|
PREJUDICED PRIDE
Friday Dec. 27, 2013
Feels strange.
It does.
Unfamiliar landscape.
Altered schedule.
Routine? Left it at home.
Two days off in the middle of the week.
And now it’s Friday – another day off, to be followed by a weekend of two more days off.
Not working feels strange.
Work will wait.
More important things to do here.
Parents are proud – I was a young one once.
When we are young parents, our pride is mitigated by all that exhausting toil – providing for, caring for, spending time on, playing with and cleaning up after children. Pride comes from watching their awesome accomplishments, not from patting our backs concerning our own.
Though there is nothing but goodness in raising children, that all pales when compared to watching them grow up to parent a babe of their own. That IS awe inspiring.
I sleep so well here.
I’m not convinced it is the quiet. Or absence of a TV in the room.
More so, I think, because my granddaughter is in the next room, my daughter is down the hall – there is a comfort, difficult to verbalize, but it generates very peaceful feelings.
Yesterday’s late start – lazily doing domestic chores, then getting on the road, a drive, a burger, catching up on some calls consumed the drive time, brief visit with Gary – then to Fort Saskatchewan in time to visit with Isla before her bedtime.
And more playtime with her again this morning as she enjoys her toys and warms again, albeit slowly, to an unfamiliar face that says ‘come give grandpa a hug’ which she blithely ignores. She visits her new toy blocks, her kitchen, her balls, pets the cat, listens to a story, eats breakfast, colours with her markers and is gone in a shot to unpack and spread out again those things her mom has just cleaned up and put away. I’m clearly too old for the active parent role (I’m amazed at Carla’s energy given she’s 8+ months pregnant with Isla’s baby brother) … I drink coffee. I like to watch!
Much fun/serious talk too, last night – visiting with Carla (Chad was working).
Just two of us.
That doesn’t happen very often.
And we talked about her sister.
Good conversation to have.
We talked about some planning I’ve not done. Good too – impetus to get some things written down so my wishes are known by someone other than me.
The grey light of sunless sky – overcast, prairie landscape out the window that will, when spring arrives, be blocked my new home construction – for now, serene view, children are playing upstairs while Chad sleeps to recover from long night shift. I must go now – I think I hear a little girl coming down a corridor, uttering words of encouragement for mom to put on a DVD, I hear words like ‘Oscar’ and ‘cookie monster’ coming softly down a stairwell in hushed tones because her daddy is sleeping.
Mark Kolke
200,248
column written/ published from Fort Saskatchewan
morning walk: -3C / 26F, we had a pre-dawn stroll down streets of the adjacent subdivision cell, Gusta on the trail of many tracks as windswept lots where spring basements will be dug under a low ceiling of strangely lit clouds – so quiet, so still
Comments Received:
Happy Boxing Day, Mark: Am sure your trip north to see Carla and family will be filled with happy memories to last until the next time. How lucky are they that you’re fit and able to make those trips to see Isla. And not only that, you come, bearing mouth watering gifts! I empathize about your other daughter. As I’ve mentioned before, we’ve been estranged from our only son for more than 2 years, and it’s like a knife wound to the heart … much more pronounced at what’s normally considered “family times”. But, we get on with living, biting the proverbial bullet so to speak. The joy is that his only child, our granddaughter keeps the joy for us and always spends a few hours here on Christmas Day. So, we take the good and enjoy it for what it is, and try, very hard, to overlook the bad. All the best now and in the coming year. Your Dad, bless him, is so fortunate to have his son, so close, so attentive, and so kind, BJR, Calgary, AB
| 
