The first time I moved to Texas she sent me a note saying it was important for us to get to know each other better.
It had a list of questions and a set of answers.
She was 9-years-old and no one was more consistent about Facetiming or Skyping me than my daughter.
The girl who at four would often tell me to put on the music and twirl her turns 17 tomorrow.
I am going to miss celebrating in person on her actual birthday for the second time in her life.
The first happened because her grandfather died that day and I had responsibilities that required immediate attention.
The second is because we are in two different states and I have responsibilities that require my immediate attention.
I think she understands the connection and that these decisions are not made lightly. I haven’t told her they are quite painful but I did make it clear it is very disappointing to me not to be able to celebrate together on her day.
Parenting is a hard gig sometimes, you make hard decisions that you think will yield benefits for the long term but sometimes agonize over whether they were the correct ones.
When Dad ended up sojourning in New Jersey for six months the guy on the right told me he was going to go back East to bring his son home.
He was 90 and for a short while we went to war over it but eventually he agreed there wasn’t anything he could do and it didn’t make sense.
It sticks out in my head because he was one of my biggest cheerleaders, so for grandpa to yell at me it had to be big.
Something must have been in the air because my maternal grandfather asked me how Sam was doing with it all.
I told him a little bit and he said he didn’t blame his machatonim and that he would have done the same regarding my mother or aunt.
Seventeen years later the memories of some of the conversations from that period are still vivid.
In part because they both told me that I had been thrown in thick of it and these were the moments when you did the best you could because there were no easy answers.
They were right.
A Functional Keyboard
It is a blessing and a relief to have a functional keyboard again. Been writing on and off here and there not just because I enjoy it but because it is much easier.
Such a relief, it was worth the 2.5 hours of pain and the chunk of time to get things set up in a way that works for me.
Still got a ways to go, but we’re quickly getting there.
Takes a minute to get used to certain functions of new technology but it is worth the aggravation and I expect it not to take too long to find a few new useful tricks.
He is right and he is write.
Got to jump on the treadmill for a few and decompress. Maybe I’ll come back and add more to the writing in a bit.
The flow here is a little choppy anyway, never hurts to pick up your feet and turn off you brain for a few.
