March 21
In which Owen's is the best daddy... EVER.
When Robin went to Paris with, first, her friend Rene and then her parents, I promised her she would come home to a child and pets who were alive. Not clean, not happy, not even necessarily healthy. But alive.
I mostly delivered.
Actually, the boys didn't fare too poorly on their lonesome. We managed to get to school roughly on time, although the trip was frequently harrowing. Robin, it seems, has introduced Owen to the Chipmunks' music and I had to listen to Alvin, Simon and Theodore sing the Beatles' She Loves You (Yeah! Yeah! Yeah!) approximately 900 times.
I consider this cruel and unusual punishment. As a matter of self-preservation, I introduced Owen to the theme song to Speed Racer. I've listened to that 1,000 times now. I'm almost (but not quite) ready for the Chipmunks again.
Otherwise, things went well except for one embarrassing moment when Daddy tried to drop Owen off and discovered that school was closed for teachers' in-service day.
Daddy had a busy day of work that day. Daddy taught Owen some new vocabulary that day.
Even so, the teachers have apparently given me a nod of approval for keeping the boy relatively under control. We ate a minimum of McDonald's and I even managed to make it to the father's day program.
There, I discovered that Owen and his friends had done portraits of their fathers complete with little write-ups. My picture was one of the only ones where the father had hair. (Good boy!)
Owen had this to say about me:
"My dad is six years old. He has short gray hair. He has brown eyes. He smiles and is serious when I don't brush my teeth. My dad has some whiskers on his cheeks and when he gets ready for work he shaves them off. He drinks blue stuff to clean his mouth out. His cologne smells like polish. I like the smell."
I hadn't realized I smelled like lemon Pledge.
Being pleased that Owen drew me with hair, I took him to the Boston Children's Museum over the weekend. He climbed on the exhibits, played basketball and made a wooden boat. On our way out, he (and the lines at the restaurant) convinced me that we could have a donut for lunch.
Remember, I never promised healthy.
The weekend after the Children's Museum, we packed up and headed to Kansas City for a visit with Grandma Pat. Grandma had spent the weeks prior recovering from a new treatment for her lung cancer: radial ablation.
I don't understand the in's and out's of the treatment, but I believe it is something like this: A red hot needle is shoved into your chest and used to cook the tumor. In Mom's case, this also collapsed her lung which ultimately required seven chest tubes to heal it. So, essentially, she was stabbed eight times.
Robin made it to KC to help care for Mom. I missed all the fun; especially when the air from Mom's lung seeped under her skin and inflated her like a balloon.
All things considered, Grandma Pat looked remarkably well by the time Owen and I got to her. She tired easily, but still managed to visit lots of friends of family including Chris Sparks and his gorgeous new daughter, Jessa. We also saw Aunt Ruth and our good buddy, Holly.
Owen has long been used to Grandma's oxygen, but isn't really processing that she's still sick. He kept unplugging her oxygen tube (or standing on it when she walked by to see her head snap back). He also insisted Grandma play soccer with him which, amazingly, she did.
Most obnoxious, however, was Owen's new game. He stole the breathing tube from Grandma's inspirator and filled it with her decorative plastic Easter eggs. Then, in a grand production, he blew into the tube to shoot the eggs spectacularly up into the air.
Poor Grandma. She will likely recover from the cancer treatment only to be felled by some nasty childhood disease that Owen has brought home from pre-school.
Fortunately, at the time of this writing, all grandparents are doing well. Everyone is safe and sound in their own homes and Owen has all his people accounted for. Only Mommy suffices for bath time and good-night stories although Daddy may fetch milk. (This, provided he doesn't stay around too long after delivery.)
We await the Easter Bunny with great anticipation and spent this evening dyeing eggs. I despise eggs, however, and live in dread of being asked to eat some of the nasty things. Worse, I can only shudder to imagine Owen's pretend farts (yes, that is the new game) turning into real ones after he downs a few of the hard-boiled horrors.
Still, I will endure. It is what great fathers do.
