Personal Space

When Andy and I were working all the time there was a definite schedule to our comings and goings. I left the house before seven and he had a couple of hours to read the paper and do whatever he did before he left for work. I returned to the house between four and five and it gave me time to read the paper, catch up on things, shed my shoes, walk the dog.
Andy came home after six in time to cook dinner and chat. After cleaning up the kitchen I went to my office on the bottom floor to finish the day's work, and he went to his lair on the top floor to do whatever he needed to do. Many weeks Andy had to travel to other cities for work. Rarely, I would accompany him. Mostly, when I was here and he was there, we spoke a lot on the phone. But both of us had a certain amount of autonomy.
I am not a foodie. I love the usual evening dinners Andy cooks for me, never a repeat, always something interesting and appealing. But when he is not home, I just eat to live. Baked potatoes, cottage cheese, a whole tomato,a peach, nuts, lots of fruit- and all of it at strange times when my stomach tells me it is time to feed it.
Now that we are here together much of the time I think about what it means to have personal space. We have this huge farm! It's always possible to go somewhere by oneself. I have my studio and Andy has his woodshop. For the first time in many years we do not have multitudes of kids in our space.
But yet, we share the bathroom off the master bedroom. I think I have to be quick with the shower because someone else is waiting. I could take my potions and lotions and dentle floss up to the guest bathroom. But so far I haven't.
We are arranging our new personal space. I know he thinks of the same issues. It's just that for so many years we had our own space and times. Now, it has to be renegotiated. We are tender about each other's needs for having privacy, but it isn't easy.