I still laugh at our inside jokes…

It’s been another week of me trying to stay busy in the evenings without the kids at home. It’s been increasingly difficult to sleep. I think it’s partly because the house is so quiet and partly the anticipation of what is just around the corner…52 weeks later.  I have had an absolute blast being out with friends, sans kiddos. But it is all fleeting; as soon as I come home and walk through that front door it all seems to be a just a little surreal.

It rained last night for a good while, and since I couldn’t sleep anyway (having another surreal moment) I figured…why not go stand in the rain? So, at about 2am I was out on the driveway soaking in the rare TX summer rain. The rain drops were unusually warm as they fell from the sky. The ground, still hot from the days sunlight, seemed to almost steam with each drop. The fresh rain smell was in the air and for just a moment all I thought about was how beautiful it all was.

Then a bolt of lightning lit up the night sky and I figured it would be better to watch from indoors…just in case. I’m not to keen on becoming a lightning rod, or ending up like the character, Mr. Daws, in ‘The Curious Case of Benjamin Button’.

In the last couple of weeks, as I indulge in the extra time I have to spend with friends, I am constantly thinking that Mindy would’ve loved this. She’s such a social butterfly; always wanting to be with friends. I was the one who never really wanted to go out much. It seems like I’ve been compensating for her in my own behavior lately. I haven’t been quite as laid back and easy going as I was before. Instead I seemed to have taken on some of Mindy’s concise, to the point, and some times confrontational nature. Maybe I just want to think that because it makes me feel good, maybe it’s actually true. I don’t really care which the result is the same. The result is that I feel like I can carry her with me where ever I go. I can enjoy life and know she would’ve enjoyed it too. She would enjoy being out with me, creating memories to share later. As sad as that could sound since she’s no longer here…it’s actually a very peaceful, inviting thought for me.

I don’t really know how to explain it more than that. If you watched the FOX show ‘Fringe’ where the main FBI agent shares her memories with a former partner by way of some weird experiment…that sort of the same. Only without the scary water tank,  electrodes, or trance inducing hypnotism. Although I’m not trying to find odd terrorist types using her memory. I like to think we remembered things similarly. So that when I smile about something we did together…she is smiling too.

Cooling off

Yesterday morning, as most any, I checked the weather before heading out for work. The nice weatherman said it would be sunny and hot all day; a typical TX summer day. I wrap up my morning routine and leave for work on the Harley, but I didn’t get 5 miles from the house when it started pouring rain. Not, this is annoying cause I’m on a bike and I’m wet rain. No. This is cars pulling off the road cause they can’t see rain! The rain drops were like little darts of ice poking at me, and the overpass I huddled under seemed so far away when the surprise downpour started. It was a very brief, very cold rain. Only about a quarter mile of the highway was even wet, but I was soaked.

Really, really soaked. Squishy socks inside my shoes soaked.

Luckily the rest of the ride in was dry, and at 60+ MPH you dry out in just a few minutes. It makes that memorable part of my morning bearable. The real highlight of the day was going out to see my little monkeys at my Mom’s. It wasn’t anything too exciting but having them gone all week is really getting to me so I had to make the drive out to see them. Princess and Sugarbear both asked if they could come home with me and I would’ve loved to have them with me. But aside from the whole full time job thing, I rode my Harley out there and there just wasn’t enough room. They will be gone again next week…all week; again. We have a little weekend trip planned that is coming up soon and I’m really looking forward to having them all in the car for a few hours. Road trips are great for catching up with your kiddos!

Without the kids on the weeknights, it’s been pretty uneventful. I’ve watched a lot of carefully selected movies (re: mindless comedies that hopefully won’t trigger grief) and spent some time with my Dad. Mindy has crossed my mind several times each and everyday, but there hasn’t been any “moments” that I have to deal with. So far all the thoughts I’ve had of our time together have been wonderful, smile inducing memories. Such as the time we took the kids to the State Fair a few years back; Mindy walked my Teen (then only about 8 years old) through the petting zoo. Sugarbear and Princess were in the double stroller and somehow Sugarbear got his little toddler hands on the goat food…which was then toddler food. Gross, but funny. I don’t remember why I was waiting on them outside the tent but I missed all the real action. The expressions on Mindy’s face as she told me…priceless. I was probably buying drinks or something as it’s always hot at the State Fair.

I’ll try really hard to stay off my soapbox here, but it’s nice to have a little break from all the little daily reminders that she’s gone…for the rest of my life. And in this world of misplaced adoration, and people “grieving” for celebrities they’ve never met (Sad…ok, but grieving…they don’t have a clue). I’m glad my kids have a real understanding of the importance of life, the gravity of death, and what it means to really grieve. Even thought the trip is unwelcome and unwanted we will be better at it’s end for having taken it. Better than we would’ve been if we tried to ignore it or deal with this as most of the world would have us “work through” this.

I’m just glad I have highlights to any given day. I’m thankful that even though I miss them terribly my kids are well cared for while I’m off at work. I’m blessed to have such wonderful memories of a wonderful life with a wonderful partner. I just hope I can get these memories all written down to share with my kids before time washes them away. As much as I want to stay dry on my bike, it was nice to cool off from this Texas heat.

Life…a year ago today

I had to look at the calendar to see what I was doing one year ago today. As I read through the entries all the events were vaguely familiar; but I would never have remembered them on my own. The week following July 4th one year ago the kids went to spend a week with my Mom. Ironically, that’s where they are this week. It’s not an annual tradition plans just worked out that way. I was coming home from work each night to Mindy; it seemed such a simple thing then. I took for granted that when I opened that door she’d be on the other side. That week she was calling me constantly…she missed the kids and she got very anxious. She knew she couldn’t call to my Mom’s fifty times a day so she called to talked with the kids, and then called me all day to tell me that she missed them. I wish I could call her to tell her how much I miss her.

I miss the kids too. They’ve been bouncing around between family members this summer and I feel like I’m not getting to see them enough. But I know this way is better for them than having them in a day care while I’m at work. I try to stay busy after work to make the week go by quicker but I’m running out of motivation. I don’t know if it’s because I’m trying so hard not to think of the fact that I’m one month away from the anniversary of the end of my life of before, or if I’m just getting worn out from the hectic summer schedule of shuffling the little monkeys from house to house and trying to cram in some time with them in between. Realistically, it’s probably both.

This time last year Mindy and I were coming off a bad month. In May she found her way into trouble again and the month of June was tense as we waited to see what the fallout would be, so we argued. Her doctors were attempting to regulate her meds and they kept adjusting them up and down and I’m sure that didn’t make it any easier for her. The higher the dose was, the easier it was for her to function “normally”. But the side effects increased and became intolerable. The doctors were trying to find that middle ground of tolerable side effects and beneficial regulation. They never made it; they ran out of time.

The week the kids were back home after visiting my Mom Mindy found a new energy. She was taking the kids out for lunch and straightening up the house and just generally taking good care of things. She and I were getting along better than ever before. I found myself daydreaming about what our future would look like and we’d talk about it at night when the kids went to bed. That hadn’t happened in our marriage in quite a while and it was a very welcome change. I really enjoyed my life in July 2008.

We’ll see what the rest of July 2009 has in store.

My little monkeys are just as brown as can be from the sun. SPF 70 is no match for the countless hours they’ve spent in the pool the last several weeks. The Teen…not so much. She’s spent most of the summer inside on the computer or the phone. Princess and Sugarbear have become pretty good swimmers. Both are swimming underwater which they would never do before. I wish we could find time to head out to the lake. I would love to get my Teen and Sugarbear on water skis. I’m just so thankful I have good kids. I couldn’t imagine doing all this and having to fight through behavioral problems or something along those lines. Now if I can just keep all the adults they interact with from pulling them in too many different directions I’ll be set. But that’s fodder for another post all together.

I hope everyone out there had a wonderful Independence Day weekend and thanked a soldier or veteran for allowing us to continue to celebrate our independence.

Princess with Sparklers

11 months down; a lifetime to go.