Category: Marriage

Categories
Dad Blogs Family Marriage

Things you’d say if you could to the ones that you love

I’m a sucker for a good sappy movie. Not the chick-flick kind where Hugh Grant plays some poor sot whose girlfriend dumped him and then comes running back. No, the kinds of movies I fall for are the ones that tug at the familial heartstrings. For instance, the movie Jerry McGuire always brings me to tears at the end. I know it’s the butt of many “you complete me” jokes, but there were some really great performances in that movie, once you quite seeing Tom Cruise jumping up and down on Oprah’s couch in the back of your head.

Another one that I am a sucker for, is “The Family Man,” with Nicolas Cage and Téa Leoni. If you haven’t seen it (and shame on you), it’s about a successful financial whiz (Cage) who is given a “glimpse” of what life could have been like had he not moved to Europe and become a wealthy banker, and instead stayed home and married his college sweetheart (Leoni). In this glimpse, he lives in a typical suburban rancher with his two kids. He’s a moderately successful tire company executive and his wife is a pro-bono lawyer. By the end of the movie, he’s acclimated to his new life and when it comes time for him to resume his old life as a wealthy playboy, he doesn’t want to go back. Back in his real life, he meets Leoni at the airport and convinces her to stay and talk to him about “what might have been” and they spend the night in the hotel coffee shop reminiscing and catching up.

The obvious point here is that we never know what life would be like had we made different choices. And I’ll be the first to admit that I’ve made a lot of choices in my life that have dramatically affected the way it’s turned out. For one, I joined the military instead of going to college first, no doubt changing the direction of my career. Another big decision of mine was leaving a girl I was engaged to (OK, she actually broke off the engagement first, but we kept seeing each other until I finally walked away). And of course the big one all of us married couples made, is the decision to get married. In this regard, I’ve often wondered about the big “what if.”

What if I’d never gotten married? What if I didn’t have these children that I complain about so much? This is where the movie “The Family Man” comes in. In it I see the possibilities of my life. Not that I would be even remotely as successful as Cage is in the movie, but I wonder where I would be and more importantly, if I’d be happy.

But then even as I watch it, I remember CareerMom and my first date. I remember how much I couldn’t wait to see her again. I remember the times that I’ve been sick or in the hospital and she’s been there to take care of me when none of my family could be bothered. Then I remember our children. I remember how, just when I didn’t think I could take any more crying or dirty diapers, my son looked up at me and smiled and snuggled his head against my chest. I remember how when he fell down the stairs under my watchful eye, I moved faster than any human could possibly move under his own power (actually beating him down the stairs), catching him just as his head would have hit the wood floor and I remember how, panicked, I held and rocked him until he stopped crying.

I remember all of these things and I realize that this is my glimpse. My real life is the life I used to dream of before I had it. Sure, I didn’t have a few of the facts down, like the lack of sleep or how my free time would suffer, but overall it’s just as I dreamt it.

And I wouldn’t trade it for all the Quan in the world.

Categories
Dad Blogs Family Fatherhood Marriage

To Grandmother’s House We Go…

For the first time in about 8 years, my mom’s side of the family (well, one of my mom’s) decided to all get together this year. And they are doing it in a four-bedroom cabin in Tennessee. This cabin is just over the river and literally through the woods from my mom’s house in Walland, TN and the cabin is located just this side of Gatlinburg, TN. So, from my mom’s house to the cabin, it’s about a 40-minute drive.

Originally, CareerMom and I decided we’d go up there, stay at my mom’s house at night to give the boys better sleeping arrangements, and then drive over to the cabin each day and spend time with family. However, as the time has drawn nearer, this has seemed less and less like a great idea.  For one, my youngest slept almost straight through the night for four nights in a row. This is unprecedented thus far and it is believed by many that dragging him up to Tennessee, where he’d have to sleep in a hard pack-n-play, would ruin whatever miracle schedule we’ve stumbled on. (Author’s Note: Since that four-night sleeping stretch, he’s had two nights of waking up twice, and then four times another night). Also, the car trip. If you’ll harken back with me to the Beach Trip of 2007, none of us were looking forward to spending 4 ½ hours up and down in the car, plus 45 minutes of gut-twisting back and forth turns through the woods to get to the cabin.

So as CareerMom and I lay by the fire the other night, we both confessed how little we were actually looking forward to this trip. Out of that came a plan: I would take our oldest son and go, while CareerMom stayed behind with the baby. There was really no way I could get out of going altogether given that the family made an effort to gather, but we both felt that taking the baby would only be a burden on everyone’s efforts at having fun considering the problems we have getting him to sleep in strange places. (Author’s Note: We took our oldest son down to the beach when he was four months old and despite constant admonishing while he was napping, people continued to yell and bang around and so he did not sleep and was miserable. Same bunch of people, same situation here).

I called my mom to break the bad news and she was, as expected, disappointed. But as I dug deeper into her disappointment, it became clear to me that really all she wanted to do was show off the baby. It was pretty clear that the rest of us coming was secondary. See, she has this little competition with her youngest sister whose daughter has two children. It’s all about whose kid is the cutest see and she’s built up my youngest son to epic proportions of cuteness and now, she’ll have no proof.  She also didn’t seem to buy my excuses, which are very valid and since she’s never raised a child, not something she can relate to.

At one point, she compared my youngest’s traveling issues with her sister’s daughter’s children and pointed out that since they are “in church all the time” (pointing out that we aren’t) her children are used to it. I pointed out, quite annoyed at this point, that having a child around other people in no way compares to traveling with children. Our kids are in daycare all day. They get along with people fine; they just HATE car seats, and they don’t sleep well in strange places.

If you’re in your fifties, and you raised children, you did so in the era of vans, during a time of built-in beds and tables and no car seats. Traveling then was a breeze compared to now. Now, the poor kid has to remain tightly strapped into a nonmovable, hard plastic car seat, with sides that come around like blinders giving the child little to look at for hours on end. It was a different time and traveling today is just so vastly different from thirty years ago.

Suffice it to say that I hung up the phone with absolutely no desire to go up there whatsoever. And what really steams me is that this will be the third time I/we’ve gone up there since spring and they haven’t come here once. But they have the nerve to question my complaints about travel.

It’s the holidays folks. How about we just be happy to get to see each other huh?

Categories
Dad Blogs Family Marriage

A momentary, “Oh Crap!”

 Which day is my anniversary on?

This morning as I sat at my desk, I momentarily panicked because I couldn’t remember today’s date and I knew that my anniversary was either today or tomorrow. I quickly double-clicked on my desktop’s calendar icon and thankfully, it’s tomorrow and luckily I still have time to get a card this afternoon and perhaps a bottle of bubbly and still look like a hero tomorrow. Before you ladies crucify me though, I had already booked a night away next weekend, which includes in-room champagne, chocolate covered strawberries, breakfast and a 50-minute massage. So, it’s not like I totally forgot about our anniversary. I guess in my mind I’d already “taken care of it” so I had just let it fall to the back on my “most important things to focus on this week” list.

But then my mind played a trick on me and I wondered if my anniversary was really tomorrow (the 6th) or today (the 5th) and perhaps I was remembering the date wrong. And what if  CareerMom, rather than telling me “Happy Anniversary” this morning, was waiting it out to see how long I’d go before remembering it. Kinda like giving me enough rope to hang myself with. Even as I type this, I’m 99% sure we got married on the 6th, but I’m still in 1% panic mode that maybe I’m wrong! This is why men should always get their wedding date engraved on the inside of their wedding band. I didn’t.

But man, I never thought I’d be “that guy.” I remember being single and thinking, “Wow! How could a guy ever forget his anniversary? What a stooge!” And now here I am, airing out my armpits after a ten second, sweaty panic attack over having done just that.

At least I did plan something though, so I’m not coming down too hard on myself. But even still, with all the planning and reminder tools I have at my disposal, why haven’t I set myself a reminder? Before my wife’s birthday I should have a reminder pop up a week prior that says, “Yo dawg! Don’t forget that CareerMom’s birthday is three days before yours.” That works—cuz, you know I’m not going to forget my birthday. Same thing for our anniversary.

But I’ll tell you, before I go judging other men on their forgetfulness, I’ll first stop and remind myself that life is stressful and demanding. Sometimes it’s easy to forget things, but even if/when you do, it doesn’t mean you don’t care.

Categories
Dad Blogs Family Marriage

Potato Soup for the Soul, Or Stomach Bug? You Tell Me

I fear that in light of several unfortunate intestinal problems this year, I am going to be forced to proclaim 2007 as “The Year of the Colon.”

Harken back if will to the ill-fated multi-family vacation to the beach earlier this year where I spent four of the most miserable hours of my life trying (unsuccessfully) not to puke over the side of the boat while on a deep sea fishing trip. Moving forward in time, just before I left on my vacation to Pennsylvania last week, I had what can only be called “pseudo-appendicitis” that included severe cramping symptoms among other things. On top of that, I’m on my second round of very strong antibiotics for the second time in 3 months. And now…oh now…

I knew that my going away for three days on a solitary (sans-family) vacation was going to cost me, but I wasn’t sure what form it would take. I figured that when I returned, my wife would pretty much hand me the kids and go for a walkabout around town. To her credit, she did give me a few hours of unpacking grace-period before doing so, but since returning, it’s pretty much been the daddy show in the evening. Which wouldn’t be so bad if our youngest of seven months hadn’t come down with an ear infection which has left him a blubbering mess, for which he is now on the very same antibiotics I’m on and which has also turned his colon into a sewage-like firehose from which there is no escape.

The night before last, my wife made a potato soup dish, no doubt inspired by something she read in a magazine her grandmother is fond of called “Cooking Light.” This magazine, in case you’re not familiar, basically takes really yummy versions of high-fat dishes and attempts to make low-fat versions of them. It also includes lots of pictures of MILFs in their little spandex outfits doing these cutesy little exercises while holding 5lb dumbbells (right!). This is the second such attempt at a recipe this month from this magazine, the first being a roasted chicken stuffed with lemons and rubbed with some kinda something (not oil mind you). The result was a terribly bland chicken…reminiscent of a poached chicken breast with no seasoning.

Back to the soup…in the place of whole milk and no doubt at least some butter and half and half, this recipe called for skim milk, sour cream and lord knows what else (I think I just threw up a little in my mouth while thinking about it just now). Now, this dish is one of those dishes that tastes pretty decent for the first few bites, but after a while, you realize that something just isn’t right. The connoisseur in me realized that for whatever reason, rather than having a light and creamy soup, we had a heavy, frothy concoction that wasn’t improved by adding any of the condiments (bacon bits, cheese, scallions) provided. Even as I told my wife it was yummy, I left a bit in my bowl complaining that I was full. No worries.

The next morning (yesterday) I awoke to a queasy tummy, which I blamed on both my antibiotics and on an…um…male pain that WebMD said was normal for prolonged infections in the body. As the day progressed, my queasiness worsened. I skipped the gym and headed home in hopes of some downtime before the fam arrived, only to be quickly followed by my wife suffering from the same ailment.

When I’m sick, I can’t sleep, but when my wife is sick…she sleeps for hours…so once again, I got to be up with the boys all evening (and night) and I’m happy to say that I’m feeling about 80% this morning. My wife is probably back up to 60% but since she started complaining of symptoms after I did, she should be pretty good by this afternoon.

So either, we got some kinda food poisoning from the soup (cuz neither child had any soup and neither child appears sick) or we both got a particularly virulent strain of a tummy bug. Either way, my mind blames the soup and as an added bonus, every now and then a “taste memory” pops up in my mind and in my mouth and it makes me want to just go let it all go. But alas, I have the stomach of iron (minus the fishing trip again mind you) and I just can’t throw up.

So, payback is a bit** and in this case, much worse than I imagined. But hey guess what? My wife gets to go out of town again tomorrow night so guess who gets to pay me back this weekend?