In honor of the anniversary.

I was browsing through some old flash drives when I found this.  It reminded me of what a great writer and communicator he was.  We were actually the lucky ones.

How Did I Get So Lucky?

This past Saturday Tracey and her older sister Kirsten took off for a four day vacation to Toronto.  I am so happy that Tracey is getting this opportunity.  If anyone in this world deserves this opportunity it would be her.  Over the past year alone she has made many sacrifices to take care of her home, children, her job and me.  I am happy that she gets some time (even though it is only 4 days) to not have to worry about being a mommy or a wife.  She gets to be Tracey the sister as they explore Toronto and other parts of Canada.

That means that I have 24 hour kid duty.  Since our kids are getting to the age where they are pretty self sufficient I was not really worried one bit.  My mother started out planning our days Saturday and Sunday and I told her to not worry about it.  I am a big boy and my health and energy are pretty good right now.  I will take care of it. I after all…..had a plan.

Saturday morning comes around and it is time to take Tracey over to her sisters so they can go to the airport.  Everything is fine. The kids get a little teary eyed when mom actually leaves and I have to admit I was a bit teary eyed myself. But I was teary for two reasons.  Yes, I was going to miss my wife.  But I was teary because I was so excited for Tracey to have this opportunity.

After Tracey left I and the kids stayed and visited for about 30 minutes with Tracey’s younger sister who was in town visiting from Los Angeles. Then into the car we went to head home for the day.  I knew we had a party to go to that evening that the kids were going to absolutely love so I really only was on my own for about 7 hours.  As we are leaving the neighborhood the disk in the DVD player begins to skip. I hear from the back of the car this:  DAAADDD….the disk is skipping make it STOP!  Caroline I am driving I can’t do anything right now.  Caroline:  Man, mom is so better at this than you.  Don’t you think so Jack. Jack: What? Caroline: Mom, Don’t you think mom is better than dad? Jack: You are nuts if you think I am going to answer that. Shortly thereafter the disk began to work again.  Problem solved. 

The kids were watching a good movie so I took the LONG way home and they did not either notice or care.  Normally if you alter from your route Jack notices it and calls you on it.  Hey I thought we were going…..  where are you heading?  But I heard none of this so I knew I was in the clear.

I pulled into the parking lot of Target (which the kids love) and Jack started griping….What are we doing here? I want to stay in the car and watch the movie. Caroline: Yeah me too!  Me: Well okay I was going to look for a new Lego kit and some coloring posters but I guess we can just go home.  Kids:  NEVER MIND….I WILL GO..ME TOO…ME TOO.  Off into Target we went for our treasures.  After a short while we return to the car with our treasures.  I look at my watch and it is about lunch time.  As we are getting settled in the car I said, WHO WANTS TO GO EAT AT LUBY’S? Kids: IDO I DO I DO!  Man, I am going for dad of the day here!  So off to Luby’s we went.  We had a GREAT lunch as we talked about many different topics.  I really enjoyed the time with the kids. They love Luby’s and know their way around so they are very self sufficient.

We get home and the kids get into their treasures.  And I don’t hear a thing for 2 and a half hours. No arguments…no yelling…  I am able to clean the house a bit and relax and do some Face Book.  I clearly scored on this one!  Daddy -1  Pressure to Live Up To Mommy – 0.

Then our next door neighbor’s grandson came over to play.  Off into Jacks room they went.  Well Caroline grew tired of coloring and wanted to go see what the boys were doing. I will be so glad when Caroline meets some girlfriends in school.  Jack does extremely well with Caroline butting in but sometimes you just want to be with the guys and today was a day that Jack wanted to be with the guys. This is when I started having to parent. After a brief discussion with Jack he agreed to let Caroline play with the lego’s . We agreed on the terms of play and off they went.  We had an additional couple of hours of quiet play after that.  From there Caroline began getting bored and returned to her coloring.  The boys went next door to play and I returned to cleaning.

The time quickly approached to go to our party so I went over to get Jack and we got in the car and off we went to my parent’s house to pick them up.  The party was for a friend of my dad’s.  Growing up we went to their house many weekends.  You see they lived out in the country.  They had 3 kids so I have many memories of going off and doing things that I would NEVER let my kids do.  For instance…I remember at the age of 8 or 9 hopping on a dirt bike with a fishing pole on one side and a Bee Bee gun on the other side.  I would crank that baby up and off into the woods the five of us would ride.  With some sandwiches and drinks in tow we would not return till dinner.  We would have a blast and return around dark thirty on Sunday. Many times we crashed in the car on the way because we were so exhausted.  The party was going to be at the daughters house of my dad’s friend.  I was very excited because while I had kept up with what was going on in their lives through mom and dad I had not seen them in at least 20 years.

The daughter lives very close to where they grew up so I knew it would be in the country as well.  All of us have grown up and have children of our own around the same age so I knew there would be many kids there for Jack and Caroline to play with.  We get there and it is PERFECT.  The house is HUGE and beautiful.  It sits on about 10 acres.  Complete with two ponds for fishing, a chicken coop, and a fenced in area for the kids to play and a saltwater pool.  I am officially OFF DUTY!! The kids are in HEAVEN. Tiffany, the host…takes Caroline off to see the chickens and collect eggs for the evening.  Jack is in the pool in a matter of minutes with the boys.  I am sitting there visiting with Greg and Justin the two sons like I just spoke with them yesterday.  Shortly thereafter Tiffany returns with Caroline. She gets into her suit and off to the pool she goes.  Tiffany joins in on the conversation and we visited and talked about not only what we are all doing now but some of the “activities” we used to do as kids.  On more than one occasion you would hear “ CAN YOU BELIEVE WE DID THAT AND DID NOT KILL OURSELVES?!?”

The time comes to go home and as I am driving home I look back and the kids are past out.  I just smiled as I remember what seemed not that long ago where I was the one passed out in the back as my dad drove us home.

We get home and Jack goes into his room and Caroline into hers and I go to get ready for bed.  I return to find Caroline getting her PJ’s on (check) and I go to check on Jack.  He has his PJ’s on and is on his bed covered up by a blanket….OUT COLD.  I tuck him in and turn out the lights.  Caroline appears from her room and asks if she can sleep in my room.  No problem.  Then she climbs into our bed.  I normally don’t allow this (the kids sleep on the floor in our room if they need to) but I did not stop her  because I did not have the heart to do so and I thought this might help me sleep as I usually do not sleep well when Tracey is not next to me. As Caroline was getting situated she said, “Okay Dad…don’t take the covers and if you have to poot face the other way.   WOW…YOU ARE JUST LIKE YOUR MOTHER!!! At least that is what I thought.

Sunday morning arrives and Jack sleeps till 8:30.  This is a RECORD! Caroline sleeps until 9:45.  As Caroline gets out of bed her PJ’s are all bunched up.  Her hair is going in a thousand different directions and she says this:  Wow Dad, That was SOOOMMMEEE Party.  What’s for breakfast?  The girl is 5 and already sounds like a senior in college.  We load up in the car and off to MCD’s we go for breakfast.  After some much needed pancakes we return home.  I make the declaration that after a 30 minute movie we will begin Operation CLEAN UP where our goal is to clean our rooms. The kids HATE this.  I knew I was in for a battle but Tracey and I are determined that the kids will keep up their rooms. I was determined and ready for battle…..and a battle it was.

You see we have had many discussions on what is clean and what is not.  Everything has a place and we must put things up BEFORE we get something else out.  The kids have been doing a pretty good job of this when they are playing with things in communal areas such as the living room or movie room.  Their room? Not so much.

After 4 hours and MANY….MANY…MANY discussions that sounded something like this…. No, that is not where that goes try it again. We were done. I did discover that under my daughters bed and behind her bed had become a black hole.  This black hole had sucked in many pairs of “lost” toys, shoes, and clothes. I found myself totally reorganizing her room and closet.  I did much of the same thing to Jacks room.  And they HATED it. It would have been easier to send them off and me do it but they needed to be held responsible.  So I just kept repeating the same thing. “Your mother and I work hard to provide you a very nice house and very nice things. We all work together to keep our home nice and neat.  Your room is your responsibility. You can do this the right way and be done with it. Or you can try to take short cuts and we will clean the room 3 or 4 times.  The decision is yours.” Man they HATE THAT.  They know that either way they are cleaning their rooms.  To add extra pressure one of Jacks friends rang the door bell and I had to tell him that Jack could not play right now but that he would be over as soon as his room was clean.  The biggest obstacle for Jack was his lego’s. Fortunately for him my mother bought him a carrying case to help him organize.  The other obstacle was his closet.  It appeared to me he was just throwing stuff in there and hoping for the best.  I had to pull it all out just to see what was in there.  We got that done and his room was ready to go.  He had an hour and half before it was dinner time at my parents. Off he went with I am sure a new found LOVE of freedom.

I return to the kitchen and continue my cleaning out of the fridge.  As I am cleaning out the fridge I am basking in my own glory of what all I have accomplished.  I was so proud that Tracey was going to come home to a clean reorganized home with kids who were thankful for their rooms. Daddy was on a role! I am expecting my dad to come over to drop something off so when I hear the front door open and shut I yell out…HEY DAD!!!  But I don’t hear anything…..hummm…..DAD????  In comes Caroline with a half empty glass of water and an EMPTY sack of Blue Bonnet  seeds.  Tracey had recently purchased some wildflower seeds and wanted to plant them next spring in different spots in our flower beds.  As Caroline drops these items off and turns to go back to her room I said, “WOW!”  What is up with the seeds Caroline?  Caroline: Oh, I planted them outside in front of my bedroom window. 

Well I THOUGHT I had everything under control.  Who knows if those seeds will take.  It is the wrong time of year to plant.

Overall I have enjoyed the time I have spent by myself with the kids.  I have learned a couple of things along the way. I have learned that my kids are very self sufficient when they want to be. Daddy is too lazy to be at their every beck and call so they only involve me when they have too. I have learned while playing with Lego’s with Jack that this is WAY better than any video game we can play together. The problem solving and creativity that Jack has with lego’s is amazing.  You can almost SEE his mind racing as he creates his next vehicle or plane.  He is really good at creating stuff. I enjoy our conversations as we build stuff together. I have learned that Caroline is a very good coloring artist. I learned that Caroline can turn anything into a song.  

Me: Caroline go clean your room.

Caroline:  I am oooooonnnnnnn mmmyyyy WAAAYYYYYYYYYYYYYHEEEEEEEE  to clean MYYYYYY ROOM.

Me: Caroline bring Daddy the phone.

Caroline: Gonna getcha….Gonna Getcha…..GOOONNNAAA GETTTTTCHHHAAAA  MR. PHONE!!

I enjoyed watching Caroline in deep sleep as she lay next to me knowing that her daddy was right next to her and would protect her from the scary lightning and loud thunder. You could see on her face how at ease she was.

I was reaffirmed that by his writing the tooth fairy to split his loot with his sister that my son has a heart of gold and he loves his sister very much and as she grabbed his hand to walk out together this morning to the car and his acceptance that she loves him that much more.  As Jack shot out of the car and retrieved his bag from the trunk I got to hear “Jackie…wait for me!” as Jack patiently waited for his sister to get her bag.  As I walked passed him I asked “How come she gets to call you Jackie?” This is a question that he has been asked many times and as of today he has not answered. He does not even acknowledge that you asked the question!

As I am leaving and giving good bye hugs to the kids and watching them return to Nana’s house for a full day of fun  I realize that Tracey will be home in one more day. It is then that I find myself asking…..

How did I get so lucky?