Empty suitcase

Well, you guys, I'm off the road. My suitcase is empty. I have been in the same area code for the last week. I left my job on Halloween. The road got to be too much. My daughter told my mother that she didn't want her daddy gone all the time. My wife told me she was tired of not being with me. My boss left the company; my new boss told me he needed me to do 2-3 overnights a week in Danville. I was doing 1-2. I was eating terrible restaurant food, staying in mid-range hotels, and missing out on my family's life. So I'm done.

I have spent more consecutive nights at home in the last week than I have in the last year. It feels good. My daughter comes to me when she gets home from preschool, she stands in front of me and we talk about her day. Every day.

It takes a certain type of person to do the job I was doing. Either they don't have families or they don't care about the families they have. It makes me sad, the conversations I've had with my counterparts around the country about how they expect their wives to tend to the family responsibilities. That's not how I roll. I've been home the past week, working my ass off, preparing our house for sale. I do dishes, I clean, I meet service companies, and best of all, I get to watch my wife and my daughter walk through the door every evening.

It was never fair for me to ask my wife to do all of this, but I didn't have the guts to quit. I have learned from the last year of my working life, more than any other time, that a good salary doesn't bring happiness.

So I'm home. I wake up every morning in my own bed, next to my wife. I greet my daughter in her pajamas. I don't tear up in a company truck at rest stops because I can't be home. My daughter is four years old. She needs me, and so does her mother. I have never been so happy to end a part of my life. No amount of money can make up for the time I've lost.

I will miss the people and things I saw on the road, but not nearly as much as I missed the warmth and comfort of my home.