My 2 Inspriations

I had wanted to chronicle events in Jonathan's childhood for him to be able to reflect back on in some manner and after having been exposed to a friend's blog I decided to do this for a while.

When I started to set this up, I looked back at my inspiration for this digital archive, Barbara Purica. A good frien of mine, she started doing this when she moved to France and has been more involved it seems after thie birth of her adorable son, Nathan. If you want to see where I got the idea, she has some very finny stories:
http://barbarainclermont.blogspot.com/2010/11/randomness.html
She shares weekly events and I look forward to ever one that she posts.

The inspiration for the title of this high-tech version of a diary is my Grandpa by marriage who passed away last week. He was always a man who enjoyed the journey (sometimes more than the destination) and made sure that journey was everything it could be. A truly wonderful man that I feel thankful to have been privileged enough to know and whom I will miss. He lived an extraordinary 102 years on this earth and we should all be so lucky to have known love twice, traveled around the world and had so many family and friends that loved us.

For those of you who will read this regularly, please understand that they will often be entertaining, but not always and I can guarantee with an almost certainty that my grammar and spelling will be atrocious;) I am quite sure that a bulk of the blogs will revolve around crazy Jonathan stories and some will be of stupid things I have done or maybe just general ranting. But I can promise that no matter the content, each one will be inherently me and honest to a fault.

The last couple of weeks here has been a little hard with the passing if Chris's Uncle and then his Grandpa. He was away for training in Minneapolis and flew in to St. Louis for his Uncle's funeral and he was in Fargo and had to drive into St. Louis for his Grandpa's funeral. The deaths of these two men who had a great impact on his life has been harder on him (I think) than he admits.

While Chris drove in from ND, I was fortunate enough to be able to ride down with my brother & sister-in-laws with Jonathan. It was a seemingly quick trip, but with a pilot who drives 90MPH, what trip wouldn't be;) Jonathan was great and slept most of the way except when we stopped for lunch to change and feed him. We got in on Saturday night and after settling in, running an errand and eating, we finally made it to bed about 11. I was of course awake at 2 and then at 5am for feedings and then just stayed up when I put Jonathan back down at 6am.

The wake on Sunday was a bit surreal for me personally. It was the first funeral I went to since I was just a child. I kept expecting Grandpa to sit up and start talking to us. People were going up to the coffin (or is it a casket?) and paying their respects and I felt that was the proper thing to do and tried to force my feet to move in a forward manner. It was as if I was stuck in cement and my legs would not obey the wishes of my brain. I couldn't do it. I couldn't go and see a shell that was once a vital man that I loved and respected. Then I felt like I was disparaging him by not doing this. My heart was in turmoil until Chris told me it was OK not to go up-everyone says goodbye in their own way. Jonathan of course started to fuss as soon as the minister (or is it preacher?) started to make his presentation. I took him into the lobby and only went back in the parlor at the very end where I tried to go to the body. I wanted to hold his hand and tell him how wonderful he was and what he meant to me. I wanted to tell him that the kindness that was always present in his eyes made me feel more special that my own Grandpa has ever made me feel. I wanted to tell him that I didn't have enough time with even though the world had been his playground for many years. I wanted to tell him the biggest sadness that I felt was that Jonathan would never know the sweetness of his hug. So instead of holding his hand and telling him all of this, I projected my message to the heavens and hoped that he received it, that it didn't "get lost in the mail".

Since that was Halloween, we all went back to Chris's sister's house, Christy, and shared Grandpa stories, looked through his albums, and laughed as her husband scared the trick or treaters they had. After a lot of laughter and some tears, we finally all went back to our lodgings in prepartaion for the services on Monday.

I had worn a new pair of shoes (I know-stupid thing to do) and my feet were killing me, so once we got back to the room I got in the jacuzzi tub. As I was getting out of it, I of course with all the gracefulness of a ballet dancer, fell and bruised a couple ribs. It made it a little hard for hugs and for picking up the baby.

On Monday am, we all got ready and met for the last time at Grandpa's retirement village. There were so many friends and extended family, that we practically filled the ballroom. It was a lovely service, but once the eulogies started, neither Chris nor I could stop the leaking of our eyes. I was able to see Jean, a man that was part of Grandpa's breakfast club, that I like a great deal. I got his name and apartment number so I could write to him and send him pictures. Afterward, we all went to a restaurant owned by Grandpa's second wife's family and all had dinner. Jonathan was passed around of course, and everyone loved him. Memories of Grandpa were shared a few more tears shed. Chris and I were exhausted, so we said our goodbyes and went back to the room. After sleeping a few hrs., we ordered pizza and went back to bed to prepare for the following day's journey.

It took us almost 10 hrs. to get back from St. Louis, having stopped once to eat and take care of the baby. We had to stop in Findlay, OH to get my car that was at the in-laws. About 40mins out, Jonathan started crying full blast since it was about an hour past his feeding time. I had to sit backward and sideways in my seat to hold a paci in his mouth for the rest of the ride-let me just say that was even less fun than sitting so far up in the seat that I ate dash the whole ride home. It took an hour to take care of Jonathan, and then we were finally on our way home.

It was a mentally and emotionally exhausting weekend. We are all glad to be home and once again be a family.