Lies

It’s the stories we tell ourselves, as much as anything, that define who we are. My story involves a lot of pain and very few happy endings. I’ve just realized that I’m going to lie to my daughter. Lie and lie and lie again, for the whole of my life. She will not grow up inside my story. Her’s will be one in which all things are possible and defeat will not ever be permanent.

My father’s story involved the curative powers of alcohol, and in a way it was a cure. It killed him. I edited the alcohol out of my tale but he bequeathed me the pain that made him drink. I would give Emlyn anything and everything that I have, but she inherits none of that. This is my new story and I will repeat it in the night before sleep, in the light of each new morning, beside fires in the wilderness and sitting at the kitchen table. That which I say three times might not be true, but that which I say now and always, will be.

A Fear-Full Man

Claire and Em are back at the house, hopefully napping soundly. I feel a pull from them that's hard to explain. How is it that you can spend half a lifetime trying to separate yourself from the world, to make yourself safe? Then you find yourself sitting in a food-court, separated from those you love by less than a kilometer, less than an hour, and you're all but weeping because they aren't near enough.

How does this happen, this unasked-for connection to the world? Did I carelessly leave the key where it could be found, or has time and age undercut all my carefully plumbed and trued defenses? And if so, what else is out there waiting to tiptoe in through that heart shaped hole?

It's getting full in here, I'll have to make some room.

Introducing Emlyn

Born July 28, 6 pound 7 onces and a full head of hair.

When last we left our intrepid blogger he was waiting for his wife to start having real contractions. Waiting in a wilderness of anticipation and anxiety. Unfortunately my anxiety turned out to be warranted. The baby was breach and Claire's waters broke long before she started having contractions. There was no way to turn the baby and the hospital wouldn't even consider trying to deliver breach. We ended up having to have a Caesarean delivery. And for the record, I will hunt down and put the boots to anyone who citizens that decision. It was hard enough to go through without being second guessed.

It was 20 minutes from the time they took Claire into the operating room until they let me come in. Those were some pretty long minutes. I've never consciously tried so hard to not think as I did at that time. I counted the holes on the edge of the mask I'd been given. I wondered how many fathers-to-be had sat in that seat and took a picture of the sign that said "No photography." I did everything I could to not let what was about to happen enter my mind. They were about to cut open the first person in the world for which I'd gladly sacrifice myself to stop such a thing from happening. Cut her open in order to retrieve the second person for which I felt that way.

No matter how hard it was for me, it was harder still for Claire.

Enough about that. In the end the method her birth is one tiny detail compared to the rest of her life. One she won't even remember.

As you can see, she's pretty much the most beautiful baby ever. What? You think I'm biased? Well, 5 out of her 6 grandparents agree and you can't get a more significant sample than that.

Learning how to be a father has been a challenge. My previous experience with children consisted primarily of avoidance. But I'm getting the hang of diapers and the lack of sleep.

There's been so much that's happened since last I wrote, it's hard to find a place to start.

The summer job helping people fix their bikes was the best job I've ever had. It was almost a daily occurrence where someone would thank me sincerely for my help; such is the nature of empowering people.

Right now we're in Sydney Australia. We spent almost a month in Colorado Springs in the USA while I attended Barnett's Bicycle Institute. It was a great experience, I learned a great deal including just how little I actually knew. Unfortunately I got sick in the last few days of the course, a minor cold with a sore throat. After we were done in Colorado we went to Sechelt BC (just up the coast from Vancouver) to introduce the little one to her Canadian Grandma. It was nice to be there but I spent the whole time being miserable with the cold.

We had a bunch of fun with my Australian visa and my passport. I had to send it off to Ottawa in order to get the visa. Twice. It literally came within 10 minutes of not being returned in time. The one-day service courier we'd chosen to get it back to us in Sechelt actually takes two days to get there because of the ferry connection. I called the Australian High Commission 10 minutes before it's scheduled courier pick up and changed the service. We stopped on the way to the airport in Vancouver to pick up my passport. We also stopped so I could go to the doctor. My cold had turned into a lung infection. The doctor took a look at me and said "You're not doing anything this weekend, right." It wasn't a question. I had to admit that I was actually getting on a 16-hour flight as soon as I was done there. The doctor paused, sighed and reached for his prescription pad.

But now we're in Sydney and I can sit on our balcony looking out over a banana tree and scary the parrots with my hacking cough. Ya, life's not so bad. We're here for a couple of more days then off for a drive to Wilby (good luck finding that on a map of Australia) to stay with the mother-in-law.

So much for the reportage, hopefully soon I'll have the time and energy to think about what any of all this means.

So we got married almost 2 weeks ago. Best wedding I've ever been to. Last night a 5am Claire's waters broke. We went to the hospital and they've sent us home until the real contractions start. I am not ready for this. Think good things for us. When next we speak there'll be a shiny new person in the world.

Time doesn't just fly, it rockets

So here it is, the last deep breath before the craziness. I'm sitting here alone waiting for the LUC to pick up our first Aussie wedding guest from the airport. From now till the baby's born we'll have at least one house guest staying here. It's been busy, so very busy despite quiting my full time job and taking one running a bike co-op's repair shop for 6 hours a day. I was leaving the bookstore anyway and playing with bikes for a summer sounded great. This is literally the end of my already skimpy free time.

We're just 11 days from the wedding and around 29 to the due date and 75 days from packing up the house and going to Colorado Springs for 3 weeks. I'm going to attend Barnett's school for bike mechanics there and then we're off to Australia for 8 months to stay with the new grandparents. Just looking at that last sentence makes me tired.

Anyway, I can't imagine I have any regular readers left, but if I do here's a little bone:

www.steveandclaire.net

I've made a point to be anonymous but really that's just an affectation these days. I'm self-censoring to the point that I'm not going to offend anyone in my daily life anymore. My mother reads this after all.

I'm not giving up on blogging yet. I do find great satisfaction in the whole thing, when I have the time that is. I'm sure I'm going to have plenty to say about the wedding and the birth of our child so I'll be back. Hopefully soon. Wish us well.

Oh, and to answer the most common question we get: no we don't know the sex. Really, we're hoping mostly for a human. You see, there's these three hours that the LUC is missing and all her credit cards have been demagnetized....so we're keeping our fingers crossed.

Acceptable

"....death. Mine, the LUC's and even our unnamed babe's and that is more than OK, it's perfect."

Hmmph. A pretty bold statement that. The kind of statement that's just begging for a reality suplex followed by an atomic elbow. Oh yes indeed, a great, crushing backhand to the head was dealt to me last Thursday.

There were two messages on the machine when I got home late from rehearsal. On the first my brother was audibly tense and terse, "Call me as soon as you get this." On the second he explained: my mother had fallen down that morning and broken her hip. They were going to have to do surgery.

She lives in Sechelt on the coast of British Columbia. It's an hour and a half flight to Vancouver from here, followed by a couple of hours of bus and ferry to get to her place. They'd moved her by ambulance to the Lion's Gate Hospital in North Vancouver so all I had to do was get to Vancouver.

Initially I wasn't going to go but I thought better of it. After all, I can get more money but I have only one mother. There's always a risk with surgery, sometimes people don't make it even during minor procedures. My mother's 77 and that makes it all the more risky. I really wanted to be there before they started cutting. Have I mention I'm a worrier? Yes indeedy I am.

I haven't been the best of son's. Sure, I rarely borrow money and she's never had to bail me out of jail but I've been geographically and emotionally distant. There are things I needed to say to her before the end.

I booked the 6am flight and after 2 hours sleep got a cab to the airport. The cab driver was chatty, really chatty. Who the hell wants to make small talk at 4am? From the Vancouver airport I cabbed to the Seabus and was at the hospital before 9. Take a moment to think about that. I crossed the Rockies to get there. It was maybe 5 hours total travel time, door to bedside. Can there be any doubt that we're living in a golden age? Well, a golden age of travel at least.

I stayed at the hospital until they took her into surgery, with just a short break for lunch . It was hard. She was in a lot of pain and the morphine was kicking her ass pretty badly. She was nauseous, itchy and mildly disoriented until they gave her Gravol which put her even more out of it. And thirsty. She wasn't allowed to eat or drink anything. All I could do was wet a sponge on a stick so she could wipe her gums and lips. Very hard that.

I didn't really get to say anything I needed to in those few hard hours. She was in better spirits than I as they wheeled her into the elevator to the operating room. I was trying not to cry.

There was no point in waiting at the hospital. I gathered my pack, map and hat and hiked to my brother's place. It was around a 45 minute walk and the weather was, well, appropriate for my mood. It rained hard, the clouds didn't even surrender a glimpse of the mountains let alone the sky. There was a moment where I stood, map in hand, the rain pattering against it unnoticed as I cried. I most definitely didn't feel like the possibility of my Mother's death was "perfect".

She came through the surgery fine. Apparently if you have to break a hip the way she did it is the way to go. The next day she was off the morphine and much more comfortable. They even got her on her feet for a few steps. Ah the power of a few titanium pins and deft hand with a scalpel. Sure western medicine has it's problems but there's nothing better for fixing broken bones.

We talked. Just a conversation glancing across the regrets I have as a son and she has as a mother. It was enough. You see, I'm just as comfortable with the fact my Mother is going to die* as I am with the mortality of everyone in my life. Or at least I am on a sunny day with more than 3 hours of sleep under my belt. What's not acceptable is any of those people going to the grave without knowing that I love them.


*Not anytime soon Mum! You have another grandchild to meet.