The Last Hurrah

We had been living the life transient and the pending move was wearing upon us all like the light at a tunnel's end that still required days of digging. We were sore and exhausted and our patience had long been packed.

Atticus worried, he fretted and he frowned. His was not a world to be upturned for the sake of flight or fancy. His was a world created by him and was lived to the extent that he found happiness in it. The move loomed upon him and rested heavily across his brow. His light lay at the entrance of said tunnel.

So it was that we decided to have his birthday party a couple of weeks early- before we left California. He needed to have his friends gather around him and wish him well. He needed the fun of a party filled with children he knew and not fear the possibility of empty chairs or faceless strangers.

He wanted all of this with a Star Wars theme.


And I added a little something that would have his name become the stuff of legend in classrooms and playgrounds:




We gave him a party and we created a memory nearly tangible. He shared it with his friends like so much cake.

There was a moment when I gathered the children around to weave them a tale of suspense and intrigue. I usually do this at parties.

I explained that due to our Star Wars theme there had been reports of Empire activity in the outer-limits of our drive. I nodded to their dry, beer-drinking parents and informed their little ears that all of the adults had pooled their money and hired a bounty hunter (when in truth none of those cheap bastards chipped in), one Jengo Fett to be exact, to hunt down the threat in our midst. To hunt down Darth Vader.

The kids ate that shit up.

I had them chanting, "Jengo! Jengo! Jengo..." when suddenly- he appeared!

Jango Fett emerged from the deepest reaches of my garage space and he walked stoically among the stupefied masses, one hand on his weapon and the other behind his back.

A hush fell over the children, a relative hush, and Jengo took his hand from behind him and he raised it over their frozen faces and they screamed as they realized that within his clutch was the head of Darth Vader.


Really. We did that. The kids loved it. The screams were joy and squeals and the promise of candy, which is something I didn't know about Darth Vader. His head is apparently stuffed with Laffy Taffy. That's probably the good within him that Luke was always whining about.


The party was a success and the children were happy and the parents were content that theirs was not an afternoon wasted, but rather an opportunity to drink free beer in the shade while their kids got sunburned and had the snot scared out of them. And it was good.

The only unfortunate aspect of the whole afternoon was that my good friend Joe missed Jango Fett, of whom he is a big fan. It was uncanny, really. Joe had just gone to the bodega to grab some salt and pencils when Jango arrived and then returned only moments after Jango left. Apparently it wasn't meant to be. The force works in mysterious ways.

There was a week left in California between the party and the move and it was filled with stress, long nights and backs that were tender to the touch, but the light grew all the closer and the tunnel? It echoed with the laughter of happy children.

And the Days You Can't Miss

I landed in Seattle at 10:30 on Sunday morning. It was Atticus' 6th birthday. I had been up since 4:30 and slept little on the plane. I hadn't had any coffee.

24 hours earlier I had been holding the hand of my aunt on one side and my sister on the other. I stared at crosses and through a window and into the eyes of my father at the podium, alone and crying. His pain was loss and loneliness.

My grandfather was behind me. I couldn't look at him. I couldn't look at anyone, but especially not him. Swimming in a sea of heartache is for country songs and bad poetry. There is no comfort there.

My grandfather was behind me and his pain was loss and loneliness.

24 hours earlier I had been drinking terrible coffee on a plane somewhere over someone else drinking coffee, hopefully better. I had been up since 4:30 and slept little the night before. I hadn't eaten anything.

Arizona in June is helpless and hopeless. It is hell with less trees. The earth peels in every direction and the wind slaps you with lies and hot air. There is no comfort there.

It is hotter in the sadness.

I landed in Seattle at 10:30 on Sunday morning. It was Atticus' 6th birthday. I hugged him and his brother and asked if he was ready to celebrate.

He was.



Happy Birthday, Son.

A Lifetime and a Loss

We arrived 3 hours early for a three hour flight. My mother would be proud. We ate oatmeal and pastries in a room that was equal parts Starbucks, pizza place and bar. It was almost early enough to drink. It would be his first flight. The kid was excited.

Somewhere in a car on a mountain my wife was driving with a sleeping boy and every pet we have. She was making good time.

My thoughts were lost in the day before. My father had called on Friday morning, the day before our move. He said she had about 24 hours left. That was what the doctor had said. The day before the doctor had said about 3 weeks.

40 minutes later she was dead.

She had only been sick a few months.

Cancer is cruel and heartless and someone should punch it in the mouth.

When she was first admitted to the hospital I had flown down to see her. She hadn't expected me. My presence in the doorway made her cry. She held my hand for a good hour. It felt like a time machine.

I haven't been that young in a long time.

Tomorrow I'll arrive at the airport about 45 minutes before my three hour flight. I will take a seat at the bar and I will drink a Bloody Mary minutes after I have eaten my breakfast. I will arrive in the place I left some 10 years ago. Again. I will sit with family and people I've never met and I will hear stories about my grandmother and I will nod at strangers and hug people that haven't seen me since I was this tall.

I will be a little boy without a grandma and I will cry accordingly.

____________________________________

If you've been reading this blog over the past several months you know about my grandmother and her battle with cancer. Thank you for reading and for your thoughts and support. Wynema Honea was 80-years-old and I have loved her for nearly half of them.

Chick Chat - Now With Penis!

So a long time ago I told the good people at Chick Chat that I would participate in a video segment featuring the dads of teh internetz (is that how they write that?), and then I forgot about it.

Then I loaded up all of my belongings into a shipping container and sent them to another state. My belongings include my video camera and lamps.

Then I had the week from hell. There is much stress in me. We're moving in a few days. We decided to sell the house rather than rent it sometime last week. Today we met with the Realtor. We've got a lot of shit to do.

Then my grandmother started the painful, downhill slide into losing her battle with cancer. She's not expected to survive the week.

That's why my video sucks. It's dark and grainy and I'm guessing a little cruder than the people at Chick Chat were hoping for. Sorry about that.

You'll also notice that my video does not have any fancy edits or credits or a soundtrack of any kind. That is because I suddenly had an hour less than I thought, thanks to someone explaining to me that there really is a Central time zone. Also, there's a really goofy-looking guy blocking the nice blue wall.

Who knew?

That said, here's my contribution, and despite the fact that you'll surely hate it, I had fun.

Please visit the other dads and their obviously better videos: Kevin at Always Home and Uncool, Tyler and Kacey at Three Bay B Chicks, and Husband of The Scattered Mind of a Tattooed Minivan Mama. Also, my condolences to Jason that couldn't make the video due to his own grandmother passing. He's at DadCentric and you should be, too.

Holy crap, I just realized that this thing is over 9 minutes long - and apparently the sound was dubbed later. That's the kind of awesome I bring to the table.