WOULD YOU BELIEVE IT ?

     Sometimes there are issues that family's don't talk about. They are topics that are quietly left alone. Often they are things that were disagreeable and hurtful. 

     For example , when my brother and I were about 13-14 , we asked Dad if we could have a motor cycle. Dad said no. We went behind Dad's back and bought a motor cycle. Dad didn't make us sell the motor cycle but it was never talked about until dad was about 80. Then it was funny. 

    A little less than a km from my house is a heavily forested ravine. There are old growth spruce trees that are about 80 -90 ft. high. 

    Today I was talking to my daughter about a little platform I found high in a spruce tree. She said that's probably one of mine. I said, "What ? You were never out there." She told me that she spent much time climbing trees in the woods. She said, "I was a good tree climber." This was when she was about 10. My kids were free range kids so she easily could have done this. 

    What I remember most is a little kid who played endlessly with toys like blocks and Lego. She also read a lot. She also bounced. She would sit on a chesterfield and bounce back and forth for a few minutes. She would hum along with the bouncing. In the car she bounced hard enough that you could feel it when you were driving. 

    So it was surprising to hear that this quiet little girl climbed trees. 

A Little Confusion!

      For the last week or ten days I've been noticing something come up about daughter's week. Now I saw it several times so I got curious. Curious enough to look it up.

      I found many widely different pieces of information.  So what did I find?

      I had a hard time to track down daughter's week. There was information but nothing definite.

       Some sites suggest Son and Daughter day. This makes sense to me. I feel that in a family if you honor one child the other says, "Hey, what about me?"

      However there was lots of information on National daughter's day. Now the dates for national daughter's day was all over the year. One site was very specific...the fourth Sunday of September. Other's said August 11. there were dates in April May and June. It looks like whoever declares national daughter's day gets to say when the date is.

     What is National daughter's day for? Well, this makes some sense. It's to honor our daughters! So there are cards and suggested gifts for the occasion. It's starting to sound like this is commercialized.

     However, since we're on the topic, I can certainly take the opportunity to tell you that I have a great daughter. I have a great son but I'll have to leave that to National son's day.

    My daughter is a very lively energetic full of life character. She's always ready for a challenge. She's also very quick to challenge anybody else. House renovation is her passion. A do it yourselfer yet! When she lived here, Dad was her assistant. 

    Bright,  smart, ambitious. She finished two degrees and has worked in different fields. She worked in human resources for an oil company, taught high school (in French!) and now is back in human resources. She works in a group that develops programs for a large company.  She's in Australia for this week introducing training packages. Last week she was in Cleveland and next week she's back in Cleveland. Busy!

    After all that she has time to keep up talking to Dad.

    I always tell her , "She's the best daughter I could ever have." I tell my son the same thing. Keep things even!

      Now I don't need a special day to think about my daughter . I can do that all year.

A Second Shot

      In my last post I covered my son's adoption. That event was not enough to derail the plan for two children. So off we go on another adoption event.

      We discussed adoption in great detail before we took any action. We decided we wanted two children. The micro manager brought up the topic of sexes of the children. I'd never given sexes a thought. I just was ready to take whatever came along. My wife asked what I wanted. My choice was to have both children of the same sex. I didn't care if it was two boys or two girls. My wife wanted a boy and a girl. So you see whose influence carried the weight.

     We also wanted a two year space between the kids. However, that was out of our hands. We made an application that we thought might give a two year space. A home visitation was not necessary and most of the information was exactly the same. So all the paperwork is done. Now you just sit and wait.

      Oh yes, we had a very bright little two year old to consider in this application. We tried to prepare him for the arrival of a baby sister. He listened, nodded his head, but the eyes told me he didn't grasp the reality. And what two year old would understand this situation.

     Well, you'd never guess this. The Dept. phoned Dec.  22 again! Come and pick up a baby tomorrow. This time we were ready. So pack up the car with a two year old and all the stuff for a newborn and off we go the next day.

     The routine in the office was the same. We were given all the information about the new baby. A big box of toys just happened to be in the office so a two year old was completely in his own world. 

     Again they brought the baby in and left us. We wanted our son to look at the new baby which he did for about two and a half seconds.

     Immediately we had some serious questions about this little girl. Her head was twisted to one side. When the worker came back we brought this up. Was there a health problem? Was this a permanent condition. The physician who did a medical on her two days before was phoned. He said she did not have anything wrong and thought that it was as a result of her moving in and out of houses, cars and offices. 

    We were reassured and decided to take the baby.

    Off the 100 miles to home with our two kids. 

    The twisted sore neck disappeared in a couple of days. 

    With two little kids we decided to stay home for Christmas. 

    The kids birthdays were four days apart so we got as close to a two year space a we could possibly get. 

    I was happy to have a boy and a girl.

    I've always told my kids that they are the two best kids I could ever have.

    Would I do it again? Yes, I'd do it over in a heartbeat!