The first month: Liberation.

[dreadedcandiru2]

Like a lot of parents in North America, it's pretty much certain that Elly and the others as seeing Labour Day as the 'real' first day of the year. While the children no doubt see it is the beginning of ten more months of agita about lessons and ten more months of being reminded how low they really are on the food chain and ten more months of being convinced that when you're twenty, they remove whatever it is that makes you understand or sympathize with kids and while John sees it is ten more months of his ungrateful teeming get complaining about something else that used to be a problem when he was their age but isnt really, Elly sees it is something else: Liberation.

This is because it is clearly the fault of the children that she rushed into cozy domesticity before she bothered figuring out who she was and what she wanted. Rather than admit that she done messed up and before she finally got around to realizing that the problem with her dreams was that they came true and she did not like the results, she will spend what years she has left relishing the return of an empty house.