Hah, is fine. No I didn't feel "cool." I'm just the kind of weirdo that was obsessed with guns from a technical point of view as a kid. Think of me more as the kid just slightly on the spectrum who collected data on everything firearm related and then wrote mods for games like rogue spear that tried to adhere to the data. I didn't shoot more than a .22 rifle or 16 and 12 gauge shotguns until my 20s. This was one of the factoids I still have floating around up there.
Now in my 40s, I still haven't owned a gun personally, but have been to the range many times with friends (I buy more ammo than I shoot and drinks after). Heck, a few weeks ago I got to put a hundred rounds or so through a friend's suppressed FN P90 (a very surreal experience), a very nice .223, and pistols in 4 calibers (.22 and 9mm with suppressors, .45, and .357).

I can empathize. I went back to work a month ago now. It was/is hard to be unavailable.
Luckily, I work from home in a fairly independent role and my wife is still on leave, so we're still largely co-parenting. We could afford to have me stay at home, but we're saying that the extra I make above the truly wild cost of daycare will go to his education, financial security, and cultural enrichment.
We're also telling ourselves that daycare will be a positive/important social experience for him because we have a small friend group locally and family is halfway across the US.