Keeping The Holiday Feeling Going

      Second week of the new year, and all seems well. I didn’t technically make any new year’s resolutions, so that’s going fine. I did think we’d tone down the partying a little, but as I may have mentioned last week, it’s taking a while for the holidays to end. My wife’s sister comes into town tonight. It’s the same sister who was here last week. She’s coming from Phoenix, so it’s not that far. 6 hours with a toddler!? I’m not sure how often I’d want to make that trip. Well, actually I do: none. I’m not fond of children to begin with, a long road trip with one, definitely does not sound fun. Especially with this particular child.  He’s technically my nephew, so I love him, and hope his life goes well. But he can be a bit of a handful. His mother is coming into town again for a wedding. I guess last week was just for a vacation, the last week of winter break for her school aged children. This week she’s coming in for a friend’s wedding. If she doesn’t have a problem with the road trip, more power to her. This week she’s only traveling with one child, her youngest. He just turned two. Yesterday. This child is so needy that his own father won’t even watch him! I find that odd. His dad stays at home, so it’s not like work gets in the way. My wife and I are watching the child as his mother attends the wedding. That’s tomorrow evening. Baby sitting on a Friday night! Woo hoo! Obviously, I don’t have to go. My wife has been looking forward to spending time with her nephew for over a month now. I have not shared in the excitement. I wasn’t even asked to attend, I volunteered! I don’t want to sit here alone on a Friday night. I sit here alone enough. Plus, I want to make sure my wife gets some food. We’re not sure how much attention he’ll need.

     Anytime my wife’s sisters come to town, they stay at their mother’s house, which I’m stoked about. We don’t have any cool toys here. I don’t even want to think about all we’d have to do to make our home safe for a child. I’ve got band practice tonight, or I’d probably be over there tonight as well. My wife is going. I know she likes spending time with her sister, but I also think she’s trying to spend extra time with her nephew so there’s some familiarity there for tomorrow night. She’s only seen him 4 or 5 times, and he’s just turned 2, so she’s practically a stranger to him. This ought to be fun!  My wife was like: “If he starts to get too annoying, you can leave whenever you want.” And I was like: “Yeah I know, I just want to make sure you get some food.” I know she can fend for herself, but I don’t know if she’ll have a spare minute. She is staying the night, I am not. So, the reality of me leaving was already a thing. My only concern is that we’re getting over there at 3, that means there’ll be several hours before I’m going to be comfortable leaving. I hope he’s an angel. However, his mother doesn’t think Grandma can handle him, so that says something. I have, however, had experience with children who behave when their parents are not around, so I maintain hope. I have a cousin who is 27 years younger than me, when he was little my parents would watch him. He was such a nice child when his mother wasn’t around. I would never have believed it if I didn’t see it with my own eyes. He was a monster whenever his mom was around. To the point that people would not want to be around them. Sometimes people say: “it’s like Night and Day.” This was absolutely the case in this situation. Unrecognizable.

     People coming into and out of town, slightly disrupting our usual life “routine,” keeps the holiday feeling going. Keeping the holiday feeling going means people feel more festive than they might normally feel, hence no return to “normalcy” yet. Then next week is my wife’s birthday. We leave for Laughlin 1 week from tonight. Short work week, road trip, casinos, it looks like that holiday feeling is going to last just a bit longer. It’s going to be February before we recover from December. Oh well, people are happy, that’s all that matters. Although it does seem like there’s already been a lot of death this year. There was a lot of death the year my wife and I met. Which, by the way, was 21 years ago! We met January 6, 2002. Within a month, her grandfather and my grandmother both passed. This year’s aren’t so personal, mostly involving people we know, but still, it’s weird seeing all of these memorial posts on FB. Then, we just found out that my mother-in-law’s boyfriend’s dad just got transferred to hospice. They don’t expect him to last much longer. My wife and I weren’t too sure that her mom and mom’s boyfriend understood what that meant. I know it bothers the boyfriend because this has been going on a while. He regularly has go out and take care of his parents at their house. For a while now, I have heard him express his feelings about his dad just waiting to die. And now it seems that it is actually the case, the hospital has told them that he won’t be coming back. So now he really is waiting to die. That can’t be easy. I’m not actually sure who it’s worse for, the person waiting, or the person observing the wait. Nothing can be done except to make them as comfortable as possible, and hope it’s a smooth transition. It’s difficult not to think about my parent’s, and my own, mortality at times like these. I hope to be ready when it’s time.