Charging My Batteries

St. James and I were sitting on the porch this afternoon, enjoying the beautiful spring day.  It was warm, breezy, felt like it might rain.  We had just puttered away in the back yard, St. James had planted some raspberry bushes, I did some weeding.  As we sat and looked at our little patch of earth, I remarked that it had been a good weekend, and that I felt good.  Better than I had in a long time.
As I reflected on why that was, I realized that the reason I felt good was because I wasn't as tired and scattered as I usually feel, and that as a couple, we had spent 2 nights in a row at home, together.    With my bum firmly planted in my patio chair, this ridiculous metaphor came to mind. I said to St. James "I feel like a cordless phone that has been carried all over the house and just needed to return to its base."   Really.  I was envisioning my bum, connecting with the chair, just like the little silver pieces in the bottom of the phone connect with the silver pieces in the base.
The phone is made to be carried all over the house and talked into, just as I am made to go out into the world, to work, to play, to see, to hear.  But the phone can't do what it's made for if it doesn't spend almost an equal amount of time on its base, charging up.  I too need to spend more time at my base, my home, to charge up so I can go out and do those other things properly.  When my phone hasn't spent enough time on its base, it beeps in my ear, or the sound quality becomes poor, or sometimes it conks out right in the middle of a conversation.  When I haven't spent enough time at my home-base, I feel frazzled, get cranky and irritable, or just plain can't follow through on commitments I've made.
After a weekend that's been spent mostly at home, with St. James, and other friends, I'm feeling re-charged.  I'm ready to start a new week, ready to go out into the world and do those things I was made for.  And ready to stay home, butt in chair, to recharge when the time comes.