My father's best friend of forty-three years is dying. His illness was sudden and misdiagnosed. It was shocking and unexpected; difficult, I think, for my father to swallow initially.

Every day, he drives an hour and a half each way to visit his friend at the hospice centre. Every few evenings, I call him to see how the day went and gauge in my mind how he is holding up. Because I know that helpless, desperate, scared shitless feeling, how it grabs you behind the knees and rocks your entire foundation. I know what it's like to watch someone you'd do anything for slip away and not be able to do a thing about it.

My dad came over last week after the kids went to bed. We sat on the deck with cold Corona's and watched the bats dart across the yard, in and out of trees, and talked. He told me that he recently found himself down by my grandmother's farm. I haven't been down there since the house stood sold, stripped and bare. I haven't had the nerve, though I've thought about it. I've been tempted.

I asked him if it looked the same.

The house is still standing, he said, and I could tell by the tone of his voice that he was a bit surprised by that. I was too.

I asked if the barn was still there.

He shook his head. The big barn is gone, he said.

The big barn is gone. I felt that sentence in my chest.

I closed my eyes and tried to picture my grandmother's homestead without the barn looming large in the distance, resplendent with its rusted roof and old, weather-worn boards, but I couldn't.

I can't imagine my grandmother's house without the barn there.

8 Comments | In: life, in general | | #

My children are constantly bickering with one another. Constantly. They tattle on each other no less than a thousand times a day, on topics that range from serious (Moooom! Oliver's shoving fistfulls of vitamins down his throat!), to the ridiculous (Moooom! Julia says I'm YOUNGER THAN HER!), and everything in between (Moooom! Oliver just ate all the cheese from my cheese and crackers! He reached over and grabbed it all!). My beloved children can take a perfectly enjoyable afternoon and turn it in to a right shit-fest in the same amount of time that it takes me to sneeze.

Julia is a highly skilled whiner with the ability to turn on the tears in seconds flat. Some of her material is Emmy-worthy, I swear to god. I see theatre in her future.

Her brother has perfected the art of tantrum-throwing, and screeching in decibels that attract stray dogs. He is sneaky and calculated, and seems to thrive on finding new ways to test my patience. I see jail time in his future.

I joke about it, yeah, but sometimes I get worried about my kids and the way they bicker and pick on one another and act the way they do. Sometimes I look at them thrashing around on the couch whacking one another and I'm like, whose fuckin' kids are THESE?! I have moments where I seriously question whether or not I am raising two little hellions while simultaneously failing miserably as a parent.

Then there are the moments where you know without a shadow of a doubt that you're doing a good job, raising good kids with good hearts – like this past weekend when I overheard Julia (who was brushing her hair while singing Justin Bieber songs to herself in the bathroom mirror, her new favourite pastime) sigh contentedly to herself and say, "I love my life so far."

I happened to be in the shower when I heard her say that. I leaned against the wall, the wet tile cool on my forehead. As my chest swelled with pride, tears dripped from my cheeks and swirled down the drain.

She loves her life. I'm doing something right.

It's moments like those that keep me going.

18 Comments | In: life with julia, life with oliver, motherhood | tags: goddammit. stop fighting with your sister., kids, parenting, siblings. | #

So my husband went out one evening last week to buy a suit. He was going to an outlet mall, one that happens to have a Bath & Body Works store in it. With that in mind, I told him to get me something nice as he walked out the front door.

“Okay,” he called. “I’ll get you something nice, babe.”

Sweet, I thought. I could really use some new soaps.

He came home with a black pinstripe suit and two bags. One of individually wrapped Reese’s Peanut Butter Cups, and another that smelled like onions.

“I got you something nice,” he called to me from the kitchen.  “Are you ready?”

I smiled. “Yup,” I called up to him.

He walked over to me, arms outstretched, and handed me a carefully wrapped steak and cheese hoagie. It was still warm, and it smelled heavily of garlic.

I gaped at him. “This is what you got me?”

He nodded, grinning.

"There's no soap?"

He appeared confused. "No, this is a nice hoagie…I watched them slice the steak and make it in front of me, babe. I got one for myself, too, so you don’t have to share. This one’s all for you,” he said.

God, he thought he was THE MAN right then, bestowing upon me a steak and cheese hoagie like a fucking king. And he was so proud of the fact that I didn’t have to SHARE the hoagie with him, that this hoagie was mine, all mine. He simply couldn’t hide how awesome he thought this gesture was, you know?

I asked my husband to get me something nice and he brought me home a cheesesteak. I don’t know why I was surprised; I mean, this is the guy who buys me discounted body wash for Christmas. But…a HOAGIE?

For the record…it was a pretty good hoagie. But it left my hands smelling like grease and steak spice, not Tropical Passion Fruit.

27 Comments | In: life with dave | tags: grinders, hoagies, romance. | #