The cerulean blue eye stared back at me through the shower streams as I slowly rocked back and forth.  The steaming bars of its aqua cage swung left, then right, but the eye did not blink.  Not that a wall-mounted shower cleanser should.  But nevertheless, it stared while I thought.

I thought about this morning.  My mom is visiting.  She was brushing my little girl’s hair at breakfast in a way that my little girl didn’t like much.  She protested, more gently than usual, but persistently, while my mom continued to finish with her nonsensical excuses as usual.  Then she ran upstairs to my wife and asked for more waffles.

“Why didn’t she ask me for waffles?  I made their breakfast,” my mom was baffled.

“Because you don’t listen,” I said after holding in my anger for too long.

“She didn’t say anything about waffles.  She just complained about brushing her hair.”

My boy, Sun Su, was still eating at the table, which is why I was quiet in the first place, but as usual, my mother is voluntarily deaf to anything but shouting.

“You.  Don’t.  LISTEN!  Why would she ask you about waffles when you were ignoring her pleas with her hair?  How can the kids trust you when you don’t listen to a word they say?  You just do what you are doing no matter what!”

“Now that’s nonsense.  I don’t need to hear this,” she blustered away to the sink.

“There you go again.  You don’t listen!  To me.  To Amy.  To the kids.  To Mark (my brother).  To anyone.  We never ask you to do anything.  We just ask you to stop!  The BIGGEST problem you have – the one BIG problem you have is you just don’t listen,” I forced the shouting down to a low rumble but it was still shouting and Sun Su was still at the table.  He’s probably used to it whenever my mom visits.  I often wonder if he’s so quiet because I get so loud when I’m mad, which is usually when my mom is around.  Ooseung responds in the opposite way.  I decided to stop for their sake.

Back in the shower, the blue button eye stood unblinking through the pendulum of jet streams.  Rocking back and forth, is this what crazy people do?  I stopped.

I wondered about retirement.  About 401K limits – will it be enough?  How am I supposed to know what things cost in 30 years?  And do I really want to work until I’m 65 doing day shifts and night shifts?  Is this schedule even possible for a 60-year old?

I squicked and rinsed my belly button.

I shouldn’t have yelled in front of Sun Su, but it was less than usual with my mom this time, at least.

Hate having to go back to work today on my day off.  I won’t see the kids tonight.  At least I did stuff with them this weekend (exercise, lame magic/science tricks, air hockey) and last weekend (science museum).  Maybe I should go to the dentist with Sun Su and Amy this morning.  He did better with his shots when I was with him.

I turned around, as the cold side turned hot, and the hot side turned cold.  Did a tiny shuffle so the shower would hit all the right spots.  I got out and dried off.

Things were too quiet.  Amy had already left with the kids.

I counted the remaining hours and decided what I should do with them.

Other pictures from our science museum trip last week: