Reflections

We are home and I feel like I have so much to share. Little things, like learning that if we take a route that is longer by both driving time and distance but which is all freeway driving we actually get home sooner because we don't get car sick and need long breaks from the car. Today we ate two fast food meals in the car. We stopped only for gas and potty visits. Also, if you snore at night your children won't be able to sleep in the hotel. This means that they will sleep in the car the next day, which makes for a more peaceful ride.

I want to write about some stuff that has just to do with my sister and my father, but I don't know that it really fits on this blog. And I am not certain exactly what I want to say. The short version is that my sister is really trying to grow up and my father is not helping.

Regarding my father's pot use: Roland is going to write him a letter telling him that we really appreciate the cottages and we hope to be able to come again, and that we need for him not to smoke pot in either of the houses. I don't know if Roland will mention that it is a problem because the caretaker, my niece and I all have asthma, or that it is a legal issue for Gary, but Roland says he will write the letter.

I am not certain about what, if anything, to say to the social worker. I want to pretend that I can put "my father smokes pot" in the same category as "my father takes out his dentures and puts them on the table when he eats oatmeal." You know, true stuff that I don't necessarily repeat. I don't really believe that they are in the same category though. She might prefer not to hear about either one, but only one is something that really affects Gary. I don't know if they will say that Gary can't go with us if we go again, even if my father does promise to keep the drug use out of the houses.

At some point I have to write about how Roland and Gary are getting close. Even though Frankie took a lot of Gary's time, it wasn't like this. This is the first time that one of the boys has bonded to Roland early. Actually, none of the boys are as close to Roland as Gary is. It is becoming fairly common for me to hear about something that is going on in Gary's life from Roland. It is cool to watch.

And I want to write about the incident at the lake. I'm not sure exactly what I want to say though. I keep thinking about how vulnerable he looked, how much like a little boy. It took me quite a while to consider that he wasn't coming back for a reason. I had no idea until he grabbed the raft that he was terrified. We were on that lake for a long time. Swimming by holding onto a flotation device and kicking is not the fastest way to move through water, even if it is relatively safe. I kept thinking that his fear was subsiding, and it kept re-surfacing. He was pretty quiet for a long time. He talked to Roland about it while I was in the shower and that seemed to help. Men (some of them) seem to have a telegraph speech. They speak very few words, but that is enough.

I feel like Gary trusts us a little bit more. He was terrified and I came to get him. He told Roland about it and Roland's reaction was calm and accepting. I think we passed a sort of test, even though I don't think that Gary was setting out to test us.