day. 

This happened a lot after school abruptly ended in the spring, and it made sense.  Weekday mornings tingled like a phantom limb, amputated and forgotten except for the lingering sensations left behind by nerves that end before their time.

We're definitely into Summer Vacation now, though.  I don't think there was ever a year, in my history of school years at our school, where the year extended this far into June.  And in all the previous Summer Vacations, I would have reverted to my Before Zoe Went to School habit of not getting out of bed until 8:00 or so.  I don't know if it's normal to have this feeling that we should be getting ready for school on a summer vacation day at 5:30 AM or not, on a regular year where Vacation would still be shiny and new a week in.  

But there it was.  I went about my pre-gym routine, going around the kitchen, filling my water bottles and glancing anxiously at the clock, mental mathing it to make sure I hadn't over-committed to a too-long workout.  

Then I remembered the thing I've had to remind myself of since mid-March: there's no particular place to go.  My husband has returned to his regular working schedule, but that has no more bearing on me than it ever did.  

I don't know that it's necessarily the school-year that I'm missing.  I don't think this odd, empty feeling in my soul has anything to do with the school-year.  When I think about it, I realize that I feel this odd, empty homesick-like tug on early school-mornings, more often than not.  Maybe it's the realization of the passage of Time, morning by morning.  

It could also be just general overwhelm at all the newness of the day.  I'm really not sure.  

I don't know what I'm missing, but there's something.  Maybe I'll know what it is, when I see it.