Saturday, February 27, 2010

Life's curveballs!

"Life is what happens when you are busy making other plans!" - John Lennon

This quote is actually a verse in John Lennons song "Beautiful Boy." However, considering the trials of the past several days, it seems incredibly appropriate. These past couple of days were nothing as I expected them to be. On Tuesday evening when I got off from work, I had this vision of having two restful days at home leading up to my Neurologist appointment on Friday (more about that in a later post).

On Wednesday morning, I had to get up and take my wife to work. This was planned because I had to take my mom and sister's car back to them. They have been very generous in allowing us to borrow their car for extended amounts of time since we lost ours. Anyway! The plan was to get up, take my wife to work and then come back, get the kids snuggled back in the bed with me, and go back to sleep for a few hours. Then came curveball number one! Both of my children, for whatever reason, woke-up (Lauryn at 4:30am and Ben at 5:15am) with no intention of going back to bed. So I got them dressed, got myself dressed, got them loaded in the car and headed out the door to take my wife to work. I stopped at McDonald's and got a quick breakfast for my wife and I. My children favor the biscuit and gravy from Dairy Queen with scrambled eggs on top, so I decided that I would wait until I got to Richmond and stop and get them breakfast that way I could feed them at my moms. I dropped my wife off at work and was en route to Richmond!

While in Richmond, my dad called and let me know that my step-mom's brother, Larry was in the hospital at the local VA. A few months ago, they discovered that Larry had cancer. I told my dad that I was in Richmond, but as soon as mom and Brandy finished running their errands, they would be brining me and the kids back to Lexington and before they left for Richmond with their car, I would come to the hospital. I asked him what he was going to do with the girls, my step-brother's children which he and my step-mom have custody of. He said that was going to take them to Daniel and let him keep him for the next few days. Insert curveball #2, and this is where my "two days of rest" disappeared. Dad said that he had not yet been able to get hold of Daniel, and might Angenette and I be able to watch the kids. Avoiding the question, I told him to keep trying to get hold of Daniel and rushed off the phone. Of course, he was unable to get hold of Daniel and asked if we could watch the kids. Of course, I did not mind. That is what family is for. Especially in time of need. So, he bought the girls to my house and we had for slightly less that forty-eight hours, we had, COUNT THEM, four children under the age of four-years-old at our house. WHAT AN ADVENTURE!

For the past several weeks Larry had been under the care of Hospice at his home in Paris, KY. His Hospice nurses decided on Wednesday that he needed to go back to the hospital to see if anything more could be done to help with the pain and possibly prolong the inevitable. A few minutes after two o'clock in the morning on Friday, February 26, Larry lost his brief but very courageous battle.

In the interest of time, and because my two-year-old just said, "Dad, I'm hungry! Let's eat!" I am going to have to bring this entry to a close. More on these topics later today:
  • My doctors appointment from yesterday.
  • Some quick notes on UK's game today at Tennessee.
  • My pick for the news stories of the week.
  • A rundown of the best comic strips of the week because you are never too old to have a good laugh!

Remember to take the time out to hug someone and let them know how much they mean to you! You never know when it might be your last chance!

More later,

- b

No comments:

Post a Comment