Off the Pan, Into the Fire

My journey through the realm of raising our sons...

Sunday, November 20, 2011

Dust to dust

Parents are not supposed to outlive their children, yet it happens. There is no answer to why, only pain, loss. I can't help but believe that when a parent is lost, the child feels pain as strongly. We humans are built to feel pain and joy, despair and elation, birth and death.

Why is that? Why do we need to be so attached that a loss takes away from our being? Love is the mechanism that gives us the strength to extend our species beyond today. Love is how we pair up, mate, and offer up the next generation.

Love offers the strength to suffer, rebound, and rejoice. Love is how we journey into the abyss and return.

Thursday, November 03, 2011

What I learned at the Battle of the Balloon

Galen and Liam decided that a balloon is a good toy, no surprise there. My guess is that Neanderthal children would have been amuse. Hell, maybe they were, just with balloons made of animal gut. Problem being was this toy implementation was a bouncy game of run around the kitchen table while daddy is trying to read the newspaper. But to be fair, I can be tolerant even as my cherished morning routines was being disturbed by happy children doing no harm.

But not this morning. And I blame sleep deprivation.

Last night I went to the theater and watched Rush's Time Machine Tour movie. It was filmed in Cleveland during last year's tour, the one I attended at the Minnesota Sate Fair. While it lacked the "live" sound ambiance, the view was much better. And at $7.50 it was cheaper, louder, and bigger than the soon to be retailed DVD could play out in my living room.

OK, that exposition is just to explain that I was out past my normal bedtime. Once home I needed to acclimate to a quiet house and watched a portion of Some Like It Hot. Marilyn Monroe has a way of trapping the eyes and keeping one awake. Goodness, the way she wore a nightie...

OK, moving on. I sloughed up the stairs to bed. The pillow, sheets, mattress, eyeballs, and nervous system were simpatico, I conked right out.

Hello 1:15 AM. Hello Galen. Hello ten or fifteen minutes of child-induced wakefulness. Problem being that when my head once again found the pillow, simpatico had migrated away to the battle of the brain electrons. Now I was thinking of things better left for the light of day, or things that did not need attention. After about thirty minutes I got up and went back to the boob-tube (damn Marilyn reference)...

I watched an excellent program by Nova, the Fabric of the Cosmos. It did not bring about the sort of stimulation brought on by Marilyn's physique, or Lemmon & Curtis's antics, it was an intellectually stimulating program discussing the make up of space. And it had the desired result, by the end of the program my mind was through with its mental gymnastics, my body was tired, and I was confident that sleep would prevail. And it quickly did.

Fast forward back to the balloon wielding, fun having kids dancing around my table as I futilely tried to read the paper. I roared, they acquiesced, and minutes later all was forgotten as the game started anew, and I eventually smiled.

As I sit here and contemplate the chain of events I am happy to state:
  1. Balloons are fun,
  2. Rush is an excellent band,
  3. lack of sleep is no excuse for grumpiness,
  4. the cosmos is complex, and
  5. a circa 1959 Marilyn is still hot.