My friends, we have some news.

After careful deliberation, Robbi and I have decided to separate.

In the name of art, in the name of sanity, she is moving out of the barn and I will raise the children.

But she’s not going far. And the arrangement is only temporary. And mostly I’m just messing with you.

Here’s the thing. Robbi is a nocturnal creature who does her best creative work from 10:00pm – 4:00am or so. Being forced to live within the antagonistic confines of the typical American workaday schedule puts a cramp on her style. Add to this the fact that she has a lot on her plate right now, and we both decided to see what would happen if she were allowed to live and create according to her natural biorhythms.

I will text her occasionally to make sure that she is still alive. She will still come eat dinner with us every night so that the children can remember what their mother looks like. But for the time being, she will be free to abandon the time-space continuum and surrender to the whim of her muse.

I’m excited to see what she comes up with. And she is excited at the possibility of getting ahead in her work.

In anticipation of her migration two blocks down the street to my mom’s house (currently vacant as my mom counts down the eleven months that remain until her retirement), we headed to Costco to provision Robbi with desirable snack foods.

Left to her own devices Robbi has a tendency to forget about typical human urges like eating. When I go out of town, I often return late in the evening to find she has eaten nothing but a cucumber since breakfast. Therefore the task to was to accumulate a stockpile of attractive, easy-to-eat foods that she would have no excuse to avoid.

We might have gotten a little bit carried away.

But I am fairly confident that she will not starve.

Costco is adjacent to the Christiana Mall, which was our next stop.

Having thoroughly torched our credit card on snackfood, we headed to the Lego store.

Kato has recently become deeply enamored of these timeless plastic bricks, and, as the result of various good deeds throughout the summer, was given the opportunity to fill one small tub with pieces of his choosing from the endless colorful glory of the Lego wall.

This incredible place did not exist when I was a kid.

But then again, neither did Lego Tower of Pisa and Lego Trevi Fountain.

Though Kato made the bulk of the selections, Robbi exercised her powers of patience and mechanical prowess to fill every last nook and cranny. If it’s possible to juke the system, Robbi might have done it.

While we were there, I took the opportunity to officially claim an honor that I’ve rightly deserved since early childhood.

That’s right. I am a Lego Club VIP. And I’m not afraid to say it.

Our tub of assorted Legos in tow, we headed next for the Apple store, fully prepared to embrace bankruptcy in style.

We were there to pick up a machine we had special ordered online a few weeks ago. It has been five years since Robbi got her last Mac, and her poor, exhausted G5 tower has been growing increasingly sluggish. We figured her new life as a solitary nocturnal bohemian was as good an excuse as any for an upgrade.

So she started with the 27′ iMac and made a few memory and processor enhancements. The result: this large white box.

She tells me that as much as she loves the new machine, she still loves me more.

But I’m not sure I believe her.

I think the only reason she brought me along was to carry the thing back to the car.

Back home, she began the process of copying all her old files onto the new Mac.

Further evidence of her fuzzy allegiances was abundant.

She is so enamored with its gleaming newness that she refuses to take off the plastic.

Earlier today (Saturday), we went to the Chestertown farmer’s market for a final walk as a nuclear family unit.

When we got home, she packed up her stuff (including her new boyfriend, which she not-so-subtly refers to as Husband 2.0)…

…and drove her to my mom’s house. Notice how she’s trying to look wistful. But it’s all a pack of lies. LIES! This is the face of a happy woman. A woman on the brink of liberation. A woman on the cusp of aesthetic bliss.

The woman is thrilled. New computer. New house. So many delicious snacks.

How many delicious snacks, you might ask?

So many.

Great masses of granola.

Various chips and Pirate’s Booty.

Extraordinary granola bars.

An entire case of San Pellegrino.

Easy-to-prepare, lunch-sized Indian food.

And various salsas, dips, and salads.

More than enough to keep one rather petite illustrator going for weeks if not months, right? What could possibly be missing from this spread?

If you were thinking “gratuitous block of gorgonzola cheese,” you know Robbi even better than I do.

While I was marveling at the sheer majesty of the banquet, Robbi wasted no time in getting Husband 2.0 up and running.

After all, it was time to consecrate their relationship. I knew I had been officially replaced when she finally removed the plastic.

Eventually, it was time to say farewell. A sabbatical can do no good until it actually begins.

The kids said their farewells.

And I said mine.

Robbi did her best to look heartbroken, but nothing could pierce her smile.

Now it is Saturday night, the kids and I are snuggling in bed, getting ready to sleep and wondering what Robbi is up to. Is she drawing a picture, coding a website, or eating gorgonzola by the spoonful.

Does she know what time it is? Or day it is? Or that she’s still in Chestertown and not floating idly on the deck of a cruise ship lost in a tropical sea?

Is Husband 2.0 giving her a foot rub and asking how her day was?

What time will she go to bed (or will she ever go to bed at all)?

For now, these questions are all rhetorical. For now, the answers aren’t important.

We miss you, Robbi. Enjoy your sabbatical. Please don’t forget to eat. We will see you soon.