bflynn

An earthquake

Unless you’ve been living with your head under a rock, you know that recently there have been two major earthquakes. On January 12, a magnitude 7 earthquake struck near the Haitian capital of Port au Prince. We will likely never have an exact casualty toll, but estimates on the number people killed range between 217,000 and 230,000. That’s about as many people as died last year in the US from pneumonia, strokes and murder — combined. (¹). The toll continues to rise, as people suffer from secondary effects of the quake like malnutrition, untreated infections from injuries, poor water quality and other issues.

On February 27th, a quake measure 8.8 hit near the Chilean city of Concepcion. This was such a powerful shaking of the earth that it may have actually shortened the length of the day by 1.26 milliseconds (²). I could not find a definitive death toll, but estimates range between 300 – 800 people, although that toll may rise as the evaluation continues.

I was struck by the difference between these two quakes. The Chilean quake was 500 times more powerful than the Haitian quake. But the death toll in Haiti was more than two orders of magnitude larger than the toll in Chile? Why is that?

I’m no expert. I know there are a lot of natural factors involved, including the proximity of the epicenter to a population center, the depth of the earthquake, and population density.

But here in this natural disaster, one of the key differences between 230,000 people dead and 700 people dead was not nature at all, but human preparation and planning. I’m here to tell you that architects save lives. Simply put, Chile has strong government enforcement of building codes designed to help buildings and their inhabitants withstand serious earthquakes. Haiti, a poverty-stricken country, did not have the rigorous building codes, nor did it have the laws and enforcement to back up the codes it did have. While the difference in building codes doesn’t account for all the difference in the loss of life that followed the quakes, it played an important role.

This is not to blame Haiti or Haitians for their own disaster. The poverty that underlies the lower construction quality has complicated roots reaching back centuries. And unlike Chile, Haiti had not had recent earthquakes to serve as warnings and reminders.

But still, I’m struck by how much human decisions can impact the outcome of natural disasters.

It’s by no means close to the tragedy of these two seismic events, but I’ve been close to a little earthquake myself this last week. On Sunday night, I got an email from the CEO of my new company informing all of us that we have entered an agreement to be acquired. For those of you unfamiliar with how this works, being acquired is usually a great thing for shareholders, often a good thing for clients, but a time of great uncertainty for employees. The ground shakes beneath your feet. Are you going to be part of the “efficiency”? Your entire department? Will the new employer scrap the parts of the company you like? How many of the other folks packing the cafeteria with you to listen to the announcement will be working somewhere else this time next year? Or is it you who will have yet another new cube?

But what can you do? It’s like a natural disaster — totally out of your control!

This is where that stark contrast comes into play. If Chile had thrown up it’s hands in the face of seismic uncertainty and said “What can you do? It’s a natural disaster!” many more of their citizens would not have seen the sun rise on February 28th. Instead, they planned, they prepared and they invested in ways to make sure that however the ground moved, the buildings will stand.

We can do the same in our lives, against our smaller disasters. We can make sure we have disability insurance. We can make some sacrifices in order to have that emergency savings account. We can actually read through those lists of preparations and stash the backpacks with emergency equipment in our basements. We can put aside enough water for 5 days per member of the household, and practice fire drills with our children. We can set up points of contact for if we are separated from our loved ones in times of tumult. We can make sure our skills and network stay up to date, even when we have no intention of switching jobs. We can continue to learn new technologies and master new tools.

Like Haiti, poverty or inability may prevent us from preparing the way we should. But for those for whom that isn’t the case, take this as a wakeup call. Are you as prepared as you can be for the disasters that can shake the foundations of your life? Because you are not helpless against them.

How Are You Doing?

It’s a question we get asked often. “How are you doing?” Most of time time, the asker doesn’t really expect a response, past “Fine, and you?” In many circumstances, it’s a social faux pas to actually answer the question. On those other circumstances, looking into someone’s eyes and clasping their hand for an extra split-second to convey you really mean it, you might hear an abbreviated version. “My sister is in the hospital.” “I’ve been really worn down lately.” Sometimes you still get a stoic “fine” which translates as either I don’t want to talk about it, or I don’t believe you want to hear it.

I’ve been reading The Happiness Project by Gretchen Ruben lately, and it got me thinking about how I talk about my own state of being. She talks about how awareness and mindfulness of your own happiness — thinking of your blessings as you might call it — enhances and to some degree even creates your state of happiness. (Otherwise, I fear, happiness is rewarded retroactively. When things go bad you might recall that you were happy then, and didn’t even realize it.)

I’d been under the impression that I do a good job of acknowledging and being present in my joy. That’s how it seems to me, that when I am happy (which is not rare) I know my own happiness and hopefully radiate it back out to those around me. This has been a happy period for me, with unprecedented leisure (between jobs), a healthy fun family, small children in the most fleeting time of their lives, a good balance of things I do for others and things I do for myself, and an ample supply of coffee. I even set out to very intentionally NOT complain about how fast my break flew by or how it was still finite.

Then the other day my husband said to me, “You’ve seemed so unhappy lately.” WHAT? Really? Here I am, knowing that I am happy in my heart and thinking that it shows, and the person who knows me best is worried that I’m UN-happy.

So I pondered where this disconnect arose between what I know I am feeling (joy!) and what I am showing (stress!). There are a few things. I’ve been working on some challenges in my life where the only person who can really listen as I work through them is my husband, so he’s probably heard a disproportionate amount about those things. But perhaps mostly, I realized, it’s how I answer HIS questions about “How are you doing?”

With people I do not love dearly, I’m liable to give a very positive reply. “Fantastic!” or “Great!” But in the partnership of marriage? I get defensive about my happiness. On some subconscious level, I’m afraid if I tell HIM I’m happy or doing well, he’ll decide I don’t need his help and support. Even in the best of marriages there’s a certain jockeying for finite privileges, like getting to sleep in or who’s going to put the kids to bed when we both just want to collapse and/or do something fun. We handle these things pretty well, I think, but in my back-brain I’m convinced that if I tell him I’m feeling happy and well-rested, the logical conclusion will be that I should definitely do the tooth-brushing then. So instead I answer, “Well, I didn’t sleep well last night.” Or “I just got done doing another load of laundry” or instead of the “Fantastic!” a stranger might get, I reply, “Ok, I guess.” That “fantastic” is really the more true answer, but instead we get into a subtle competition about who’s more legitimately tired.

How sad. How wrong. My subconscious doesn’t even really have much to go on in this diminution of joy, either. My husband always does his share. But out of this defensive mechanism of mine, I’m hiding my joy in him and in the life we have built together. I’m not entirely sure how to resolve this, except to be more open and less defensive. To share more equally of my joys. To volunteer a little more brightly when I see or feel something that is good.

I am a happy person. I am living a happy life. I hope that the joy of it does not just lurk unspoken in my heart, but shines forth to my husband, my children and my community.

One of Gretchen’s blog posts that really struck a nerve was about the cost of being joyful in our society. She shared a prayer by St. Augustine:

Tend your sick ones, O Lord Jesus Christ;
rest your weary ones; bless your dying ones;
soothe your suffering ones; pity your afflicted ones;
shield your joyous ones.
And all for your love’s sake.

So. How are YOU doing?

Vignettes

Grey seems to be doing very well in his new preschool. We’re hearing about his friends and the things he’s doing. He keeps careful tabs on what we’re packing for his lunch, and offers guidance on acceptable offering. He’s bringing home art projects. One recent one was about the tooth fairy. The question was “What does the tooth fairy do with the teeth she collects?” His answer was that “She cuts the teeth and wishes come out.” Neat! He’s also bringing home these awesome drawings with these elaborate back stories. He’s reading more and more (although I think that’s unrelated to preschool). He reads a lot more than I realize, sometimes, and can read entire books. He picks up lots and lots of written words. So he seems like he’s doing very well.

We also get these sheets on Thane’s progress. All I can say is man, that kid can eat. There’s an update on how much of his lunch he ate, and the answer is almost always nearly all of it. It’s also kind of funny how surprised and unused we are to him talking. The surgery was now about three weeks ago, so you’d think we would’ve adjusted, but he keeps being verbal in ways we don’t expect. It’s like if Maggie from the Simpsons broke out in a discourse with Lisa. For example, at dinner tonight Grey turned to him and asked “So Thane, how was your day at daycare?” (Aside: I love that Grey has internalized that dinner is sharing time — sometimes he’ll ask his father and I how our days were, too.) So far, so sweet. But then Thane replies, “Good!” Yoinks! Or Thane will come out with his new favorite word, “No.” He loves to do something he knows he’s not allowed to do, while saying “No” as though that somehow makes it ok? Unfortunately, the new daycare does NOT accommodate his need for a morning nap, which I really don’t understand. He’s 16 months old, as of this weekend. Plenty of 16 month olds haven’t dropped their morning nap yet, right? He plays hard, he eats hard, he sleeps hard. Actually, as he gets older, I think he looks more and more like my father – right down to the large feet. (He wears a shoe size only two sizes smaller than Grey does, and Grey is hardly small-footed. My father wears a size 13 wide.)

My first week at work was absolutely as good as a first week could be. I really like my coworkers. I’ve met oodles of people. I’m very well supported. I’ve gotten my first task, and I’m at the panic stage of learning a new language. It’s structured very differently than web technologies, and I haven’t figured out the structure yet. My colleagues come from very different backgrounds (Lotus Notes, for example) and can’t help me figure out the analogies because they don’t know where I’m coming from. So I’m doing the time-honored technique of reading everything I can find, staring at code samples, and waiting for it all to gel. It will. I know it will, it just requires (amazingly) hard work, open-mindedness, patience and sleep.

The storm last night was amazing. It would’ve been some blizzard if it had come down as snow. It came down as driving rain. The noise was astounding. It sounded like we were sleeping at the base of a waterfall. I have never heard such noise! The house, however, did not shake. I feel very secure in its old bones. On the other hand, we lost some of the gutters — all the way up to the roof line. They just need to be put back into place. Also, the trim on our windows is really quite rotted. Does anyone know what one does about that, other than hire a contractor to come replace all the trim in our windows? (Ah, yes. I suspect that’s the real answer.)

I’m loving the Olympics. I’ve tried to record the nightly programs, and they’re a lot of fun. I’m sad to see them come to a close. However, as the rains fall and the snow melts it comes to mind that not far away is spring training. Truck day has come and gone. Pitchers and catchers have reported. Position players are in Ft. Meyers. In fact, according to a quick trip to their site, the first Spring Training game is next week! Ah, winter. You do not ACTUALLY last forever. You just feel like it! For some reason, this winter has seemed less oppressive to me than usual. Perhaps it’s all the change in my life, or getting enough sleep for a week there.

Interim report

I think I really like the new company. I have yet to meet a colleague I don’t genuinely like, and I swear I met the entire third floor this morning. (Just about the only people I haven’t met are the guys next door — and I’ll get there!) As of about 3:30 this afternoon, I even got a real-o programming assignment in the brand new language/environment that I’ll be working in. I believe I read my panic and inability to figure anything out correctly as complete fatigue. This afternoon and tomorrow will be the worst of the ignorance, and then I’ll start climbing the hill towards competence.

It’s funny how much I find I know about things that aren’t actually useful. There was a discussion about contracts and pricing and I was practically jumping up and down because THAT is an issue that I UNDERSTAND.

Anyway, hopefully once I’m using less of my processing power for making friends, remembering names and learning new languages, I’ll have some left over for you!

Oriented zombie needs BRAAAAAINS….

So Monday morning arrived, and lo. It was time for me to do a “commute” and go to “werk” again. I spent the first four hours of my day being oriented on things, large and small, at my new company. It was interesting. I’m sure I’ll remember it later, when I actually have slept on it. Right now, I’m like, “Uh, I learned like stuff?” Then I spent the afternoon attempting to log into all the various systems I was supposed to log in to, unpacking my huge box o’ stuff (my pens occasioned comment), discovered where the loot was stored, where IT sits, and that there is composting available in my building. I call that a day well done.

Oh also, this blog represents my own view and by no means the view of my employer, who I’m kind of hoping no one ever figures out or ties back to this blog, so it really really doesn’t represent them. (Why yes, I did actually read the internet use documentation and guidelines. I’m a sucker like that.)

I don’t intend to discuss my employer or employment much here. And obviously that’s like 90% of what I’m thinking about right now. That and logistics, like packing lunches, how tired and hungry the boys are when I pick them up from their new preschool and other completely thrilling things like that.

So to sum up:
Good day. Good company. Things are going well.
Hopefully I will be less zombielike soon.

Once more, into the breach

So this Friday is my last day of the blessed interregnum. I think it’s time. Two weeks was, as it turns out, just long enough. On the one hand, I think I could handle this pretty much indefinitely if forced to… this whole not working while mostly getting paid, having benefits, and having the kids go to daycare. It’s a tough gig, I know.

But I’m really well rested. I’m the best rested I’ve been in years. In part thanks to that darn stomach bug on Monday, I’ve gotten more sleep this fortnight than I’ve gotten since… I don’t know when. Maybe since puberty. Nah, there WAS that stretch of unemployment in 2001. Still. I slept in until 10 am this morning because hey! Gather you snoozes while you may for time is still a-flying!

And then there’s my to do list. Do you remember that long list? I’ve done the taxes, done the budget (that took ALL DAY yesterday, for reals), cleaned the carpet, cleaned out our clothing for donation, gotten recycling stickers (although not put them on the cans), applied for a HELOC and was told that one needs EQUITY for a Home Equity Line of Credit. (Who knew!) I got the cat food, bleached the comforter, cleaned off the front porch, repotted my ivy, made a turkey dinner, did the old company offboarding, the new company onboarding, got sick, took care of a sick kid, and tried to make sure that our evenings and weekends were unusually chore free.

I did not order pictures or update the baby book, but the day is not yet done.

On the fun side, I read several books (not enough), watched the Olympics, beat Torchlight, got to an end point in Fable and slept in. I probably did a little too much work and a little too little goofing, but even when you’re not working, there isn’t infinite time.

This moment is a little frustrating. I look at everything undone (why does the pile seem none-diminished?) and think, “Wow, it’ll be hard getting around to that.” There are still things that I’m not willing to give up, but that I know will be a challenge to get done. I realize I’ve been thinking of starting my new job as the complete loss of all free time. While for sure I will not have as much free time as at my last month or two at my old job, or this lovely break, my life will not cease because I have a job. (If so, it’s the wrong job for me. I don’t think this will be the case.) I wish there was some way to channel the restedness of my current self to make life easier for me in the future. I suppose that’s what doing the taxes now was all about.

It actually helped TREMENDOUSLY to have that interim meeting with them. I can imagine where I’ll be sitting, what kind of work I’ll be doing at first, who my coworkers will be. Instead of a black box onto which I project my worst fears, I have a filled in outline of my opportunities. It’s a great company.

I admit that I am afraid for this blog. I’ve worked really hard at it. I know that may not always be obvious from the quality of posts: “Today’s random collection of cute kid stuff and witty complaining”. But some of the posts have been hard work, hard writing, and stuff I can be proud of. Writing a blog post is a little like buying a lotto ticket — you keep hoping that this will be the one that launches you to Internet Fame and Advertiser Fortune! But that hasn’t been the case for me. The few I thought had a chance to do that have settled down into obscurity. In fact, the one posting of my that is most hit is from a Google search of “today sucks”. (Sorry mom! You taught me to use better language!) It’s exactly the kind of whiny post I write on days when I have nothing to say. The only redeeming fact is that plenty of people click through for a link of “Gives Me Hope” that I added after noticing all the traffic.

So what does the future here hold? Gradual drying up? Guilt for not posting? New, rich posts because my brain has all this new, rich material to process? Once a week catchups? I don’t know.

I love variety. I struggle with change. I’m not nearly as confident as I appear in the movies. I just have to have faith it’ll all work out.

Oh, before I forget! I didn’t do my big “order prints for great-grandma and baby books and a non-digital future” but I DID get the latest pictures up on the web. There are three sections:

The goodbye party at Chuck E Cheese: aka why I should be nominated for sainthood

My church’s potluck. Probably not interesting to you unless you attend my church.

Family photos from February

And finally, I did something new. For Grey’s second to last day at his old preschool they were supposed to bring a picture of something they loved. I let him loose with the camera. When he was done, I made a collage on Picasa (fun and addictive!) of some of the things he loved. I made one mistake, making it too much about the things I love, but hey. We’re all human. He didn’t notice.

Tax day

So today is sacred to the Doing of the Taxes. I have to admit, taxes are super-un-fun for me because we often end up owing money. Very large chunks of money. Amounts of money that could be a lot of fun in other circumstances. So I have all the joy and happiness of doing taxes just so, at the end, I can have the thrill and fulfillment that come with writing a Very Large Check to the federal government.

So imagine my chagrin and disappointment when I logged in incorrectly to my tax website (which I use, you know, once a year) too many times and they told me I’d have to wait 20 minutes before logging in again. Oh, horrors! Despair! And I was so looking forward to it!

On a completely unrelated note, I can’t figure out why it takes me all day to do taxes, can you? Nope. Boggles the imagination.

So for today’s offering you get a completely unrelated and random grab bag of Stuff I’ve Been Thinking About. All of which may or may not get written in 20 minute interstices between incorrect logins.

Thing 1
So for several weeks now, my husband has been talking about his “Secret project”. He’s had this box that he works on that I’m not allowed to see. He spent many an evening in pursuit of his secret project. I was getting the distinct feeling I was about to be seriously outclassed on Valentine’s Day. Desperately, I bought some Hazelnut Lindor Truffles and hoped for the best.

Well, he gave me half a dozen red rozes, and a box of chocolates from Fine Chokolader.

Here are the roses:

A closeup:

Aren’t they lovely? I was taken completely by surprise by his hard work and the gorgeous outcome. Then he showed me the rest of the box — all these practice runs and different flowers. It was hours and hours of effort. It is gorgeous. And best of all, these flowers won’t wilt or fade. Thank you, love.

Thing 2 – the Olympics in Vancouver
When I was young and still learning how the world works, my family took a trip to Vancouver BC for Expo 86. (Funny, I could’ve SWORN it was Expo ’88, but the internet must know better than I!) This was a huge deal to my young mind. I remember distinctly the amazement at having my passport stamped by all these countries (or, er, their booths as the case may be). I remember the robot taking a picture with us. It was hot, I recall. And Vancouver was this mecca of excitement — the most important place on earth at that moment! (Or so it felt.)

I suspect my opinion of the importance of the World’s Fair was greatly affected by growing up in proximity to Seattle. If you heard about he history of Seattle, which I did rather ad nauseum growing up, you couldn’t miss the importance of the 1962 World’s Fair in taking a provincial town and turning it into a world class city proud of itself and its accomplishments. It was for the ’62 World’s Fair that Seattle built the Space Needle. My father was a Boy Scout volunteer for those games. It was, and still is, a Big Deal.

Finally, for the last couple years my husband and I have vacationed across the straight in Victoria. Which, for the record, is totally not like Vancouver. But I have a sense of fellow feeling, of “I’ve been there!” that makes the entire thing even more fun to watch!

OK, the tax software has finally let me in, so I suppose I should have at. Watch this space for more procrastinatory dialogue AND/OR bonus whining about having to pay more than was withheld.

(Note: I’m actually philosophically delighted to pay taxes. I generally think they’re a great idea, although my confidence in the system has taken a bit of a hit lately. However, that doesn’t prevent me from whining about it.)

Prelude to the Afternoon of Shovelling the Driveway

The last few days have not gone as planned. First Grey got the stomach bug, and lo. Sunday was not as expected. Then Monday I had procured tickets to The Secrets of Tomb 10A, and my husband and I were going to go check out the mummies ALL BY OURSELVES. It was going to be just like Vienna. And maybe we’d have a dilatory lunch or something. Bliss!

Then I was going to pick the kids up from Lawrence and drive past all my old haunts one last time. You can go back to visit, but you never again go back to belong. It was such an unexpected belonging — me and the creaky, broke, corrupt, lovely City of Lawrence. I would go a last time over the 130 year old iron bridge that will soon be demolished, that I could see from my window at work. I’d check out the latest foreclosure signs. I’d whisper goodbye and feel silly and maybe shed a few tears as I pulled away from Rubertina’s a last time.

All this was not to be. I spend the day as sick as I’ve been in Grey’s lifetime. I think the last time I was that sick was while I was pregnant with him. The time before was my freshman year of college. I rarely get very sick. But I was washed out. Sitting up was too much work. I napped from 10 am to 3 pm. My butt hurt from excessive sitting. Before about 8 pm, what I’d had to eat was 20 cheerios, 5 Ritz and some Jello. I skipped COFFEE people, that’s how serious it was.

On the plus side, I seem to have lost some weight! Not the best way to go about doing it, but don’t look a gift stomach bug in the mouth! (No really, to be avoided.)

Then, this morning, the boys’ first day at their new daycare, we go in to find Thane’s crib covered in vomit. Of course, based on his behavior today I’m not at all convinced he’s sick, piker. He’s certainly not anywhere as sick as *I* was, Mr. Incredibly Perky and Can I Come Up On the Couch For the 93rd Time Mom?

And so my last week of employment freedom races by in a blur of effluvia. And I haven’t even done the taxes yet. (Tomorrow! It must be tomorrow!)

I’d tell you more, but there’s about 3 inches of sticky white snow that should be shoveled while Thane sleeps, or this’ll get ugly.

Put today in the loss column

I try hard to focus on the positive, the joyful and the thoughtful. I attempt to shift my mental space from the whining (which is easy and natural) to the rejoicing. I have read that rehearsing a litany of wrongs makes you an angrier person, whereas choosing not to do so and not to practice your anger makes you actually happier. I believe this to be true. I suspect, since this is the venue where I do much of my intellectual and emotional processing, that this leads to a rather Polyanna-ish blog of my life. (Although it’s worth reminding you that Polyanna’s optimism worked!)

Anyway, that’s a long and meta intro to say that today? I’m not up to it. I can’t even tell you what exactly happened to make today one to be forgotten. It started ok — I got to sleep in until a near pre-kids hour due to an amazing and loving husband. But Thane is at such a stage. He’s not bad, not at all, but he’s demanding. I probably hauled him up onto the couch 45 times today. He wants things that are beyond his capabilities. He doesn’t really believe that I mean it when I say no. He hits his head on things apparently recreationally. And when thwarted, he throws a back-bending, writhing fit. He is, in short, 15 months old. (Aside: it’s AMAZING just how much progress he’s made verbally since the ear tube surgery. It’s VASTLY different. In the what, week? I swear his vocabulary has doubled. He OBVIOUSLY wasn’t hearing well before and now he’s parroting EVERYTHING. It’s pretty awesome.)

Grey? Well, he’s his own version of demanding. He bounces back between super-capable and frankly lazy and demanding. (AKA: four years old) He and I had a little friction this morning, which I suspect was at least equally due to me being cranky for no good reason. Then, aikido. Oh, he’s been doing so WELL. He knows the names of the techniques. His focus is amazing. He’s energetic. He listens and does well. But today we had an EPIC MELTDOWN.

I’ve always read that you should be very honest and true to your word with your children, and I have tried to be. (I think integrity is important, and I think it’s learned by example.) So if, for example, I promise him he can be excused if he has three bites, he gets excused when he has three bites — not four. I’m starting to wonder if this sets up an unrealistic expectation. Today, he wasn’t doing his rolls properly, and he’s getting far enough along that he needs to learn how to do them right, not his way. The person he was working on (lucky enough to get one on one time!) asked him to do it once more. He did it. Then the person said (apparently) “Again!”. And Grey stormed off the mat in high dudgeon and did not stop crying for about 15 minutes. It took me about 2 hours to get him calm enough to tell me what went on. And what a two hours. I had to carry him out of the dojo. He hit me. He’s getting strong and big — it hurts. I still don’t know what to do when your child hits you and you have to (for example) get out of the dojo and get home. You’d be amazed at how quickly your back-brain steps in when someone, even your own beloved child, hits you in the mouth. (For the record what I did do was pin his hands to get him in the car, not give him his DS, go straight home instead of to our usual post-aikido treat, and send him to his room for the next hour and a half or so.)

We all stumbled our way, grumpy, through the remainder of the evening. We put the boys to bed about an hour and half early, based on their completely exhausted behavior. And then, Grey started throwing up. He threw up while asleep. Now he throws up all the time, but this was something special. (I think the difference is that he usually throws up because of his gag reflex, so he has plenty of time and warning. This was not so tonight. I think this was actual nausea.)

So here I am, bedraggled and patience in rags. What should’ve been a joyful family Saturday was more of an ordeal. I don’t think I was my best self. Worse, I don’t think I discovered in any of this a lesson I could learn or trick I could apply instead next time — no silver lining or lemonade here.

Just the promise that tomorrow is another day.

One year ago

There are moments in time that are seared into your memory. For me, I can watch them as though remembering a scene in a movie. A year ago, in the middle of the night, was one such moment.

My husband’s father was sick. He’d been sick for a very long time. Shortly before we conceived Grey, his father was diagnosed with stomach cancer. They removed most of his stomach, followed by radiation treatment. Michael never fully recovered. He couldn’t, without most of his stomach, pull the nutritional value from the foods he ate. This was a great horror to him, a constant discomfort and embarrassment. For the next four years, he fluctuated between terribly sick and maybe, possibly getting better. When Grey was born, he was very, very sick. He looks older than his father-in-law in those pictures. But with courage, optimism and hope he always kept striving. We’d hear about the amazing improvement he’d made with the latest treatment attempt. My mother-in-law could rattle off the protein content of many foods, and was constantly researching and trying new supplements or foods, hoping to find the one that he could eat, that would bring him back to health and vitality.

But that week, my indomitable mother-in-law sounded frazzled, tired, and at the end of her rope. She sounded like she was going to cry. I’d never heard her sound like that before, or since. And he was very sick. Things weren’t going well, not at all. That afternoon, feeling a bit foolish, I’d bought my husband tickets to go down to see them. His Dad might not have needed him, but his Mom did.

And then, in the dark of the night, our months-old baby down the hall, the telephone rang. It took me a minute — we hadn’t had land line phones for quite a while. It did not take my husband a minute. He vaulted out of our bed as though he’d been waiting for this call all night. He stood, shivering, in the dark hallway. “Oh, Mom. I’m so sorry. Oh God.” I laid there in bed, staring at the ceiling, listening to my husband hear that his father had died.

After a while, she asked to speak to me. All she got out was “I’m so sorry” before she burst into weeping.

Two days later my husband boarded the planned flight, to be with his mother and clear out his father’s closet and make fond jokes about the man who had raised him.

That day at work, I wrote about Michael.

It’s been a year since then, and we still miss him. I thought, when I got this new job, just how proud of me he’d be. He was my father-in-law, but I started dating his son when I was 17. He was a father figure for nearly my entire adult life. My husband, as he increases his roles and extends into management, laments that he can’t call his dad for advice. My mother-in-law still sleeps with his vest and wears his old Timex watch, even though the velcro is giving.

Last night, for bedtime story, Grey and I read the story that he and Papa Flynn wrote over a year ago, about Forest Ranger Grey and the Falling Acorns. We watched the precious snatch of video that captures a moment in that writing. We looked at pictures of Papa Flynn and I told him some stories about him. Grey expressed his theme of disappointment, Papa Flynn is STILL dead?!?!?. Seriously, isn’t a year long enough to get over the whole dead thing?

Thane, my sweet Thane, oh child. He will have no memories of his grandfather who died when he was months old. We have a few pictures of Michael holding him. Mike looks like hell in all of them. But when he stops trying to eat the monitor, I’ll show him and tell him too.

Michael, you are greatly missed. You are not forgotten. We have not put you on a pedestal of perfection, instead we miss the exuberant, raunchy, crazy-smart, crazy-making man you really were.