Sunday, June 20, 2010

Happy Fathers Day!

It is Sunday Night....the weekend is winding down.  The bills are paid, the laundry...done...mostly...and the dishes are drying.  I have been on my hands and knees scrubbing our white tile floor (curses, you previous owners!) and my homework is done.  I spent individual time with two of my boys this weekend and all five of us had time together for Fathers Day today.  The weekend has been great...but...alas...Monday is coming. It comes like a freight train speeding in from the horizon and I am powerless to stop it.  Oh, if we could only stop time for just a little while on Sunday evenings....but I know if I had the power, I would never hit go again!

I spent some time looking at old pictures this weekend.  Time has passed so quickly.  Eighteen years ago, I was a pregnant single mother with two young boys in tow.  Odd details plague me...such as...why did I favor that blue and black Where's Waldo sweater while I was nine months pregnant?  I looked like a huge bumble bee with a bruise.   Why did I buy a black Nissan Sentra with no air conditioning?  Neither of these questions really matter, obviously, but it's interesting to look back at who were were...and how it relates to who we are now.  Now I know not to wear stripes...especially since I weigh now about what I did then...while I was nine months pregnant....It's hard to blame the baby fat on your baby when he's about to graduate from high school....but I'll keep trying.  Now I know that cars must have air conditioning if you are going to live in El Cajon.  It's too bad I didn't learn that before we bought our house. 

The boys and I were together alone for ten years.  For the first couple of years, we didn't have a car.  I remember the day that the black Nissan Sentra with no air conditioning was repossessed.  It was obvious that I couldn't make the payments.  When they called to tell me that they were taking it back, I told them to come get it.  The poor man that came to pick it up couldn't look me in the eye.  I walked him out to show him the car followed by two boys under the age of four and a newborn in my arms.  I think he drove the car in and then hit a bar on the way home.  He seemed much more traumatized than we were. 

Fast forward ten years.  Eric and I met while I was on a date with someone else...it was one of those dates that you think will never end.   We ended up in a little coffee shop in Lakeside that played live music.  It was very...very...hot inside!  Lots of people and very little air.  When we walked outside, we met Eric trying to get some air also. We invited him to church and two years later we were married.  He had no idea what he was getting into - poor man.  I think he spent the first year of our marriage in a haze wondering what he was paying penance for.  One night, I think he truly thought he had entered some weird Alice inWonderland alternate universe.  Matthew was sick and was prone to febrile hallucinations.  The boys and I were used to it.  As his fever went up, I could here his anxiety increasing.  I sat with him telling him that I was there while I tried to get his fever down.  He started saying...
"There's someone else here..." 
"Honey, it's me...I'm right here..." 
There's someone behind you..." 
"Who do you see, honey....it's just me...."

Dramatic scream and then....."It's...the...Devil!"

At this point, I saw Eric drop to his knees and realize that it wasn't just Alice in Wonderland but he had somehow entered the Sixth Sense. Matt's typical hallucination was seeing children playing ring-around-the-Rosie around him. This one was much more intense than normal. Remarkably, Eric is still with us ten years later!


Tuesday is Matt's graduation from high school.  Eighteen years could not possibly have passed.  We will be joined at his graduation by Eric, David (his 1st Dad) and Rudy (his grandfather).   My boys have been blessed to have many men in their lives to look up to.  Some people worry that boys will be sissy's if raised by single mothers.  Dont' believe a word of it.  My boys are exactly that....all boy.  I know that from the time that Tommy flooded the school bathroom from putting rocks in the toilets...to Matt trying to skateboard off the roof and chipping his front teeth...from Christopher doing backflips off the neighbors wall.  From finding a rattlesnake in my freezer after the boys went hiking and living with three pet rats...to discovering that any new posters probably meant that there was a hole in the wall.  It was all part of raising boys and while I was called a single mom....I really wasn't one.  I may have been single but I was anything but doing this job alone.  We were surrounded by male college students from our church who spent time with the kids.  I had friends husbands that would take them out along with their own kids.  I can only say that we have been truly blessed....and I am grateful for all of the men, fathers or not, who had a hand in helping my boys become the men that they are. 

As I look back over our lives, I have so much to be grateful for.  If you had any hand in helping my kids grow...if you have ever told them "I love you"...if you have spent time with them in any way....then thank you.  They are really good men.  I love them....but even more than that....I like who they are becoming.  To my boys, I say "I am proud of you".  To my friends and family, I say, "I couldn't have done it without you!"  To my husband, I say, "Your time is coming...we're almost there!  Thank you for the last ten years and all you have done for our family". 


Love to you all!

1 comment:

  1. Very poignant. I raised my two boys by myself for 10 years. I understand the struggle--and the joy of finding someone who was meant to be their father enter into your life. Congratulations and keep writing!

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