My Many Interests

Monday, September 23, 2013

Ramblings and Wishes

I don’t know why I do it, but sometimes I just can’t help myself. How I found the first video I couldn’t tell you, but before I knew it, I had watched about ten Daddy-Soldiers-Reuniting-with-Their-Kids videos. I guess I wanted to see someone get their parent back, when I know that Lilly and I won’t. It’s okay, folks. I’m not going mental. It made me feel good. And it cleared my sinuses.

I got in the photos that I had printed. Most of them are from the memorial, but I added some of Lilly and family members. I wanted to have them to put around the house, so that Lilly and I will have reminders in front of us. When they’re on a computer, you have to voluntarily search them out, but if they’re on a wall, you see them all the time.

I was thinking one night while I was out about all the things that Carroll and I didn’t do. Not big trips and the such, but little things like going out to dinner. The few times that we got a baby-sitter, we didn’t know where to go. Here’s our date would go:

Silence for the first 10 minutes of the drive and then we look at each other. Carroll: smiling “I want to go home and pick her up right now.”

“I do, too, but we’re not. We’re going to go and enjoy ourselves. Where do you want to go?”

“I don’t know. How about you?”

“I don’t know. You decide, because you don’t always like the places I pick.”

“I do, too!”

“Okay, Pappadeaux’s.”

“That’s Cajun. Everything is too spicy, even the chicken.”

“Ha Ha, see? So, how about some place we’ve never been?”

“I don’t know any places.”

And so on . . . . .

While I was out one night a few weeks back, I stopped by Barnes & Noble and then hit this little pizza place with a patio. The weather was perfect. I got a pizza, sat on the patio, watched traffic, and thought that Carroll would love this place. Of course, now, I’ll just have to tell her about it, but while I sat there, I thought why couldn’t I have found a place like this before and then we would have a place to go?

My only answer to that was something that I had heard before. You have to plan. If you don’t plan, then it doesn’t happen. Even little things like dinner with your spouse have to be planned. Especially, when you both are fighting a disease together. But this doesn’t have to just apply to the sick. You healthy folk could use a stress reducer like this. So, plan your date. Write it on a sticky note and put it on the fridge or the back of the front door. Then, when a miracle does happen and you get a free night, it’s already planned.

If it ever comes a time, and you’re the only one enjoying a great pizza, you won’t feel so guilty.